1st August and back on the Bristol Avon

I hadn’t been fishing the Bristol Avon too much recently. Since the start of the season the river has been up and down like a Weston Super Mare donkey as we say around here. However with the sun of the previous week and the important dry spell the river was still pushing through but the river was very clear.

For me this is the best time to try and outwit the chub and barbel involving sight fishing. This means first finding the fish and the size that you are after.

Then carefully feeding the swim and setting the trap as we say.

Often you can observe the routine route of barbel and set the trap so they find the bait. In the past I’ve baited and lead the barbel to the area where I’ve wanted to catch them.

First though the important thing is to find the swim where they will feed.

I knew a great swim that I’ve fished many times and it’s great for spotting and feeding the barbel. Often I call this the 5 minute swim. Results are that quick honest!

Well normally there are 3 or 4 fish in this swim. One is near 10lbs another 9lbs and a smaller one of about 8lbs. Today it was different the water was crystal clear and all I could make out was two barbel the 8lb one and a smaller one of 5lbs.

I trickled in a bout 5 pellets and they moved up together with a few chub. They had a few pellets then left the swim. This is normal! 10 Minutes later I cast in this time with a pva bag of a few more pellets. Sure enough out they came under the cabbages and started to pick up the odd pellet.

What I find so exciting you can see when the fish pick up the bait they twist and then shoot off so fast. Silt is kicked up from the cabbages and the river bed.

The fight was not spectacular but as she came towards the net a final couple of lunges had my heart beat racing.

Soon though she was in the net.

So that was all of 10 minutes after casting in. So you can see how important location is.

I was thinking of a spot of crust fishing for chub, however someone else was near to the swim I wanted to fish. I wandered off and found some good size chub taking crust after crust in a swim that was just impossible to fish and land fish safely. I need to think about how to tackle this problem.

Rain started to fall so I decide to move to another stretch where I had not fished this season. The rain was very short lived as I settled into a swim where I could see a couple of barbel and some good chub over 5lbs. A few pellets were scattered into the area where I wanted the fish to feed. The barbel came and investigated then drifted off downstream. I cast out and could see the 10mm pellet, I was fishing that close in.

Soon a few chub came to investigate and guess what one of just over 4lbs picked up the bait and around went the tip as it shoot off.

Time to rest the swim for 15 minutes or so. I wandered off to look around the fishery and found some other good size chub just under a flood raft under a nearside bush.

I returned to the swim again and proceeded to catch another chub of similar size as the first one. Again I saw it pick up the pellet twist and turn and bolt off downstream, all very exciting.

A friend Andy Cowley arrived on yet another stretch and wonder if I was fishing. Now I hadn’t seen him for several weeks and wanted to catch up with him. Soon I was packed up and travelling towards the stretch he was on.

He was fishing a lovely swim where I had seen some barbel in recently. Sure enough they were still there but very wary. We had a chat and he recounted on some excellent sport he has been having recently.

There was only just a few hours left of sunlight and I wanted to fish a swim where I had seen a double in recently. It’s not an easy swim to fish due to a number of branches preventing me from getting near to where the barbel are. So it’s all about drawing them out to an area to where I could catch. I stood on the bank and dropped a couple of pellets in between the branches. The double came out and drifted downstream. Another little barbel of about 4 lbs came to investigate and then another one of about 7 lbs.

So at least they were at home. I baited from upstream of the branches, however I couldn’t see my bait in this particular swim and so had to sit back and wait. Within 20 minutes the tip shoot around and I was soon playing a good chub of about 4lbs. So that’s three 4lb chub for the day.

Once re casted I fed a few more pellets and waited again. I much prefer to watch the fish feeding on the bait but not in this swim. After another 20 minutes the tip went and this time the fish on the other end was no chub. The barbel was really fighting hard and tried for the snags several times. It was using the extra flow to really pull back hard. It looked a good fish. Eventually these  lunges and runs became fewer and lacked strength. Once it was in the net it didn’t look like it was the double that I wanted. Sure enough on the scales it went 7lbs 5oz. Andy came along and took the photo’s for me, also I wanted to show him the swim for future reference.

There was the last couple of hours of light left and we headed off to another couple of swims. I fished a fast run that last year held some good chub and barbel while Andy went into the banker swim. The swim that I fished had changed over the last few months and the raft that deflected the flow and created a slack had been washed away so the flow was quite strong. It still looked to contain the odd chub and sure enough after 15 minutes or so the tip whipped around and I was soon playing a decent chub. It was about 3.5lbs or so. Andy had a couple of pulls from chub that just didn’t develop into a take.

So that was it for the evening. Not too bad 2 barbel 4 chub.