In the height of summer there's often no worse condition than bright sunshine. With fish increasingly wary of predators, and water low and clear, nothing sends barbel diving for cover like a clear blue sky. And yet in winter the exact opposite can be true. Barbel fishing is undoubtedly tougher in winter. The fish will feed in the coldest of conditions, but their appetites are much reduced and concentrated into narrow time-windows as they manage energy budgets in cooler water. The trick is to look for the environmental conditions that open these windows, and also those that will slam them firmly shut. I was reminded of this on a trip to the River Wye in December 2019. The river was high and coloured and the day had started off cold and overcast. We had fished the morning without success, targeting both the pacier water out in front and the calm slacks above and below trees that overhung the bankside and now acted as breakwaters to the relentless flow of tea-coloured water. The full range of bait options had been explored, and every trick in the book deployed. Not so much as a nibble, other than on the delightful chicken and chorizo pasties Nick had baked. The barbel's appetites may have nodded off for the morning, but chunks of chorizo and strips of chicken doused in a sticky spicy sauce and encased in pastry were doing it for me! (Leave your email address in the comments for the recipe! #omnomnomnom!)
Mid-afternoon brought a change in the weather. The sky cleared, the sun rose in the sky and the temperature bumped up by around 8 degrees. The conditions only lasted an hour or so before the falling sun and the clear sky caused the temperature to drop sharply once more. But there was no doubt about it, it was the sort of weather change that brings barbel on the munch in the depths of winter!
 |
| Poised... rigs perfect, conditions right... Any moment now? |
It pays to be ready for these conditions. Rods set, baits ready, hooks checked for sharpness, hooklengths for frays. You don't want to sit and wait in the cold all day and then miss your one opportunity. We decided to hedge our bets. I fished the deeper pacey water, and Mr. Fisher targeted the slacks. We were sure the weather would bring them on, we knew this section of the river regularly held fish, so fishing their two main haunts seemed a sensible bet. We were confident that the change in conditions would bring the fish on the feed, and we were ready... waiting... out of pasties.
My luck came in first. No more than half an hour after the change in conditions my rod twanged violently and then went slack for just a moment as the dislodged lead shot down river taking up the slack from the bowed line. The rod hooped over just as my hand gripped the slender cork handle and I lifted into a typical floodwater barbel, staying deep and holding easily in the flow. Each surging run stripped of yard upon yard of hard-won territory. Bringing fish back upstream in these conditions is never easy. The nearside bank is peppered with now-sunken shrubs and there's only a narrow section to guide them through. Precision stuff. After a long tussle of man vs. fish, with fish using several hundred cubic metres of water per second to it's every advantage I guided the net underneath my winter trophy. Not a huge fish, perhaps 5-6 lbs, but it shone like a bar of gold in the winter sunshine. It's metallic flanks iridescent, peach coloured fins aglow. There are moments when you just have to admire the beauty in nature, and this was one of them. A beautiful fish, so perfectly adapted to life in a raging river. This wasn't a fish hiding down the edge, it has been caught in the tooth of the flow, a large bow of slack line the only think keeping the lead in place.
 |
| Bar of gold - iridescent in the winter sun |
 |
| Peach-hewed pelvic fins keep barbel anchored to the bottom in flood conditions |
Slipping the fish back I tried for another in the same location without success. Keen to not waste the opportunity of a feeding window I gambled with a switch to a slack section between two trees, deep water with cover and sheltered from the flow. Before I had the chance to see if my rod would hoop over again I was rudely interrupted by the familiar shout of 'Fish on!' from up-river...
 |
| Bankside trees provide breakwaters in the flow and natural shelter for barbel in flood. |
As I arrived Nick was trying to keep a barbel from embedding itself in the near-bank snags. Time and time again it shot off downstream, dragging Nicks tackle through the bankside scrub. Eventually the fish obligingly shot out into open water and Nick was able to guide it upstream and back into the bank to his waiting net. Another fish of perhaps 5-6lbs. Nick seemed to have taken offence at my suggestion it was just a splasher of 3lb or so. Barbel are so deceptive to gauge size-wise until you've got them on the bank. I'm genuinely rubbish at guessing when they're in the water!
 |
| Stunning. Size doesn't matter when fish look this good. |
No sooner than Nick had slipped the barbel back the sun began to descend in the sky, the temperature dropped and the window closed. There were no more takes, just a glorious sunset. It had been a glorious day on the river. Not just because we'd caught that feeding window amongst perfect conditions, but catching a few was certainly the icing on the cake.
 |
| Sunshine - warmer conditions can bring fantastic sport. Be ready...! |
No comments:
Post a Comment