WILD IS THE WIND....

 

     ....and I hate it with a vengeance. It hassles me, the brolly slapping me in the face, the rod tip waving around like a prick in a shirtsleeve. I can't even think straight when its mythering me like it was today. But, this would be my last chance of an Avon Barbel for a week or so, and a week is a long time in the British rainscape. Chances must be taken.

     This swim has been productive but while it has given with one hand, it has taken with the other in the shape of two lost Barbel on the float. With wild and particularly foul weather forecast for the foreseeable future. It seemed like this might be a perfect opportunity to have a real go at putting one on the bank. Given that despite numerous attempts, I have never knowingly even had a bite from one in the Avon on meat, pellets or boilies and the fact that casters have hooked me two, bait choice seemed pretty obvious.

 
     Back in the day I had some success on the Severn fishing with hemp, tares and casters in a blockend feeder with casters on the hook. In fact my all time best Barbel at just shy of 8lbs came to this method. Tackle and tactics established then, a mark IV carp rod, Mitchell 410, 10lbs line to an 8lbs hooklength and size 10 match carp hook should do the job. Scratching about in the loft I managed to find a selection of oval feeders in weights from 1 to 2 oz with the holes already enlarged, essential to allow an easy escape for inanimate baits like hemp and casters. I was set up and ready to go for it as was storm Eowyn.

     Down by the river it was howling upstream, pushing waves up against the flow and past my swim but my plan was never in doubt, I had a couple of pints of mixed casters, hemp, tares, and old maggots and these would fill my 1.5oz feeder and be recast every 15 minutes. I would also catapult more bait every cast just as if I was floatfishing. If nothing else, I thought, a chub was very likely to slip up. It is surprising how obvious a bite is even when the rod tip is flapping violently around. Bites are harder, sharper and cause higher frequency vibrations of the tip than the weather does, a lesson long-learned when beach fishing. There, the wind is always blowing, the tips are always high and sometimes waves as high as five feet hit the line with monotonous regularity. One might think it impossible to discern a bite in such conditions but even 6" whiting give a very obvious indication on the tip of a 3 or 4lbs test curve beach rod.

 
     So it was today, my first bite coming within an hour of starting and it wasn't long before a fine Chub, my best for a while from this river, was in the net. To be honest the fight is somewhat less exciting on a Carp rod than it is on a float rod and it's not the most enjoyable way to catch Chub but the bites are exciting when one can confidently expect the next to be from a Barbel, potentially of double figures. Of course that confidence was somewhat misplaced, but I did catch more Chub despite the ever increasing wind. A small fish followed soon after but it was an hour or so and one missed bite before I hit the next. An ounce smaller than the first at 3-9 it was nevertheless proof of the effectiveness of the tactic at least for Chub. Frankly if it works for chub it will work for Barbel and so with more awful weather forecast and floatfishing being impossible, I will be back soon enough. 

     One slight adjustment to the rig worked well today, with casters breaking up rather easily on a bigger size 10 hook than they do on my usual size 16, I found that adding a rubber caster or two to the hook at least meant that should the real bait disintegrate then at least something was available on the hook for the fish to try. I don't like artificial baits for silver fish having proved to my own satisfaction on several occasions that they are barely 10% as effective as the real thing but as an addition to balance out the weight of the hook and as a failsafe if the real bait is removed, they do have their uses. I hooked four from 5 bites today, missed one and landed three so I'm all revved up now for another try now, weather permitting.