Geoff and Matt go barbel fishing on the Wye

Matt had wanted to give his Dad a birthday present. A day barbel fishing on the river Wye.

Both of the guy’s are very good match anglers however the agricultural nature of fishing the wild river Wye was something else to them.

36hrs previous there had been some much welcomed rain. This was pushing the river up only by a couple of inches.

When we arrived the river looked perfect, some colour and extra flow.

We fished with the normal feeder set up with pellet on the hook. Now this swim is one where the sport is hectic with good size barbel and plenty of chub are caught!

Well after the first 4 hours on none action on the rod tops we moved upstream to see if we could tempt any bites. Normally it’s eel country and that is what we got lots of bites from eel and one was landed of about 2lbs. Now those that know me understand that eels are not my favourite fish and unhooking them is not my best pastime. However luck for me it was lip hooked and back in the river it went.

So still struggling for bites in the original swim we sat and waited for the evening feeding spree. Well to be honest any bite would indicate a feed spree today.

Matt’s Dad  Geoff was the first to have a bite. He hooked a small chub of a couple of pounds.

Then alleluia the rod arched over and Matt was playing a hard fighting barbel, this was at 4.45pm.

As it turned out it was a great looking fish of 7lbs 10oz.

Matt and a 7lbs 10oz barbel

Geoff meanwhile hooked a barbel that did him on the rocks. The mainline went slack and everything was gone.

So swiftly retackling and casting out there appeared to be a few fish moving about as we got a good few line bites.

As it reached 7.30 Geoff was into another barbel, not as large as the first one he played it well and as it neared our swim the hooklink got done on a stone again.

That was it the barbel gods were just not with us today.

The river conditions were perfect water temperature was lower, however there was an oil slick coming down on the surface which I had not seen before.

A couple of other anglers came down for a chat from another beat and they hadn’t had a bite all day. The beat they were on is normally very productive as this one. Strange times!

This was by far the worst day’s fishing on this stretch, I don’t think it was fishery fault but the fish just didn’t want to feed.

I’m going to take Geoff back over again soon to catch his first barbel so watch this space/blog.