1st of July Bristol Avon another good barbel

First a joke?

I had a Trivia competition shot to pieces I was first until the last question which I got wrong. The question was “Where do women have the curliest hair”??
The answer I should have given was “ Fiji ”

I arrived at the same swim I fished on Wednesday. I didn’t get there earlier and only arrived at 7am. There was one other angler there who went upstream to fish. I feed with hemp and sat back to see who was at home….a few small barbel came to feast.

I didn’t see any others of a large size. The day was going to be hot and sunny and it didn’t fail, luckily I was stationed under a tree which offered some shade.

As normal the fish were in the snag but came out to feed slightly upstream and then under my feet where I had put some hemp.

I was fishing pellets again with a small PVA mesh bag of mixed sized ones and a short hooklink.

I waited until mid morning before I saw a couple of larger fish and was prepared to wait for another 1 hour before moving on. Sure enough at about 12.30 I got a take from a fish under my feet in the cabbages. The clutch was set tight and the fish just cut through the cabbages on the tight line. I really like to see these cabbages float downstream in the flow as you play a big barbel. Finally I saw the fish which I thought was about 7lbs and then soon it was in the landing net. Mark another angler further downstream saw me catch the fish. I had met him on the previous visit. I rested the fish in a sack while I set up the weighing equipment. On the scales she went 8lbs 4oz and again quite thin after spawning.

I took a quick video of the fish.

 
Mark came to see me just as I was returning the fish. He hadn’t fished for barbel much and bought most of his rigs and so on. I then spent the next 45 mins or so showing him my rigs and showed him how to tie the rigs and knots……..all this for free. Seriously I don’t mind showing people knots and rigs, it’s the swim and the knowledge that is important. The feeding also plays an important part.
Mark asked to sit and watch for a while which he did, and soon we were watching some doubles swimming over the bait. Soon the rod bounced around and a roach of about 1lb was the culprit. I didn’t weigh it and Mark said it was the largest he had seen.
We were then bailiffed which was good. It was by another coach for the area. We had a good chat and reminisced about our training.
Mark then had to leave and I carried on fishing. Sure enough those large barbel returned and they were right under my feet. The rod top nodded a few times and then it was away……….how do those roach do this.
I had another roach of about 1lb. This would spoil the swim for an hour or so.
I’m doing some work further downstream this week for two days so I need to do some ground work, so I left a bit frustrated.