Warwickshire Avon - Barbelistic and Bedraggled

The final day of the river season always arrives a bit like the last day of school equal parts excitement, nostalgia, and the quiet suspicion that something mildly ridiculous will happen before the bell rings. This year was no exception. I awoke with grand plans of sneaking off early, rod in hand, making the most of those precious final hours before the curtain came down on another season. Unfortunately, those plans collided head-on with domestic reality. 

The Wife, quite reasonably it must be said, had declared that an early Mother’s Day outing in Stratford-upon-Avon was required, preferably involving a respectable amount of food and an irresponsible quantity of white wine. 

My role in this arrangement was simple: chauffeur, payer, and general dogsbody. Naturally, I accepted my fate with the stoicism of a man who knows that resistance is both futile and likely to reduce future fishing permissions.

The morning progressed well enough. Stratford was looking as picturesque as ever tourists wandering about looking for Shakespeare, swans behaving like they owned the place, and restaurants happily removing money from my wallet in exchange for lunch. 

The Wife was in excellent spirits, which generally translates to “another large glass of wine wouldn’t hurt.” Meanwhile, in the back of my mind, a tiny angling alarm clock was ticking away. The river season was ending, the light would fade eventually, and somewhere out there a barbel might be considering its final bite before the great closed-season fast. Still, all things considered, it was a pleasant enough diversion. I even convinced myself that perhaps the fish would appreciate the extra rest before my arrival.

Then came the mattress incident.

What was meant to be a “quick stop” at a bed shop for Sam’s new mattress turned into the sort of retail expedition normally reserved for Arctic explorers. Apparently modern mattress purchasing involves computers, posture analysis, demonstrations, and what I can only describe as interpretive lying down. One moment we were “just popping in,” and the next thing I knew we were being guided through the building like VIP guests at some sort of bedding museum. 

I glanced at my watch repeatedly, each time discovering that another half hour had vanished into the great commercial void. Two hours somehow turned into four out. Four! By the time we escaped with a mattress suitable for a teenager (who, incidentally, could probably sleep perfectly well on a pile of coats), I was already composing my fishing obituary in my head.

Still, hope springs eternal in the heart of an angler.

With Saturday’s match cancelled due to high water conditions, I reasoned that a quick visit to the legendary Piccadilly Circus stretch would be ideal. 

Only ten minutes away, and historically about as reliable as river fishing ever gets. If a barbel was going to save my season, that swim had form. The Wife and the rabble were safely deposited at home, and I set off like a man chasing the final bus of the evening. Upon arriving at the official car park, I had a brief moment of blissful optimism. Empty. Not a car in sight. For a fleeting second I imagined I’d have the whole place to myself. But angling optimism is a fragile thing. 

As I approached the first field I spotted a vehicle parked brazenly by the gate over the footbridge. Now, this field is meant strictly for match days, but clearly some enterprising soul had decided that rules were more of a suggestion than a requirement. Ah well, I thought, perhaps they’d wandered off somewhere else.

No such luck.

Sure enough, when I reached the bank there they were: one match angler and his mate. The mate, incidentally, had arrived on a motorbike (yes a motoebike) and parked it directly behind him like they were staging a fishing-themed remake of Easy Rider. I must admit I had a little chuckle to myself. Outside of the clique there’s often much muttering about rules and etiquette, but within the inner circle it seems to be more of a “park where you fancy and crack on” arrangement. Still, they turned out to be decent blokes, which is always worth more than perfect parking discipline.

The match angler was fishing meat and had already landed a tidy barbel of about seven pounds. Lovely fish and a promising sign. He was in good spirits too, mentioning that the club could do with some positive reports after all the gloom following that fish kill a couple of years back. “Let us know if you catch one,” he said. “We need a bit of good news.” No pressure then.

By now it was creeping towards five in the afternoon. The day had been lovely, but the breeze had taken on that sharp edge that reminds you winter hasn’t quite given up yet. Standing in the shade felt like someone had quietly opened a fridge door behind you. Still, the river looked perfect—coloured water sliding along nicely, the sort of conditions that whisper “barbel” to any optimist holding a rod.

I decided to go all in with a Robin Red attack. 15m drilled pellet and a matching paste wrap. A PVA bag of krill freebies and if ever there was a bait that could persuade a barbel to have one last reckless munch before the closed season, it’s that spicy little wonder. I settled into the swim and waited for the magic to begin.

Forty-five minutes later I was still waiting.

Not even a polite chub rattle. Nothing. The rod tip might as well have been carved from oak. Eventually boredom got the better of me and I shuffled a couple of pegs upstream to a swim where I’d landed a near-double back in December during proper flood conditions. If lightning was going to strike twice, this seemed as good a spot as any.

Twenty minutes later: still nothing.

At this point I began to suspect the fish had held a secret meeting earlier that afternoon and voted unanimously to ignore me. So back I went to the original swim for one last attempt. The sun had dipped below the horizon by now and the light was fading in that slow, quiet way rivers seem to specialise in. It was one of those evenings where every sound feels slightly louder and every ripple seems important.

And then it happened.

Thump. Thump.

The rod tip knocked twice like someone tapping politely on a door… and then absolutely melted down. Line peeled off the reel and suddenly the whole world snapped into focus. Barbel! it, charged downstream like it had somewhere urgent to be. Unfortunately that destination appeared to be a submerged tree, which meant I had to apply a firm amount of persuasion to convince it otherwise. The rod bent, the reel protested, and after a few tense seconds I managed to turn it away from disaster.

What followed was a thoroughly enjoyable scrap. Not a monster by any means, but strong enough to remind me why barbel are such magnificent creatures. Eventually the fish slid over the net cord and I let out the sort of satisfied sigh normally reserved for finishing a difficult DIY project without swearing too much.

After a well deserved rest in the landing net, a quick photograph in the dull light, and a moment of admiration, the fish was returned to the coloured water where it vanished with a flick of its tail. A perfect end-of-season gesture.

By then the match angler and his motorbike-support crew had packed up and left, which was a shame because he’d asked me to report any barbel captures. I like to think somewhere out there the rumour mill eventually delivered the news: one final barbel to round things off.

I fished on until curfew, but that was the only bite of the evening. Curiously the chub didn’t show up at all, which is odd because that swim has recently resembled chub soup. Rivers are funny like that. One week they’re bustling with fish, the next week they’re as quiet as a library.

Still, I couldn’t complain.

A barbel on the last evening of the season feels rather poetic. The past few weeks have actually been a bit of a purple patch for me, which naturally means I’m now fully expecting my fortunes to return to their usual level of “character building” once the season reopens on the 16th of June.

But that’s fishing.

You endure the quiet days, the mattress shops, the motorbike anglers, the freezing breezes and the endless blank spells… all for those moments when the rod tip thumps and the reel screams.

And if you can end the season with a barbel in the net and a good story to tell, well, that’s not a bad result at all.

Warwickshire Avon - The Untrodden Pt.50

Back at the syndicate stretch again, embarking on that most noble of late-season quests: winkle out a half-respectable chub before the curtain comes down. I’d grand plans of sneaking into Piccadilly Circus for a cheeky afternoon-into-dusk session rod tips trembling with anticipation, the kettle working overtime, and me settling in like a man with absolutely nowhere else to be.

Alas, domestic life executed one of those last-minute pirouettes wives seem professionally trained in. Suddenly the dream of riverbank reverie evaporated and I was back on dad duties instead of watching the tip for that tell-tale knock.

To be fair, the Wife had endured what can only be described as a Vag Cam appointment 24 hours earlier (yes, exactly what it sounds like). Mercifully it hadn’t been too grim, and by Friday afternoon she’d decided she was perfectly fine to head off to yoga  despite having a uterus reportedly filled with enough water to make even a grown man wince in sympathy.

So off she went, limbering up, while I stayed home performing my own form of advanced flexibility: bending my fishing plans around family logistics. Bugger.

The weather was doing its best impression of a wind swept and damp flannel and my knee was still staging a protest after that Glasgow jaunt. Over sixty thousand steps in two days what was I thinking? At my age that’s practically an ultramarathon. 

The shin splints have migrated north and taken up residence on the inside of my right knee like an unwelcome squatter. Still, between ice packs and a liberal smear of Voltarol, I’m hobbling along well enough to pursue matters piscatorial. 

Roving the swims was the plan, dodgy knee or not, because sometimes the chub don’t come to you, you have to go knocking on their door like an overly persistent Jehovah’s Witness with a landing net.

Tactics were simplicity itself: bread in the feeder, cheesepaste on the hook, and faith in the river gods. Proper chub fishing none of this space-age nonsense.

Word had reached the grapevine that fellow syndicate member Ade Busby author of Barbel Under the Bridge and part-time tormentor of lesser anglers like myself had recently bagged a 6lb 6oz chub on this stretch. 

Daylight had produced nothing for him, mind you, and then the moment the light dipped… bang. Typical chub behaviour really: sulking all afternoon like teenagers and then suddenly deciding they’re ravenous once you can barely see your rod tip.

The river was rising, which I greeted with cautious optimism. A bit of extra colour can be a chub angler’s best mate like fishing behind frosted glass where the fish can’t quite see you fluffing the cast. Sadly, it wasn’t quite the rich, chocolatey broth I’d been hoping for. More of a piss weak tea job. Still, hope springs eternal when there’s cheespaste in the bag and time on the clock.

I ambled onto the stretch with all the confidence of a man who had absolutely no evidence to support it. George Burton and Dave Williams were already stationed along the bank like two thoughtful garden gnomes contemplating the mysteries of the universe or more accurately, why the river looked so perfect yet so completely unwilling to give up a fish. 

After a brief riverside conference (which mostly consisted of scratching chins and saying “they’ve got to be here somewhere”), I decided to go on the rove, which in fishing terms means wandering about pretending you have a plan.

Off I went, creaking my way from swim to swim like an elderly heron that had done one yoga class too many in the 1980s and never quite recovered. The feeder plopped into crease lines, slid under suspicious looking bushes, and landed in those delightfully “chubby” swims where you just know a fish the size of a small sausage dog should be lurking with bad intentions. Each cast had that wonderful moment where the rod tip quivered ever so slightly and the imagination instantly leapt ahead to the weigh-in speech: “Well lads, I did say they were having it…”

Alas, the river had other plans. Swim after swim looked magnificent  the sort of swims that appear in glossy magazines with captions like ‘Guaranteed Chub Holding Area’ yet contained absolutely nothing except water, mild disappointment, and the distant echo of my own optimism quietly deflating. I switched to bread at one point, which felt like a tactical masterstroke until several tiny fish arrived to nibble it like pensioners sampling free cheese at a supermarket. Encouraging, yes. Useful, no. Meanwhile, the chub whom I shall now refer to as “Me Chub” had clearly taken the day off.

Eventually curfew crept up the bank like a bailiff with a clipboard. I packed up and left George and Dave to it, wishing them luck in the sort of tone usually reserved for people about to assemble flat-pack furniture without the instructions. As it turned out, they fared exactly the same as me. Three anglers, a lovely river, decent rising river conditions… and not a single fish among us. A perfect blank. Still, tomorrow is another day the final day of the river season. Which of course means the chub will almost certainly decide to feed like piranhas five minutes after we’ve all packed up for the year. 🎣

Warwickshire Avon - Bailiffs and Bedlam

There is, I’m often asked, a reason why I remain gloriously absent from the glowing circus tent that is social media. The answer is quite simple really: self-preservation. Many moons ago back when phones were for ringing people and a “stream” meant something with water and trout in it I decided I didn’t particularly want my existence narrated in real time to strangers who felt the need to comment on it while eating toast in their pants. 

From the outside looking in it all appears rather… consuming. Facebook, Tik-Tok, Instagram an endless digital village green where everyone is shouting, nobody is listening, and somewhere in the corner a man is angrily arguing about the correct way to hold a carp.

Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not entirely immune to the odd pang of jealousy. Some of the fish that appear on these platforms are the sort that would make a saint swear. 

Huge great slabs of whiskered magnificence that look like they’ve been fed on protein shakes and small livestock. Of course I’m jealous any angler with a pulse would be. But attached to these aquatic triumphs is always a curious side order of vitriol. 

Perfect strangers furiously debating rigs, baits, ethics, lunar cycles and the moral integrity of a landing net. It’s a bit like watching a pub argument except everyone is typing and nobody has spilled a pint yet.

And then there are the dietary announcements. For reasons known only to the internet, people now feel compelled to inform the world about their digestive relationship with the “carnivore diet”. I do not wish to know this. I barely wish to know this about close family members, let alone Trevor from Doncaster who has been eating nothing but steak since February and would like to discuss the consequences. Angling used to involve fish, rivers and the occasional thermos of tea. Now it appears to involve gastrointestinal updates and motivational quotes over pictures of kettles.

Instagram, of course, is a different kettle of filtered fish entirely. A magical land where everyone lives a flawless life, owns immaculate tackle, and appears permanently bathed in golden evening sunlight even at half past eleven on a Tuesday morning. Reality, as we know, is rather less glamorous. I remember once while zander fishing on the canal, quietly minding my own business and contemplating a sandwich of questionable freshness, when a young woman arrived at the aqueduct car park with the sort of purpose normally reserved for bomb disposal teams.

Out came a paddleboard. Out came a wetsuit. Out came a phone attached to a stick that probably cost more than my first rod. She paddled precisely fifty yards into the middle of the aqueduct, posed heroically against the skyline for several photographs, and then paddled straight back again, packed everything into the car and drove off. I can only assume that somewhere online a caption appeared reading something along the lines of: “Morning paddle — five miles of peaceful canal vibes ✨.” Meanwhile the only witness, a slightly baffled angler with a flask and a couple of Zander rods, was left wondering if he’d just watched Cinderella arrive at the ball and leave before the buffet opened.

Still, each to their own. The world is a broad church and some of its members apparently enjoy photographing themselves pretending to exercise. Personally, I prefer fishing.

Which brings us neatly to another smash-and-grab sortie down at what I affectionately call Warwickshire Avon’s Shanghai Pudong an industrious little stretch where curfews are obeyed, barbel occasionally make questionable life choices, and the river seems to have recovered somewhat from the dreaded oxygen crash that knocked things sideways for a while. Word from the match yesterday was that a few barbel had shown themselves again, which is always encouraging. Rivers heal in their own time, and with the rain we’ve had lately the fish tend to shuffle about looking for nicer accommodation. Bit like anglers really, only with fewer folding chairs.

Last time I visited, things kicked off gloriously as the light faded, the sort of frantic spell where rods thump, reels complain and you begin to suspect the fish have collectively agreed to ruin your evening in the most delightful way possible. Naturally I returned armed with exactly the same cunning plan.

A 15mm robin red pellet. A paste wrap. A little PVA bag of freebies for good measure. The angling equivalent of ordering the same meal at a restaurant because it didn’t poison you last time.

Anyway I rolled into the car park just as the bailiff was hauling his dog out the motor, ready for its evening patrol like some sort of furry fisheries enforcement officer. We had a quick natter, the usual exchange of fishing wisdom (and mild exaggeration), before both of us wandered up toward the river. I plonked myself into one of the pegs opposite the houses. Not exactly my dream swim you know the sort, where you feel like you’re fishing in someone’s back garden but the fish clearly hadn’t read my preference list because that’s where they were hanging about.

The bailiff let the dog stretch its legs while I got the rods sorted and a bait in the drink. It was one of those slow starts where the river looks suspiciously innocent, like butter wouldn’t melt in its flow. Eventually, just as the bailiff wandered back up the bank toward me, the rod gave a proper whack and folded over like it had just remembered an unpaid electricity bill. A chub had absolutely nailed it. After a short but lively scrap a very respectable fish slid into the net. Job done !!

With that fish returned and the bailiff heading back toward his car, I glanced at the clock and realised I had less than 45 minutes before curfew. On this stretch that means rods out half an hour after dusk, which is normally about the time things actually start happening. Typical fishing logic really. Luckily the fish hadn’t read the rule book either because the swim suddenly switched on like someone had flicked a light switch.

What followed was one of those glorious little feeding spells where you barely get settled again before the rod tip tries to launch itself into the river. In the space of that short window I managed another four chub, with the final one tipping the scales at a very tidy five pounds. Proper river scrap merchants too  the sort that make you wonder if they’ve been secretly lifting weights in the margins.

One odd thing though: after every fish the hair rig seemed to be getting longer. At first I thought I was imagining it, but no the chub were hitting the bait so hard they were actually stretching the hair. By the end of the session it must have grown nearly two inches. Not that it mattered much, because the bites were so ridiculous the fish were practically hooking themselves while I stood there grinning like an idiot.

No barbel graced the net this time, but honestly I wasn’t too bothered. It was one of those classic smash-and-grab sessions where everything just comes together for a short burst of action. Add in a howling wind that looked like it was trying to relocate half the riverside trees to the next county and it somehow made the whole thing even more enjoyable.

It’s a real shame the season’s nearly done because the fish are clearly in the mood for a proper feed. Still, if this session was anything to go by, they’re finishing the season exactly how anglers like it  slightly chaotic, wildly entertaining, and just long enough to leave you wishing you had another hour.