As i hinted in my last entry ive not had much chance to get out lately due to other commitments and its been over a week since my last trip. I decided upon an evening session on Wednesday though and headed down the river with a mind to catch some more Barbel. After catching a couple last time around and resting it for a week i headed back to the same swim.
The weather was cool and very cloudy with a brisk upstream breeze and although the river was still very low and clear, i fancied my chances. Luncheon meat was my bait of choice today seeing as all my fish of late have fallen to it and i had spiced it up a little with a liberal dusting of curry powder. You will see from the pic below that i use a paste coil on the hair when fishing meat as i find that once its screwed into the bait then it really isnt going anywhere and it stands up to being pecked at by small fish for a lot longer aswell .
It was around an hour after casting out that i began to recieve a few twitches before eventually the rod tip slammed over. After the initial run the fish didnt really do a great deal other than keep deep so i thought it might be a good one. When i saw it in the water it looked fairly long but after netting it turned out to be quite skinny. The fish was very lively on the bank and the needle on the scales flickered between 9.14 and 10.2 so i settled on 10lb exactly, nice.
All too soon the darkness began to descend, i was till get the odd knock and twitch from small fish but didnt get any more real bites until just before dark when i hit into something that felt very strange indeed. It was thumping like mad on the end of the line yet it felt heavy almost like it was snagged on something. After some steading pulling the culprit was soon revealed as a clonking great Eel. At 3lb5oz it was a good fish too and after it covered me and all my kit in foul smelling slime i decided to call it a day and headed for home.
Friday 23rd September
Todays trip was on a stretch of my local river Soar, the scene of my 11lb barbel capture the other week. It was T-shirt weather when i arrived and although the action was very slow it was nice just to be out, might as well make the most of the good weather whilst it lasts!
Nothing was forthcoming for the first couple of hours and the river looked pretty dead . This couldve been down to the number of boats on the river today of which there was loads. Eventually though, just as i was passing the time of day with a chap off one of the aformentioned boats my upstream rod rattled off and after a typically hectic scrap a small Barbel of 7lb6oz was landed .
After that, i stayed on until dark for no more action whatsoever with barely even a tap on the rod-tips and i packed up pleased at not blanking. At least i seem to be catching fairly consistently at the minute .
Saturday 24th September
Today i hit the grand old age of 35 and after a hearty breakfast i decided to head out to a spot of bailiffing and have a chuck about with the lure-rod for a couple of hours. During my rounds pretty much everybodys ticket was in order and i only had to ask one chap to leave for having no ticket. Its amazing how people open up to you when your out checking tickets and i had a couple of very interesting conversations with regards to some future Barbel areas to try.
So what of the fishing? well, i dropped in on several swims but it was very slow indeed, no follows or taps on the lure whatsoever . I persevered and did eventually manage to get a hit in the end and from a nice fish too. It wasnt as heavy as i initially thought when i first saw it but at 2lb8oz it was a good Perch and most welcome.
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