Tigger

Deleted, it's pointless now

Last....hang on , it was sunday last week not saturday , the river was a couple of feet up and I had to don my chesties in order to get out to the area i'm usually able to reach in my thigh waders. I'd forotton how much of a hasstle it is when you want a slash and your wearing chest waders! The water felt cold and to be honest I wasn't expecting much, so I was surprised to hook something solid after only a few trotts through. I won't harp on about how I got a piece of wood shaving in my eye after cattying out the first pouch of maggots, or how I had to walk back to the car and try to swill my eye out with half a small bottle of water that had been in the car since june!, or the rain, the downstream wind,etc etc. Anyhow, within a couple of hours (that includes the time it took to walk back to the car etc, oh, and re-tie my hook after it hooked a large twig on one of my fist casts) I did ok and had six barbel and some xxl dace as a by product, several pic's from the session....

I've fished for the last two saturdays in a row, week before last I caught five small barbel and some chub... .

I have no idea how i've never seen this thread, i'm shocked! So sorry to hear this, I really liked Dave, a true character and gentleman R.I.P. Dave.

I had several hours trotting for barbel yesterday, but not a sniff of a barbel! Maybe the sudden overnight frosts and with the river only just dropping down after being in flood had put the dampers on me catching a barbel. Anyhow, I did catch 5 decent chub of about 3 1/2 to 4lb , several roach of around a pound, small roach, dace and chublets....no barbel though! Had another couple of hours after chub today. There was a horrible strong downstream wind but the temps were up from 9 degrees yesterday to 14 degrees today. I did ok today and had quite a few chub, no monsters, but all of them were around 2 1/2 to 4lb and really fought hard. A couple of pictures from the day....

Too posh for them down your end .

Have you still got your huge collection of reels Chesters? Was it intrepid reels ?

I had to abort my trotting for barbel today due to conditions of the river, but rather than miss out on a days fishing I visited another venue and targeted chub instead. These chub fight really hard and are difficult to stop from getting into the bankside vegetation. Because of this I used a hardy marksman supero 11ft avon rod and it was perfect for the job. Here's a couple of pic's from some of the swims I dropped into....

I've always found those placcy bits whatever colour they were or direction the line went through, they come appart, sometimes very quickly! When they do split the swivel is still useable as they only cover the other swivel eye. I actually prefer to use them without those placcy covers. I would only buy the ones without those placcy covers now.

I managed to get a couple of hours trotting on saturday afternoon (just gone). The river was a little up on my previous session and had a colour of peat to it. I think the peat colour comes in from one of the tributaries a few miles upstream, thankfully it wasn't that horrible brown sawdust looking mess which is obviously particles of sewage! I only fished two swims that day, in the first swim if I fished more central in the river I would get a bite a cast, either a dace or roach, if I cast closer to the opposite bank I would normally have a much better chance of catching chub and barbel. Anyhow, I caught lots of roach and dace, but not a hint of a chub or barbel which were my target species so I moved downstream to another swim. I had to wade out about 45 yards across seriously slippy rocks and then cast about another 30yds to reach the sweet spot of this swim, which was close to the opposite bank and was quite fast in comparison to the swim i'd just fished previously. I had a decent chub first trott through, maybe about 3 pounds, then I had a number of chublets and a few dace. After about half an hour I struck into a more solid critter which turned out to be a small barble of about 3lb. Shortly after that I had another barbel which was about the same size as the forst one. I remembered I had no food left in the freezer for my Manueli piranha and decided to catch a few small roach and dace to take home for it. I really don't like doing it but the piranha has to eat. What was unusual was when I gutted the dace they were full of roe ! Possibly this warm spell has kicked them off but I do think they will have been spawning throughout the summer. If conditions are right I don't see why they wouldn't just keep breeding, as fish do in aquariums. I didn't bother taking any pic's, it was a long wade back to the bank on those awfully slippy rocks and for such small fish it wasn't worth the trouble.

I have to try and catch a fish when I go fishing. I often spend more time walking and crashing through undergrowth than I do fishing. I never have a relaxing fishing session!

Fishing a fishless river can't be much fun Chesters, you'll have to travel a bit further maybe? Is there no other rivers than that one within a decent radius of you?

I spent yesterday trying to hunt down a stunted trout, I couldn't find one! I must have walked about 6 miles yesterday, through long grass and nettles, balsam, stick bob bushes etc etc and was propper nackered at the end of it. I visited two stretches catching fish on both, first tott on the first length and I had a roach that I reckon (without weighing it) would be a good 2lb, then another exactly the same! After that I had a few decent chub, chublets and dace, and a single small barbel. You wouldn't believe it, on the next length I had another of those roach, virtualy identicle, they must have followed me . I also had a good few decent chub, chublets and lots of dace with a few being quite large, as far as dace go. Not a hint of a barbel on the second stretch, strange as it used to be lifting with barbel on that stretch. Only a few years back I had 43 barbel, some large chub, chublets, dace, and trout on one swim, and yesterday not one barbel and only a couple of decent chub and some dace, quite depressing to be honest.

I think you might be as well asking on the traditional angling forum, they are obsessed with cane rods and fancy dress! I do think they will be able to help you out on info about your rod.

I fished on sunday, target species was chub, mission accomplished.... I had a dabble on the river today...30 degrees and blazing sun! Luckily for me I know of a spot that's shaded by a huge steep banking covered in large trees. Anyhow, I fished the swim from 1.30pm to 3.30pm theis afternoon, packing up just before the sun came round and fried me! I was lucky and had a good few dace, chublets, a few decent chub and 6 or 7 barbel, I lost count . The barbel weren't big, but a barbel is a barbel and they all fought hard for their size....