My friend Graeme and I started to get stuck into the Barbel on our club stretch of the Ribble in the Autumn, we mostly fished short evening sessions midweek and spent the first few exploring the stretch trying to find likely fish holding areas. We identified one particular swim that looked promising, from up the bank you could see a sandstone ledge about half way across with a pronounced crease on the surface, this effectively channelled the flow through the inside of the swim. One of the reasons I fancied this swim was because it had a nice long glide down the inside so looked perfect for a bit of trotting. Below is a summary of a couple of the better sessions.

27th September 2011

We started around 6:30pm and Graeme (AKA Jammy Sod) was into the first barb 15 minutes later and at 7:15pm was into his second which went off like freight train taking him right across to the far side before I slipped the net under a magnificent fish which gave him a new PB at 9lb 2oz.

I immediately packed away the trotting gear!

We then had a mad couple of hours in which time we netted a further 6 fish between us all around the 6 to 7lb mark.

At one point we even had a double hook up which ended up in a knit one perl one situation and a broken rod tip for me

End result was Graeme 5 (including a new PB) Rob 3.

3rd October 2011

We headed off again for the Ribble and a Monday evening session. This time the conditions were a little harder with low water and a strong wind pushing upstream making the swim quite choppy.

However we did still manage to get amongst the fish, the best one again falling to Jammy Sod at 8lb 11.

Final score 3 all!

Pretty much all the Barbel fell to standard feeder tactics with hair rigged pellet.

All in all a very enjoyable campaign with some nice fish from the swim we found off our own backs with a bit of good old fashioned watercraft!

I did manage one more visit at the end of October and had high hopes after some heavy rain, unfortunately though the floodwater was freezing cold and pretty much killed the Barbel fishing. Also the swim is definitely one for low water as I couldn't hold bottom with five ounces of lead strapped to my feeder! I ended up moving downstream and spent most of the day trotting which resulted in a PB Dace, not huge and I don't know what it weighed but it's certainly my biggest