Warwickshire Avon Detour.

 The last couple of weeks I've been planning a trip with Jeff Hatt, the author of Idlers Quest, in search of anything swimming but my main targets were the Barbel and Zander in the evening.

 After a somewhat turbulent journey up from south London on Monday I finally made it up to Coventry where we had agreed to meet, the weather wasn't ideal for certain species but made it a pleasant day for fishing for us both, bathing in mid 20 degree weather is always good for topping up the tan.

 We both walked the first beat whilst looking for potential spots to fish and I was almost spoiled for choice as just about every swim looked like it would hold everything possible and especially Barbel, Jeff's quarry was mainly the Roach but they proved difficult and very elusive and the same went for me as well, as I rolled meat for quite prolonged spells with only one small enquiry, we stuck at it for a couple of hours until we decided to move down to Stratford-Upon-Avon but before we did that Jeff did manage to pick up a Roach of about 5oz, not large but a start.

Rolling unfortunately didn't offer any luck.

 

Jeff diligently watching for a Roach bite.

 

The perfect rolling territory, just a shame nothing played ball.

 

 After a walk back down to the river we ended up at Lucy's mill, where Jeff and I targeted the Roach and as evening drew nearer I'd put out a Zander bait hoping to catch one, with my PB being under 2 1/2lbs it wouldn't take much to beat it, we both started to get bites and it wasn't long before the Roach showed with a couple for Jeff and I, with also a Roach-Bream hybrid appearing too, as the evening wore on I found a shoal of feeding Roach and managed 7 in the end to around 10ozs, with my hosts rods remaining very quiet, unusually.

Mr Hatt's Redfin.

 

My biggest Roach at around 9-10ozs.

 From what seems to have been a hard day on the Warks Avon, it certainly was a nice trip out, no Barbel this time but it happens and fishing could have been so different on another day, who knows.