Sessions.

 

 I have been out on the banks for a couple trips, two on the Blackwater, another Bristol Avon venture and a local trip to the 'Small River" for some fun and much needed bends in the rod as my challenge this season is proving to be quite lean on the runs front.

 The first of the two Blackwater trips yielded a fish in the shape of a nice Chub weighing 5lb 7oz which was pleasing, just not a swashbuckling double figure Barbel...

 The second trip resulted in a blank which is more like the Blackwater I know :) 

 Last Sunday I headed back onto the Bristol Avon in the full knowledge that the river was in full flood and still rising upstream, my spidey-senses were tingling and had to get over there, 150 miles of tarmac were left in my wake before realising I'd left my net at home....C*CK!. So I had to do the responsible thing and wait for the local tackle shop to open and buy myself a net that I already have two of at home...only the second time I've done that, the first being a blank session on the Itchen where I decided that if by some minor miracle I was to catch I was prepared to get with it! 

 This time around I wasn't going to undertake such tomfoolery, the river was angry and the amount of debris coming down even in the slacks made fishing difficult but I wasn't going to give in and continued fishing in the spots I felt a Barbel may be lying up and waiting for a bit of food to fall in front of it. So another blank.

 Then a couple weeks back my van was "due" for a service, the bastard is brand new with delivery mileage only yet after just 7500 miles one was needed. So I put it in and what do you know, it's on the banks of my playground, so I met up with Dad for some Barbel bashing to which we did bash out loads of Barbel, nothing massive but all good fun given the slim pickings this season has thrown up so far. I can only hope the remaining four months are a stark reminder of how good it can be.

Dad's best at 6.05

R.Blackwater Returns.

 

 Hmmmmmmm......the Blackwater is fast becoming a drain on my brain, god it's been a slog and not sure when its going to offer up that big chest of treasure, hours of moving, feeding (little bits here "n" there and putting a decent bit in when I know I'm coming back within a couple of days) and nothing seems to be working. I know the odd Barbel is still coming off the river but its so infrequent.

 Sunday lunchtime I got back down for another go and did my usual of moving around, 45mins in each spot with just a small PVA bag of six boilies each time, any touches I stay put, unfortunately I am not even getting that, six swims later and 35mins in whilst doing an update on my season so far on the challenge my rod FINALLY zipped off, on it in a flash I was bent into what was certainly a Barbel and it felt great, not a monster but great to have a fish on the other end. 

 A few minutes later a lovely dark BW Barbel was in the net. 7lb exactly on the scales it was a sight for sore eyes, unsurprisingly it was the only bite but my first Barbel off this particular stretch, boy its been hard and on Tuesday I went back down again in less than ideal conditions but still opted to try, but nothing.

 I will of course, like night follows day, I'll be back for another twenty four attempts.....

Hauling.

 

 Last Saturday with the conditions holding up well enough to sneak back out for Barbel I made the effort to go and that turned out to be a good decision, another long drive to Somerset was in order as I revisited the Bristol Avon and really try to make good of the successes of recent trips.

 It was wet, squalid, muddy and quite frankly everything I love about fishing in the autumn, gusts of wind dislodging tonnes of leaves, all I needed was some action. This time around I changed it all up, I decided to move around, single rod on the pin and an isotope on the tip which was keenly watched all night from 6pm when I started all the way through to 6am before heading off home. 

 The clouds broke up around 8pm giving way to lovely dark skies filled with stars, the occasional shooting star and silhouettes of Tawny Owls darting between trees above, but it wasn't just the natural world providing a spectacle, the Barbel put on a show too! The first two hours were quiet but by 2030 things began to happen and my rod slammed around with what would turn out to be the first fish of the night, a nice porky 6lb 10oz fish which was a new best for the river.

 I was really pleased with that fish, a big chunk of dynamite baits "source" meat on a hair fished with a lead just heavy enough to hold bottom which when leaves and other debris would cling to the line would gently dislodge the lead allowing the bait to creep across the bottom in an arc to settle finally beneath a fallen willow in a gravel channel, once that fish was released I just copied the same approach, bait went out in exactly the same position and an hour n half later off it went again!

 It was turning out to be good night! Another 6+ came along, which was followed by 5+ and a small one of around 2lb!  

 Toward midnight I got another good bite and Barbel number 5 was on and felt a lot better than the others that I had previously done battle with and in the torch light it looked like it was a much better fish, could it be a double? It looked like it could be. I started to get a little nervous as it crept into the net because it looked like it was but my nervousness soon gave way to disappointment (to an extent), she settled on 9lb 6oz, a new best for the B.Avon, it lacked length but was really thick across the back and deep, just quite a short fish, but five Barbel off the B.Avon in a night! It was one hell of a night. Or so I thought, as I had the "9" resting up I recast and before I could put the rod down it went again with the centrepin screaming off with a fish that was in the 5lb bracket, crazy! 

Best of six fish overnight.

A 9+ & 5+ brace shot.

 

 Amazing evenings fishing especially for this river which has had a well documented fall from grace in terms of barbel fishing, I certainly found a honey hole as it were, but it was missing one thing....

Back to the Brizzy Avon.

 

 With cooler weather on the way I thought I would try and sneak in a 24hr trip after work on Thursday as I was a day ahead on my work schedule which opened up my Friday, with the trip planned unfortunately it coincided with a very cold night which was very uncomfortable with so little cover. 

 A trip of mud, rain and cold it wasn't pleasant but I was rewarded with a 6lb 4oz Avon Barbel within 40mins of arriving which was the only excitement. A nice fish but 4lb off the target, I will have to revisit soon, I want to get this river chalked off by Christmas. 

A Fitting Finale.

 

 Now, after that difficult spell on the R.Aire and those two Barbel off the R.Wharfe myself and Dad opted to stop by somewhere that given my limited knowledge I felt we would have more success. 

 After a short 40mile drive due south we arrived at our destination, the diminutive R.Idle, this was my second visit to this gem, it was to be my Dad' first and we made a beeline for an area I had done well on on my last trip. As we made our way downstream we saw ample Chub and Pike, but no Barbel which was odd, but when we did get to the peg where I had five to 10lb 3ozs we did see 11 Barbel sat just downstream and it wasn't long before they started to commit to small pellets, but knew that these fish would take a while to get confident enough to push on upstream towards us to be presented a hook bait.

 Over 3hrs we tried to get the fish further upstream to us and knew casting to them would push them away and after three hours we thought what have we got to lose as no fish committed, I cast down towards the fish and they immediately backed off for deeper cover, they did exactly what I thought they would, so we begrudgingly packed up and moved back on upstream. 

 As we made our way up I found Barbel in a couple locations and even though they were feeding they were very skittish and it wasn't until about 5hrs into the trip I finally got two fish feeding, one around 8lb the other a double figure fish from what I could tell, a big broad fish with good length. The bigger of the two fish continued to visit the sandy/gravel crease in front of me more than the slightly smaller fish, the time it took to get her really confident was too long for Dad as he opted to head back towards the car to rest his back, sitting down wasn't an option.

 Ten minutes later, you guessed it, she picked up the double 8mm pellet rig and shot off down stream leaving a trail sediment in her wake, it was a typically rip-roaring battle as I've come to expect, but amazingly when she finally gave up it looked bigger than the biggest at 10.6 that I had last month and the scales didn't disappoint, 10lb 10ozs - bloody awesome....the river record is only 11lb 5ozs, this fish could possibly do that come March if it packs some winter weight on. What a stunning specimen too, wowzer.

Everything a Barbel should be.

 Well there was no way I could top that fish, but I really wanted Dad to get one for his efforts, so I left that run and headed on back up to the car to persuade him to get back out on the bank. On the way up I did find another shoal of Barbel hanging just off a sand patch and my inability to ignore a Barbel kicked in, I rang Dad to let him know I was coming up to the car but not before I fed that shoal for half an hour, cast out, first cast bang on the money, 5 mins later the rod hooped round as I watched a decent Barbel puff out some sediment through its gills and shake its head to rid the hook...no no no, play nice now Mrs Barbel! 

 9lb 11oz:) not bloody bad at all, I love this kind of angling, LOCATION LOCATION LOCATION! The three most important words in Barbel fishing. 

 After releasing her I marched onward to the car and dragged Dad' arse back to the river and subsequently went on to have three takes, losing one and landing two of...

7lb 6oz

6lb 15oz

A mint little for me towards the end.

 A fitting end to a great trip!

Wharfe and Aire Returns.

 

 After a few weeks of planning and sorting out a couple tickets the time had come last Wednesday to get set, this time around though my Dad decided he wanted to come and I thought it would be good for him to get out for a few days. After I finished work I swung by my parents gaff and picked Dad up and drove to mine where we loaded the car and had dinner before setting off for the Wharfe with an arrival time of around midnight (228 miles - 4hrs 22mins).

 Mercifully the roads were clear the whole way barring a 5-minute rolling road block for a highways officer to reset an SOS phone by the looks of it as we were 3 cars from the front...hows your luck.

 Anyway, we arrived half hour ahead of schedule and very quickly I had my two rods out with a load of small pellet lumped out, problem was we are currently having spring tides on the full moon and the part of the river I was fishing is fully tidal but only a few miles from the end of the tidal range, on neap tides the affects aren't felt up here but we gained 3-4ft upon the incoming tide which wasn't comfortable and made everything super muddy.

That said, within 30mins I was away, a rip roaring take as the tide reached the top, the battle was incredible in the deep water (at the time around 13-14ft), the runs were powerful and I felt this fish could be what I had come for and when she finally gave up I really did think it was a comfortable double such was the length of the fish, so when I got her on the scales I was expecting it to be 10lb something, but NO!

 Amazingly she settled on 9lbs 6oz and yes, it beat my Wharfe best by one ounce, but I honestly thought and built up in my mind that she was my 31st river done, alas it wasn't the case. All said and done for the Wharfe a 9.06 Barbel is still a very big fish and doubles aren't common but with my quest nothing less will do in the cold light of day.

 Anyway, after that initial excitement I had to wait three hours for another bite, similar to the first it fought very well but knew fairly quickly it wasn't as big and at 7lb 5oz it proved so, after such a good start I had visions of a mental session and playing the numbers game my chances of a big one would be better, but inexplicably the next 12hrs drifted by without a touch! Just plenty of chatter with Dad about all and sundry, 2pm on Thursday we called time on the Wharfe and headed to the Aire where we hopped between sections of water (free waters) where we failed to register a bite but a lot of the good areas were taken by anglers who looked like they were camped out for ages with the view of catching plenty.

Mid 7.

 After calling time on the Aire we set about just getting Dad a fish or two on the Friday, so we drove to our destination and set up camp with the view to starting the next morning.

Bristol Avon, Off the Mark.

 

 As usual fishing has been hard going and I thought about going somewhere else as I needed to break up the blanks on the Blackwater that are starting to get on my wick, I am fishing well I just don't think there are many Barbel in there (to some that may come across as making excuses but I would have expected something by now).

 Anyway, I headed off to the Bristol Avon in search of a double figure Barbel. I had a two-day project in central London penned in for Wednesday & Thursday and managed to get done inside one day which opened up a nice day to go fishing on the Thursday, 4am I was up and loading the car with a 144 mile journey ahead. The excitement was growing with every mile chalked off.

 Once I arrived I had a good look around and it was clear where people were fishing as empty tins, line and litter was dotted around in bushes and long grass which is never a good thing to see ( binned as much as I could when I finished up ), I began rolling meat for the first hours so I can try and get accustomed with what was out in front of me and hope that a barbel could be picked up as I rolled under and past a fair few rafts of debris but those efforts weren't rewarded at all.

 After lunch I opted to move between a couple of spots on the static meat approach, so little activity had me wondering whether that was actually going to be a better option, a few more hours passed with nothing more than a plucky Dace or two, as the sun began to drop I got a decent wrap around on the tip and sure enough my first Bristol Avon Barbel was cutting through the flow of the weir and straight to me, not a big fish from what I could see at distance but they can be deceptive at times, this time around it turned out that my first BA Barbel wasn't going to be a double as it shrank as it got closer but one all the same!  

A little over 5lb, it's a start.

 Soon after the release and the rod went back out it was pounding away again, this time with a Chub in tow and this continued for another half an hour as successive Chub came to the net, none of any real size, one of them maybe reaching 4lb but given the flurry of activity I was keen to make the most of it and as if a light was flicked off it went dead before pitch black and up to midnight it was dead. That spelt the end for me, I packed down and had a good kip in the car for a freshen up for a morning assault at 7am.

 4c overnight was a shock to the system and it was no warmer when I got fishing with a distinct chill of winter in the air, we are only in September! I began rolling meat again and covered similar areas from the day before and although once again I was fishing well but with no returns.

 As midday came along I had a decision to make and with the area I was fishing was getting busier I couldn't move around like I did on Thursday so I opted to jump in the car and head to the Blackwater which is about half way between Bath and home, 4 hrs were spent flitting between swims with nothing once again to show for my efforts, but one day my speculating will be rewarded, I went home for a nice hot shower, visit the throne and warm bed with the Mrs.

Struggling....

 

 Since my visit to the Yorkshire Rother and Idle my 40 Rivers Challenge fishing time has been met with hours of motionless tips and the blanks are beginning to rack up again. For a moment back in late August I thought I had turned a corner and things were going to get better, however the Blackwater chiefly has been a major thorn in my side and I've really struggled to engineer bites, the Barbel seem to be on holibobs somewhere because they aren't where I'm fishing.

 That said my visit to the R.Teme the day after my R.Wye jolly up ended up a Chub fest with 13 coming to the net, all on the 8mm robin reds with nothing over the 4lbs, plenty of action and walking done but not one Barbel seen and the same can be said about the Blackwater until last night when I decided to go lamping and somehow managed to briefly spot a Barbel about 6/7lbs on a gravel shallow, but my god there seems to be so few fish around! 

 So when I've got a bit of time I'm going to go back for that and yes, I know it's not the target fish but a Barbel off there this season would be a sight for sore eyes, they've been extremely elusive and theres nothing I have been able to do about it. 

 9 trips to the BW equating to 76hrs of angling in sunshine and rain!

 I have just got to keep trying and moving around stretches to inevitably I WILL catch my target fish!  

This is full winter flood is one hell of a beast,
fishing here you feel so small!

Comfortable!

Nom Nom 

R.Wye Revisited.

 

 On Thursday I had a day booked on the Wye with a couple of friends who wanted to catch a Barbel, both chaps are very good anglers on the fly front but do love to dabble in coarse fishing too when the opportunity presents itself. I left home a lot earlier on as I wanted to get some fishing of my own done but I had no real plans, just fish and catch what came along, for once I visited a river with no pressure to deliver a double figure Barbel for my 40 rivers challenge.

 I left home at 0430 as its a straight 3hr drive to the location and as I was crossing the Prince of Wales bridge I started to get all excited as to what the day would throw up, even at 37 I still get that warm feeling of excitement when on my way for a session regardless of the target. Thirty minutes later I arrived at the river and even after all the rain that has fallen across the country the river was as low as I've seen and I know this was only my 11th trip to the river but that was backed up by anglers who have far more knowledge of the river than myself.

 That said I didn't hesitate to get setup and opted to begin at the very end of the beat and slowly work my way upstream. With the very low water my suspicion was that if I found deep water I would find fish. 

 First of all I began with 10 medium sized bait droppers of 4mm and 8mm pellets, fed on a single line just off the main flow which dropped into around 8ft of water from 4ft just above, the thought process was the Barbel and Chub were further downstream and wanted to draw them up to where I was presenting my hookbait which was my usual Wye approach after having limited success on large baits found after around 4 trips that small baits ruled and they were picked up readily by Barbel, so 2x 8mm robin red pellets were put on a 12'' hoolink with small hair and a light lead, just enough to hold bottom.

 To be fair once I had begun feeding I opted to not fish for a while to allow any fish following the scent to get acquainted and feed confidently, after half an hour of sitting on my hands I got my first cast in. I did think I would get fish straight away but oddly I didn't, a good half an hour passed before I got a proper indication and this was a gentle pull round on my tip, it was so gentle the centre-pin let off just a couple slow ticks before I lifted up the rod. Once I was playing the fish I could tell straight away it was a Barbel and a good one too, having caught many good Barbel over the years you can tell when you have a decent one on the end and this fish just held low, powered its way upstream twice some 40 yards each time before turning it a final time to guide it slowly into the net, that was a great fight! 

 To achieve what I wanted to on the Wye I embarked on 10 trips and 168hrs of angling, over 3000 miles of driving, out in all sorts of shite weather only fit for ducks and eskimos, roll on 11 months I come over for a jolly up as it were and land a pearler that on the scales settled on 10lb 4ozs! Angling is a funny game isn't it. 

 A Wye double figure Barbel and yes, I have had one but this one three ounces larger will be inducted into the 40rivers challenge hall of fame! and with a backdrop like that its one of my best ever self takes, shame the flash had to be used but the hill blocked out the sun near me and actually kept forcing the flash to engage and without it the images were really poor, so be it!

 Once I had released that stunner I carried on fishing and kept little droppers on pellet going out but amazingly the following two hours were totally quiet, barely a tap and when I did it was silk weed building up on the line and dragging my lite link ledger out of position. 

 By 1130 my friends turned up after being caught in poor motorway traffic and when they arrived we got to tackling up and then search around for some areas to get them fishing, their desire was to catch a Barbel but given what I had experienced the previous 4hrs besides that corker which would make any session a blazing success I thought it was going to be hard going. 

 And so it proved....the first 4 hrs we spent roving around before I offered them the option of fishing one of the beaches which ordinarily would be underwater by around a foot but we could get right down and showed them both where they needed to be fishing and I got a good bed of bait out at the top of the run that Mike and John were both going to fish, around 10 yards apart.

 Once they got comfortable and fishing I went looking elsewhere for a plan B, C and D if that run didn't produce like the previous 3 swims. 4pm passed without a touch and 5pm slowly approached when out of nowhere I had another bite! 8hrs of a bit of fishing and guiding I was in to my second fish of the day once again a Barbel, this one behaved fairly similarly to the first and yet another good solid battle was enjoyed, yes this one would turn out to be just shy of 9lbs but the colours are something I've not seen on a Wye Barbel so it was a pleasure to see!

8lb 13oz Wye beauty.

 Shortly after I had this fish Brian turned up so I went to go let him in and on the way down dropped in on Mike and John to learn Mike had had a 3lb and 10lb Barbel! that made my day massively, unfortunately John hadn't managed a Barbel and for all our endeavour that was how it all ended but it was a brilliant day, the weather wasn't great after 11am with persistent rain and the odd snippet of sunshine felt right as thats all I ever endured on the Wye anyway. 

Back to the Blackwater.

  Leading on from that incredible trip up north and following through with my plan to finish at 3pm on the Idle I decided to drive back down to the R.Blackwater for further punishment, that big Blackwater barbel has to come along at some point, just two bites in 6 trips totally 55hrs!. 

 Given the circumstances that preceded this visit I felt confident of finally catching a Barbel, so I set about roving the river with bits of meat and bread in every likely space where a Barbel might be. Having left Nottinghamshire at 5pm ( a couple hours after I originally billed after being drawn in by the lure of another good Barbel to which I did achieve ) I parked up in my usual spot on the BW and got wandering.

Purple Loosestrife, the riverbank is 
not complete without it in summer.

 A couple of hours passed without incident and as dusk came and went I had a gentle pull round on the tip which I hit into and amazingly it was a fish, my suspicion was crayfish but thankfully it fought back but I knew it wasn't a Barbel and soon enough a decent sized Bream surfaced in the torchlight, at least it was a fish. 

 But the crayfish were clearly down there chewing my Source "hard-hooker" boilee, damn things I can't wait until we find a way to eradicate them entirely. But this was another that I crushed under my trainer earlier in the day, think I'm on 6 now that have been squished, another dozen have dropped off.

Horrid things.

 Unfortunately after that Bream I didn't have another bite and around 1am I called time on my epic 514 mile journey, four rivers visited, three rivers fished, three doubles caught across two rivers and no joy on one river. It was a brilliant 44hrs on the road!. That really was an epic.