This is a three session blog of good tench barbel and a day on the Wye

The tench fishing had not been going to plan……most others having similar problems with the tench not playing ball.

I had arranged to fish with my mate Graham again at the Cotswold Water Park. It was to be the normal 48hrs stint. I arrived the previous afternoon to Graham who had some last minute sorting to do. There were a few tench rolling as the afternoon passed into evening. The carp were giving a right old going with spawning kicking up plenty of weed in the margins. It was a fairly wind free night. I had one screaming run from a carp that got me weeded and threw the hook at 1.30am other than that it was very quite. Even the morning didn’t show much happening again other than the carp rolling around spawning.

Graham arrived and set up camp close by. At 5.30pm he was playing our first and only tench of the session. It was not huge and at 5lbs. Inline maggot was the method as per normal.

We celebrated by having pie and chips again. By now though the wind had got up and was pushing into our bank. So did the vast rafts of weed that the spawning carp kicked up. By 9pm we had both had enough and reeled in for the night as the indicators were continuous bleeping.

I woke the next morning and recast the rods at 4am and put out some more hemp and live maggots…….and that was it precious few tench showed and the weather was colder and as they say that was that.

So the tench gods have not been kind to me this year again true I had many more than last year but not the monsters that swim in the lake…..next year perhaps.

So that was Weds when I packed up and headed home.

Thursday saw me on the river for my first serious session after the barbel. It was cloudy morning with blistering sun in the afternoon. There had been a slight algae bloom in the river which reduced my options in spotting feeding barbel. I eventually found a couple amongst a few chub taking the pellets that I threw in. One barbel was about 6lbs the other about 8lbs. So I set about catching one of these.

For stalking I tend to use a back lead to pin most of the line to bed of the river and depending on the features on the lake bed I tend to vary the length between lead and back lead. As I was fishing close to snags I decided to use 12lb main line with the same for the braid. I do like the ESP curved shank hooks for this type of work they stay very sharp even if they are battered on the river bed by small fish.

Well after about an hour and a couple of extra casts because I wasn’t sure whether the chub had nicked the pellet the barbel started to come out to feed more purposeful. Then it happened the rod arched over and I was playing an angry barbel. Through the cabbages and weed it went a few time however it was never in danger of snagging me. The fight was very spirited and lead me around the swim. It was over much too soon and was in the landing net.

Luckily for me Chris Luke was nearby and was able to take the photo for me. He had been lure fishing for pike and perch and had caught some good ones. Now I had worked with Chris’s Dad and his brother for many years at the Keynsham Cadbury factory so it was nice meet him.

So with the weighing over the photo’s were taken of a handsome 9lbs 13oz barbel which later in the year would easily be a double. So both of us were pleased all round.

The light was not good for much more spotting as the evening was approaching, so I decided to call it a day.

Well Sunday I was guiding a Father and Son team on the Wye, Trevor and Archie. The conditions were not looking too good 27c and bright sky’s meant that it was not ideal. Their goals were to catch wild barbel as they had only caught them before from a still water.

The river level is way below normal summer level so I new a couple of swims that might produce. There is also a fair degree of shade in each swim so it would help cool us down.

I knew though that with the heat wave we are having the canoes would be out in numbers.

I met Trevor and Archie at 7.30am. Previous to this I was prebaiting and preparing the swim for them. It was a wonderful morning in the Wye valley all quite other than the calls of the pheasants’ and the odd car passing.

Once we met and cast out it wasn’t long before we got a few taps on the rod of either chub knocks or feeding barbel brushing the line. Archie was the first to catch and it turned out to be a lovely little one of 4lbs 12oz. Within 15 minutes Trevor was on the score card with 6lb 3oz fish.

20 minutes later Archie struck into a real powerful barbel that he did really well to land, as it was it turned out to be te largest of the day at 9lbs 3oz.

The canoes started to come down the river at about 10.30 and kept coming and coming. This doesn’t effect the barbel fishing too much but with some people out of control in the things it’s not pleasant at times.

Archie and Trevor continued to catch barbel. Archie also got the prize for the largest chub of the session 4lbs 6oz.

We moved down to another beat in the afternoon as a friend Tony had kindly allowed us to fish it as he was off home. The result was that we were soon off catching barbel again.

However again the canoes made things difficult with people wanting to wade on the shallows upstream. It was not only the canoes but also the locals who were splashing and swimming in the river with dogs too.

This uprooted plenty of weed that caught on the lines and made fishing problematical for long periods of time.

Because the next day was a school day and they had a long drive home Trevor and Archie left at 6pm. It’s a pity as I would have thought that the barbel would soon be on the feed again once the sun became lower in the sky. In total they caught 11 barbel lost about 4 and landed 3 chub to 4lbs 6oz so not a bad days fishing under the circumstances.

I returned to the original swim to fish for one more hr and caught a 6lber and a big 7lber. Then by 7.15pm I too was winding my way home. So it was great to be back on the Wye once more.

I did pop out today for a session however the river had the worst algae bloom I had ever seen. It was like tea and visibility was about 1ft down in the river water. I managed one small roach of 1lb on a pellet and a chub of about 3lbs.

Because I had not barbel fished this section before this year I was unsure where the cabbages started and finished so therefore confidence levels were low. It was hot too 28c.

I did however stop off to take a photo of a guy turning the cut grass. It was so dry clouds of dust blew up with the breeze a sure sign that the weather had been hot.

The very last thing I did was to look at a small lake to see whether there were any carp. Yes there were a few floating around just below the surface. However the lilies were out in flower and looked stunning.