The River Arrow - Brushcutters and Bronchoscopes

Sam and I bumped in to the swim creator on the river Arrow and boy did he have his work cut out. The upstream pegs of the weir couldn't be more different than those below it, a canalised section of around 6 pegs that is around 8 foot deep in places and harbours some fish well worth catching.

Bream, big chub and even barbel...!!  

I might well give the area a go to see what I can winkle out. The problem is the opposite bank is a more heavily fish club where the stretch of convenience means, they can actually park behind their peg. When we went for a nose every peg was taken as I did fancy having a go for the chub, but you could literally lip read what the other angler was saying to his mate that came for a chat, errr, I'll leave it for another time.

So we went downstream for a rover to try and catch some chub using simple link ledger tactics and gob stopping pieces of bread. 

It came from 'Dead Man's Hole' or something like that according to the brushcutter swim creator (nice fella) because it was a swim I discovered myself fishing it for the first time where the SSG took a while to settle, it must be a good >8 foot deep hole, when even with a clear river, it's dark and dingy here. 

A good fifteen minutes without a bite once the bread had settled I did think about moving when a pull on the quiver tip I got a big drop back bite and a chub was on. An epic scrap on my prefered chub rod (TFG River and Stream) it was taking line and certainly didn't want to see the insides of ones landing net. 

They are in superb condition these Arrow chub, probably because the once resident otter that tapped its clawed paw on the shoulder of every barbel that once called this place home, probably upsticks and went to pastures new. 

Fingers crossed they make a come back but for now the chub are there to provide a bend in the rod. To be honest I've not made it a secret chub are in my league table above the barbel, but then maybe if I was closer to a water that has them in numbers those positions could switch.

Anyway usually in small rivers like this once a fish has caused swim carnage (weighed 4lb 9oz) that's your lot for a bit so as Sam gets restless like I do, it was on to the next swim.

This was towards the end of the stretch as I wanted to prime the banker swim with some mash before returning to it. A swim nicely cleared for a match that is on the weekend it's a snag fest here. The problem was despite carrying a tinge of colour because of the recent rain it was still pretty shallow and you could see the bottom in much of it.

We gave it a go though, Sam manning the rod because I'd caught a fish and he hadn't, and naturally it was his turn. I mentioned in another post, he his such a good angler know, he what to do when that chub heads for the snags. 

Which he played out rather well indeed because after trying a couple more swims without success, we headed to the banker swim where literally two casts two cracking chub. There is a fallen tree over at the far side and also a tree to the right where the chub tend to hang out, because they have plenty of escape routes, and they seem to be there all the time. 

Sam actually missed another two unmissable bites that for some reason didn't connect, so with those chub returned there must have been quite a few of them down there.

For such a small river the average size of chub is on the high side, and on return to the car we dropped in to the weir where I managed a nice one that after a huge drop back bite realised it had made a mistake and shot to my right a good ten yards in what seems like a couple of seconds. I thought I'd missed my chance but reeled in a load of slack and the fish was still there.

Another short but enjoyable session on the river Arrow where we both caught 2 chub each and all a high stamp. There was a 6lber caught here recently apparently and no reason to doubt that, so I'm looking forward to giving this stretch a go in the depths of winter.