Warwickshire Avon - Stealth Modes and Stalagmometers

As I've said before I'm not quite feeling it at the minute, but I don't think I'm alone on that matter. The Warwickshire Avon for example is very low indeed and gin clear where fishing can be very tough indeed. The fish just vanish and ok, if you fishing maggots under a float you'd catch some fish, but to put a proper bend in the rod you'll be scratching your head.

You only have to look at the match results on the stretches I fish where matches are won from lots of chublets not from decent sized chub. When the light goes however the change is quite dramatic and those bigger fish start to venture out. 

I don't need to look back at my blog to know it's no different year on year when the conditions are like this. What it is good for is for spotting fish and Sam wanted to go fishing in to dusk and in to dark to try and catch a chub. This stretch can vary quite considerably where it is shallow in the main with some nice gravel runs and also some swims with some decent depth.

After a nose around without really seeing much we settled in a swim with the most depth over the longest length. There are some good chub to be caught here too, in-fact my first 5lb chub and many more after came from here. 

We were lederging bread large pieces of bread under this raft and heading in to dusk I'd feed some mash to get them interested. The bread was getting mullered from small fish from the off and you know when the bread has been extracted from the hook when the 1oz quiver tip stops giving indications.

Not much was happening on the bigger fish front until that is the bats appeared because the first unmissable bite missed. 🙈 In-fact 4 more unmissable bites between Sam and I, things were not going well and we didn't hook up to anything !!! Then bites stopped completely and we left with a tail between our legs !!!

I'm not enjoying it at the minute, that's clear to see over lots of sessions recently so in the morning I actually went to the canal where in two hours I had 4 schoolie Zander fishing deadbaits. Nothing big showed up apart from when a boat went past then something big that was sitting in the shallows came out to chase a fish and caused a rather large disturbance on the water. 

I got back home and with threatened thunderstorms later on in the afternoon (they never happened) Sam again wanted to go out to catch some fish. 

So back out again where we went further afield to catch some more fish with maggots under a float where some small chub were caught was well as some dace, with this one being attacked by a decent looking pike on the retrieve where its scales were scattered everywhere. We also had a chub rod to fish bread off the top where in one swim we witnessed one of the biggest chub we have ever seen circling around the bread like a shark before it vanished, most likely seeing us and spooked off !!!

We tried a few more swims to see what was around where in one swim it really was like an aquarium with all manner of small fish taking the manky maggots and casters without a care in the world, then something happened 👀 You see out of the corner of my eye under my polarised sunglasses I spotted a HUGE, I mean HUGE!!! barbel that showed its flanks in the middle of the 6ft swim and my jaw dropped. 

"SAM, SAM see if you can see this !!!"

I gave him my polarised glasses and the barbel did a slow 180 turn and headed back to the incepting area it was sat it. 

"WOW, WOW it's a MASSIVE BARBEL, Jesus"

Sam wasn't wrong, the biggest barbel I've ever seen close up, let alone him and after a disappointing couple of months I've (we've) now at least a target to aim for, a fish bigger than my Warwickshire Avon PB of 12lb and 14 ounces ?, well I'm sure this fish will beat that for sure. Pincushion distortion and lateral chromatic aberration were noticeable ? no idea, all I know that it was a massive Barbel before is disappeared !!

Are there any other barbel here as well ? only one way to find out I suppose.

You can see why the fish like it here, reed filled shallows either side of this swim that drops off to a decent depth, and there is cover over at the far side and also to the left and right. There is one big problem though and that is a rather large snag in the middle of the swim. It's difficult to know what it is but it's manmade and a rather large obstruction that balloons off the bed. 

After consulting the Barbel oracle James Denison he's given me some tips to target this specific fish. One big issue is the amount of pellet nibbling chub/chublets that also frequent this swim, but I've a few different approaches to try that I'm hoping will come to fruition,

So for a while I'll be operating in Stealth Mode !!, It's time to press that button. From the lacklustre despair of late, I've got the mojo back again. 💪😎.