Is there any barbel fishing in north Lancashire, County Durham or north Yorkshire? I live in Cumbria where we have no barbel and I would really like to catch one. I need somewhere not much more than 1½-2 hours drive so that I can fish it as a day trip.

Try the ribble.
Also not river fishing but good.woodlands lakes at thirsk! ive caught barbel there up to 4lb!

Try the stretch behind The Tickled Trout Hotel at
Preston(Junction 31 M6) for a start Mike. You can
get a day ticket at the filling station by the
hotel. If you need any more info,drop me a PM.

The Wear in Durham holds Barbel to good size.
The Northern Yorkshire Rivers, Ure,& Swale in particular hold some very good barbel.
To get to Woodlands, you have to drive over several good rivers that hold bigger and better Barbel, and for a lot less money.
But for access I would agree the Ribble near Preston would probably be your best bet. Straight down the M6 and not more than 5 minutes to the fishery once you get off.
BOF

I did hear that barbel were in the Eden,(Carlisle) but that was some time ago.
Big fish in the Wear but not much day ticket fishing, although you could do worse than join DCAC which gives access to miles of water not normally coarse fished. Home-page Also,3lb+ grayling, big sea trout and salmon for the same price

wearyone knows the wear as well as anyone (other than perhaps NigelIT who rarely posts here), the main difficulty on the wear is locating the fish,

There are some free stretches which also contain barbel but you may find yourself competing with Peduncles after the salmon without a rod licence, which can get a bit scary.

(PS Hi wearyone, there are a lot of anglers on here who'd been interested in raffled rights as keith suggested, Alan Roe would kill to fish some of those stretches)

Thanks to everyone for the info.

Monkeyboy and Cartman, yes I think I'll try the Ribble as its only a 1 hour blast down the M6 for me. Is it tidal at Preston?

Wearyone, I fish the Eden 'all the time' - a couple of times a week right through the year for salmon, trout, grayling and chub (no dace anymore). There have been rumours of barbel for years but I don't know of anyone who has caught one. There was a massive fish kill downstream of Appleby a few years ago when some chemicals got in the river. Every fish was killed over 10 - 15 miles of the river but there were no barbel (no pike or perch either - also widely rumoured).

You won't be troubled with the tide untill you
get further down stream and into Preston itself.
It doesn't have much,if any effect at the back of
the hotel.

mikeclough
I take it then that the beck which enters the Eden at Rickerby Park has no dace either.
Used to have some great days there 20 odd years ago.
Phil, I think Nigel was wearing short pants when some of the barbel were first intoduced to the Wear.

[ 24. June 2004, 10:44 PM: Message edited by: wearyone ]