River Great Ouse - St Neots

[Pond Plopper]

I'll be off for a weeks caravanning and fishing in September at St Neots right on the rivers egde, how cool :cool: is that...

 

Any tips on best baits and methods to use, as I need to streamline my gear down to get it in the car + wife and inlaws :confused: .

[ricey]

i would go for a roving approach. search out the chub and barbel.

avon rod + reel

landing net/mat

scales + camera

 

for chub you cant go wrong with bread. september is usually still nice and warm, so floating bread crust is a good bet. failing that squeeze a large flake on a link ledger rig.

 

try chunks of luncheon meat for barbel.

[chevin]

Are there barbel in the St Neots area these days? I caught them at Hemmingford Grey in the early '60s but they didn't appear to be moving up stream. There had been reports of barbel being "hooked" in the weir pool at St. Neots but I never heard of one being caught there and I often thought that eels were responsible for those hook ups. However, there were a number of people moving fish all over the place in the '60s, so it is more than likely that some Thames or Kennet barbel finished up there!

 

Is the Paper Mill weir pool still fishable? I used to catch a lot of good chub in that pool. One of the easiest chub swims I have ever fished. At one time I would bet money that I could have a good chub out of it on my first cast! I used to love fishing there. The weir pool at Eton Socon was good too, with good carp up by the power station.

[ricey]

never fished the Great Ouse myself, but looking at a map, St. Neots looks like its pretty close (downstream) to the point where the Ivel meets the Ouse. I would have thought that barble would around there somewhere

 

try looking here http://www.stneotsangling.org/

[ricey]

hmm after a bit of reading, it looks like its mostly bream/carp/roach territory.

Pike and Perch and the odd chub can be had too though.

 

good luck

[Pond Plopper]

Guy's

 

Thanks for the additional info, you've all just wet my appetite some more.

 

Cheers...

[chevin]

ricey:

hmm after a bit of reading, it looks like its mostly bream/carp/roach territory.

Pike and Perch and the odd chub can be had too though.

 

good luck

Things may well have changed since I last fished the area, but what you have seen doesn't appear to be particularly accurate. There were lots of chub in the St. Neots area and it was for them I used to visit St, Neots. There is a power station at Eton Socon and that is where the carp were, but of course they could have spread. Yes, St. Neots is just down stream of where the Ivel joins it at Blunham, but as I remember, the Ivel held no barbel. I think that it was in the late '50s Dick walker caught a couple of barbel in the weir pool at Offord but I don't think there were any more caught from that area of the Ouse until I caught them at Hemmingford Grey in the early '60s. By catching them there on several occasions I felt that I establised the fact that there was a thriving community of them in that pool. I heard several people claim to have hooked barbel in the main weir pool at St. Neots but their claims were based on the fact that they hooked fish they couldn't move off the bottom. I have never had that problem with barbel, but I most certainly have with eels and there used to be large numbers of them in both that weir pool and the Paper Mill weir pool.

 

I used to like to hire a boat from St. Neots, row up to the pool at Eton Socon and then drift down fishing for the chub under the over hanging trees. I never caught any large chub there but there were plenty in the 3 - 4lb class. The bream areas were largely in the areas above and below the main weir pool though there were still plenty of nice chub below both weir pools. Lots of bleak in the area though so small baits were generally ruled out by them. Not that I ever wanted to use small baits the fish I was after were generally quite happy to accept a generous offering.

[Lid]

If you freeline slugs on a size 4 hook, I believe you will get a significantly better result with chub and maybe some bonus perch too. I find the perch tend to take get hooked m ore easily on smaller slugs though.

[chevin]

Yes, black slugs are a good bait for chub, but in the stretches I have mentioned I found Velveeta cheese to be about the best bait of all. If I couldn't get Velveeta then I would grate some cheddar cheese and make a soft paste out of it by mixing it with bread. For perch just about anywhere on the Ouse I preferred an Ondex No4 to just about any bait though minnows were also very good and a bleak would frequently bring about the downfall of a good sized perch.

[DonRemus]

Hello folks, nice to see St Neots is on the map. This is my first post here. I actually run the local club website mentioned in this thread http://www.stneotsangling.org.

 

Pond Plopper - when you come to the St Neots campsite try Pocket Park Marina which is an offcut of the Gt Ouse just behind the camping site. It is our best venue currently and I have recently had roach/bream bags of 14lbs 10oz, 30lbs, 26lbs and 23lbs 8oz including single bream of 8lbs and 6lbs 8oz. The venue has colour while the river is very clear. Here are some links to recent catches by myself and Johnny, another member:-

 

http://www.stneotsangling.org/gallery/

 

 

Wheat is really good at this venue, I just loosefeed hemp with occasional wheat with wheat as hookbait.

 

I have also had some chub in the evenings from a small stream between the river and the marina which is a short walk upstream of the caravan site:-

 

http://www.stneotsangling.org/gallery/

 

 

Hope this helps - look forward to seeing you on the bank.