Warwickshire Avon - Fish Whisperers and Flagellomania

So, we are back on the Warwickshire Avon, Nic and I, and to be honest it has been a while. Not because I have fallen out with the river, or because the river has specifically asked for a restraining order, but simply because life, work, family, weather, fish and the general nonsense that surrounds trying to go fishing all seem to conspire against actually going fishing.

Nic, on the other hand, has recently become something to appease the curtain twitchers, largely because his Seven Heaven Weir YouTube video has now accumulated something in the region of 35,000 views. Thirty-five thousand! I struggle to get thirty-five people to read one of my blog posts without threatening them with violence, yet Nic is now apparently an internet sensation and presumably spends his evenings signing autographs on luncheon meat tins.

I imagine the phone has been ringing constantly with offers of television work, book deals and Hollywood adaptations, although knowing Nic it is probably just somebody asking if he can guide them on the Wye. Still, fame is fame, and if he isn't signing autographs somewhere, he is probably guiding anglers around the River Wye and pointing knowingly at things while saying, "There's usually a fish there."

This, however, is Nic's manor, so to speak, and there aren't many people who know this particular stretch of river as intimately as he does. He knows the swims, the depth changes, the snags, the banks, the bits you can walk down without falling into the river and, most importantly, the bits where a barbel might actually be persuaded to put its head above the parapet.

After a considerable amount of badgering, nagging, whining and what I would describe as perfectly reasonable persistence, Nic eventually succumbed to my moaning. We pencilled in a short evening session, nothing elaborate, just a few hours into dusk to see if we could winkle out a barbel.

I should point out that "short session" is now becoming something of a speciality of mine. Gone are the days when I could happily sit beside a river for fourteen hours contemplating the meaning of life while waiting for a quivertip to move three millimetres, because these days after about four hours my body starts filing formal complaints. There is something wonderfully appealing about a quick smash-and-grab session. Arrive, fish, hopefully catch something, pack up and go home before your knees start making noises normally associated with a Victorian staircase.

The Warwickshire Avon has had a bit of a bad wrap over the years, particularly where barbel are concerned. According to certain sections of social media, if a river isn't producing a seventeen-pound barbel every time somebody puts a lump of meat on a hook, it is apparently finished, deceased, buried and already being mourned by people who haven't actually fished it for five years. Social media has rather changed the way some people view fishing. If there isn't a photograph, a ridiculous hashtag, three hundred likes and somebody standing behind the fish looking as though they have just discovered the Ark of the Covenant, then apparently the fish didn't really count.

And if you are after barbel purely for the notoriety of catching them, then I suppose the Severn, Trent and Wye offer more obvious opportunities. There are considerably more whiskers swimming about in those rivers and, consequently, considerably more opportunities to produce the obligatory photograph of yourself holding one while staring into the middle distance as though you have just negotiated a particularly difficult hostage situation.

Of course, the Warwickshire Avon has had its problems, and some of them are very real indeed. Our furry friend the otter certainly hasn't helped matters over the years, although I suspect blaming everything on an otter is rather like blaming the state of British roads on one particularly badly driven Ford Fiesta.

Then there was the quite staggering fish kill in June 2024. The incident was attributed to an oxygen crash, with material washed into the river during storms also believed to have contributed to the problem, and the scale of it was genuinely upsetting. It wasn't ancient history either. This was a relatively recent and significant event, and when you see the consequences of something like that, you can't help wondering what the future holds for the river and the fish that call it home.

Yet despite all of that, more and more barbel seem to be showing at the moment, which is enormously encouraging news for those of us who live locally. There is something particularly satisfying about catching a good fish from a river that is practically on your doorstep rather than spending two hours driving across the country before you've even picked up a rod.

Don't get me wrong, I love travelling to fish, but there comes a point when you question whether the seventeen-pound barbel is actually worth the diesel, motorway coffee, toll roads, parking charges and the gradual deterioration of your spine.

If instant results and trophy shots for Instagram are your primary objectives, then perhaps the Avon isn't necessarily the river for you. 

Unless, of course, your name is James Forty Rivers Denison, in which case you probably turn up at a puddle behind a garden centre and somehow catch a barbel that requires a wheelbarrow. 

His 40 river challenge will be ticked off by this time next year if he keeps his recent momentum up, keep at it James !! I look forward to the book !!

For the rest of us mere mortals, the Avon offers something slightly different. You have to put the time in, accept that some sessions will produce absolutely nothing and understand that the river isn't particularly interested in your social media engagement statistics.

And that is precisely why I like it.

There is something very appealing about fishing a river where you aren't guaranteed anything. You can walk miles, fish perfectly, put the right bait in exactly the right place and still go home with nothing more than a slightly damp sandwich and the suspicion that the fish were laughing at you from underneath a tree root. This season I have actually been doing reasonably well, I must admit. I've had some nice barbel from the Avon, with my best so far an ounce or so over twelve pounds, which isn't a bad fish at all and certainly gives the scales something worthwhile to do.

Naturally, however, once you catch a twelve-pounder you immediately stop being grateful for catching a twelve-pounder and start wondering where the fourteen-pounder is. This is one of the many wonderful psychological defects associated with fishing. You could catch the fish of a lifetime and by the time you've driven home you are already wondering whether it had a brother.

The Avon has bigger fish, without doubt, and that is what keeps me interested. Somewhere underneath those roots, behind those snags or tucked beneath an undercut bank is a barbel that could potentially make the twelve-pounder look like a junior member of the family.

I just need to persuade it to eat something with a hook in it.

The problem, if you can call it that, is that the Avon is often gin clear. During daylight the fish can see everything, and I mean everything. They probably know what brand of hooklength you are using before you've even finished tying the knot.

You can stand on the bank and stare into the water and see weed, stones, branches, gravel, fish and, if you're unlucky, your own reflection looking increasingly desperate.

But as the light fades, everything changes.

Those fish that have spent the afternoon hiding in snags, tucked beneath overhanging branches or sheltering underneath undercut banks begin to venture out. The river takes on that wonderful evening feel where the light disappears, the birds quieten down and suddenly you start thinking that perhaps, just perhaps, tonight could be the night.

Of course, every angler knows this feeling.

It is the same feeling that has emptied thousands of bank accounts and caused millions of unnecessary purchases from tackle shops.

You sit there thinking, "This is it."

Then three hours later you are packing up thinking, "Why did I think this was it?"

Still, that is fishing.

Nic and I planned to meet up, walk the bank for a nose around and have a look at what was happening before settling into a swim. There is something to be said for walking the river before fishing it, particularly on the Avon, because things change and what looked perfect six months ago can now look like somewhere you'd store a stolen bicycle.

The walk also gives you an opportunity to peer into likely areas, look for signs of fish and, most importantly, pretend that you are doing something productive rather than simply wandering around with a fishing rod.

Nic, naturally, was much more knowledgeable than me. He'd point at a bit of slack water and say something along the lines of, "There'll be one under there."

I'd look at it and think, "It looks like water."

This is the difference between somebody who knows a river intimately and somebody who has spent most of his life asking, "Do you reckon there are any fish in there?" 

Eventually we settled on a couple of swims which both of us had not fished before and started getting ourselves organised. There was nothing particularly complicated about the plan. A sensible bait, sensible tackle, a sensible amount of optimism and a complete absence of anything remotely sensible about our expectations.

The objective was simply to put a bait where a barbel might find it once darkness arrived. That sounds easy enough, but of course anglers have an extraordinary ability to turn the simplest possible activity into something resembling a military operation. 

Rods come out, alarms are attached, leads are selected, hooks are checked, bags are opened and closed repeatedly and at some point somebody inevitably says, "Where's my scissors?"

Nobody knows. They are always somewhere. Usually in the hand of the person asking where they are.

As daylight began to disappear, the Avon started to change character. The crystal-clear water that had looked almost sterile earlier in the evening suddenly became dark and mysterious, and the snags along the margins began to look less like bits of wood and more like very effective fish-holding machinery. 

This is when I really like the Avon. There is no guarantee of a bite, but there is always that possibility. The whole river seems to come alive just when you can no longer see what's going on. And that, of course, is when your imagination gets involved. 

Every little pluck becomes a barbel. Every knock becomes a barbel. A leaf hitting the line becomes a barbel. A distant owl becomes, somehow, a barbel. You sit there staring at the rod tip convinced that it has moved when, in reality, it hasn't moved at all. It is simply your eyesight slowly giving up. Now, we'd chosen an area with cover and lots of it, decent pace despite the low conditions and some streamer weed in and around the swim. A nice dink on the bottom too, so at least we knew we both had the baits presented correctly. 

The beauty of fishing into dusk is that you don't actually need much to happen before the excitement levels rise. A slight movement, a single liner or a tiny change in the position of the rod tip is enough to have you sitting upright like somebody has just shouted "free beer". Nic, being far more experienced on this stretch, was naturally far more relaxed. I was considerably less relaxed. This is partly because I wanted a barbel and partly because I had already mentally written the blog. This is another problem with fishing.

You don't just have to catch the fish; you have to remember what happened, where it happened, what bait you used, what the weather was doing, what Nic said, what you said and whether the fish looked sufficiently impressive when photographed. The fish, meanwhile, is simply trying to eat dinner without becoming a blog post. As the darkness properly arrived, the river became almost completely invisible.

The noise of the water increased, the banks disappeared into shadow and the whole place became wonderfully atmospheric. Somewhere out there were barbel. We just had to convince one of them that our bait was a better proposition than whatever else was naturally available.

That is the wonderful thing about the Avon. You aren't surrounded by bivvies (unless you're on the other bank), tripods, twenty rods and enough tackle to outfit a small expedition. 

It can be wonderfully simple. Two anglers, two rods, a river and the faint possibility of a barbel. No drama. No pressure. No expectation. 

Well, apart from the expectation that I was going to catch one. Which, when you think about it, is quite a lot of expectation. Still, that was the plan and we settled down to see what happened. The Avon was doing what the Avon does best: flowing quietly through the lowlight while keeping its secrets firmly to itself.

And somewhere beneath the black surface, possibly under a snag, possibly beneath an undercut bank, was a barbel that had absolutely no idea that two idiots were sitting on the bank waiting for it. Hopefully, before the evening was over, we'd introduce ourselves.

Jesus Mick, stop with the waffle !!!

The sunset was particularly vibrant, which was rather inconvenient given that our club has recently reminded us that there is to be no night fishing, a rule which, to be fair, has always existed but has presumably been rediscovered after a few members decided that “until dusk” was actually shorthand for “until the milkman starts his morning round”. 

The problem, however, was that nobody had actually bothered to quantify what constitutes night fishing, other than the wonderfully scientific explanation that fishing into dusk is fine and “night fishing is when it is fully dark”, which leaves us with the slightly awkward business of deciding precisely when fully dark actually is.

According to the astronomical boffins, properly fully dark means the Sun has disappeared more than 18 degrees below the horizon, thereby bringing astronomical twilight to an end, which on this particular evening would have been somewhere between 8.45pm and 9.15pm, depending on which bit of the planet, calendar or celestial calculator you happened to believe. Sunset had been at 7.02pm, so technically we could have been sitting there quite legally for another hour and three quarters, but our own interpretation of the regulations was considerably less ambitious and we had decided that half an hour after dusk was probably a good time to pack up before somebody appeared from the bushes with a clipboard and a torch.

Anyway, enough astronomical nonsense, because we were there to catch fish rather than discuss the orbital mechanics of a medium-sized star, and there were certain swims along this stretch where the fish have a habit of switching on almost as soon as the light disappears. The trouble was that in the run-up to dusk both Nic and I were getting absolutely nothing apart from the occasional tentative nibble, which is the angling equivalent of receiving a text from someone saying “we need to talk” and then waiting for the inevitable disappointment.

I wasn't particularly optimistic, although optimism in fishing is usually something you leave at home along with the sensible footwear and any realistic expectation of success. Then, almost precisely on cue, official dusk arrived and something changed in my swim, with one fish topping that looked suspiciously chub-like and the first little tremors appearing through the rod blank and, via the cork handle, directly into the side of my leg.

Nic's swim, meanwhile, remained about as lively as a library after closing time, and for the next twenty minutes I sat on my hands rather than striking at every tiny movement, largely because I had already convinced myself that every twitch was either a fish or an overexcited piece of weed. Eventually those short pulls developed into something considerably more convincing, the rod arched over and suddenly I had a proper bite, a proper fish and the sort of excitement that makes all the earlier staring at an unmoving quivertip seem entirely worthwhile.

Initially I thought it was a chub, which would have fitted the circumstances rather nicely, but then Sean from Snagged Bro!! appeared over my shoulder like some sort of nocturnal fishing apparition and, under the beam of the headtorch, the truth was revealed. It wasn't a chub at all but a bream, which isn't quite the glorious climax you imagine when the rod suddenly folds over in the gathering darkness, but at least it was a fish and therefore officially better than sitting there catching absolutely nothing.

By this stage the curfew was creeping towards us, Nic remained resolutely biteless and I had one bream in the net, which meant there wasn't really any argument for hanging around other than the usual angler's belief that the next bite is always going to be the one that changes everything. We decided to call it a night, although I remain convinced that had we stayed another half hour the swim would have erupted into a frenzy of feeding fish, with the only thing stopping us being the club rules, common sense and possibly the police.

The thing is, I've always found that little window around dusk, and particularly the period immediately afterwards, can be when the magic happens, with fish suddenly appearing as if somebody has flicked a switch marked FEED NOW. Tonight was a perfect example, albeit one where the magic apparently came with a fairly strict time limit and only issued one bream as a complimentary sample.

So that's another swim on the stretch explored, another peg crossed off the list and another little piece of information filed away in the increasingly untidy cabinet of fishing experience. Nic has now added his swim to the official “don't bother” list, while I've learned that mine might be worth another go when the light fades, preferably before the astronomical definition of night catches up with the club's considerably more practical one.

Still, it was good to catch up and have a proper evening beside the water, even if Nic managed to blank while I somehow scraped together a bream and an inflated sense of achievement. Next time we'll try different pegs, keep our eyes on the light and see whether the magic decides to put in another appearance, although knowing my luck it'll probably arrive eleven minutes after we've packed the rods away.

Warwickshire Avon - Breadonomics and Buffoonery

There are few things in angling quite as satisfying or quite as nerve-racking as watching a great slab of floating crust drift lazily towards a summer chub that has already spotted you before you've even spotted it. Clear water has a habit of making an angler feel like he's wearing a fluorescent jacket and tap shoes, while the chub sits beneath an overhanging bush looking as suspicious as a home office inspector at a cash-only car wash in Coventry.

Chub have earned their reputation for caution over generations of surviving everything that rivers, predators and anglers can throw at them. Every shadow, every misplaced footstep and every badly aimed cast is carefully logged in that thick skull of theirs before they make the unanimous committee decision to disappear in a puff of silt.

Yet for all their apparent paranoia, chub possess one wonderfully exploitable weakness: greed. They can spend five minutes inspecting a crust with the concentration of an art critic before suddenly deciding that if they don't eat it immediately, another chub surely will.

That's precisely why floating bread is such a deadly summer tactic when the water resembles polished glass. Instead of trying to convince a wary fish to grub about on the bottom, you're simply offering what looks like an easy, natural meal drifting straight into its dining room. No Heath Robinson tactics here, a hook and a piece of bread. 

The beauty of surface fishing is that you become part angler and part theatre audience. Every drift carries the possibility of a fish rising with all the stealth of a submarine or all the subtlety of an overeager Staffy chasing a sausage.

Of course, presenting the bread is only half the battle. The other half involves resisting the overwhelming urge to strike the instant you see a pair of white lips appear beneath the crust, because chub have an uncanny talent for making you look ridiculous while they calmly mouth your bait and spit it back out.

Summer chub are often at their most relaxed during warm, settled conditions when insects, seeds and all manner of edible morsels are constantly dropping into the river. In those moments their guard, though never completely lowered, slips just enough for confidence to overcome caution, and that's exactly the opportunity the patient floater angler waits for.

Stealth is everything, mind you. Crawl if you must, wear dull clothing and avoid skylining yourself on the bank, because the average clear-water chub seems capable of detecting a badly tied shoelace from twenty yards away.

When it all comes together, though, surface fishing for chub is one of angling's purest spectacles. There is no quivertip to stare at, no electronic gadget to beep, just a drifting crust, a widening bow wave and the sort of heart-thumping anticipation that reminds you why people become hopelessly addicted to rivers in the first place.

And when that great bronze flank finally rolls beneath the bread before engulfing it with glorious confidence, you'll almost convince yourself you've outwitted the cleverest fish in the river. The truth, of course, is that the chub simply forgot to be suspicious for five glorious seconds which, thankfully for us, is usually about four seconds longer than we actually need.

People often tell me how lucky I am because I finish at lunchtime on a Friday. What they conveniently forget is that by then I've already ticked off forty-three of my forty-five hours, so it's hardly an early finish. It's more like being let out for good behaviour after serving a full sentence.

The good news is there is finally some light at the end of a very long tunnel. In another four and a bit years I'll be hanging my work boots up for good after forty years of graft. I suppose you could call it early retirement, although after four decades of work I think I've earned the right to swap deadlines for dawns on the river.

To be fair, work hasn't been all doom and gloom over the years. I've had some cracking jobs, met some brilliant people and built up such a good network in angling that I'm forever turning work down these days. I never imagined I'd reach a point where I'd rather spend an afternoon watching a piece of bread drift downstream than earning another few quid, but that's exactly where I've ended up.

Anyway, enough about work because fishing is far more interesting. I headed over to the Warwickshire Avon where Nic from Avon Angling was guiding Patron and blog reader Richard Clapp not too far away. Before long they wandered over looking suspiciously pleased with themselves, which is never a good sign when you're still waiting for your first proper chance.

They had managed around eighteen fish in just three hours for something like sixty pounds of fish trotting maggots. Sixty pounds is an incredible catch by anyone's standards and the aerial footage made it look like somebody had tipped a giant pan of chub soup into the river but you will have to wait for the video. Everywhere you looked there seemed to be fish, and they were certainly making the most of the bread going in.

My own session wasn't quite so hectic, but I wasn't complaining. I managed three lovely chub from around the weir, the best going four and a half pounds with the smallest around the three-pound mark. They're such spooky fish that once you've caught one from a particular spot, the rest disappear as though somebody has sounded the underwater fire alarm.

One fish came from the slack water after I'd watched the smaller fish demolish every floating crust I threw at them. 

I changed to a slow-sinking piece of bread and that proved too much for one decent chub to ignore. It drifted down naturally and the fish confidently took it without a second thought, which unfortunately turned out to be a very expensive mistake.

Later on I wandered beyond the weir and stumbled across a group of big chub in what could only be described as a suicidal swim, yes I took a video, but didn't bother trying to catch one. 

They happily shared almost an entire loaf of bread between them without showing the slightest bit of caution. Greedy doesn't even begin to describe them, and if bread had feelings it would probably have reported them for bullying.

Not far away several big bream were cruising lazily around some lily pads. They looked settled and catchable until a narrowboat came chugging through with all the subtlety of a bulldozer. 

Within seconds every single bream had vanished, leaving me wondering whether they'd swum off or simply evaporated.

We eventually wandered back towards the weir, chatting away about fishing, rivers and all the usual nonsense that anglers somehow find endlessly entertaining. 

Sometimes the company is every bit as enjoyable as the fishing itself, especially when everyone is catching fish and taking the mickey out of each other. It certainly beats talking about work.

Back at the weir the smaller fish were still attacking every floating piece of bread that landed on the surface. I flicked a slow-sinking piece right over the top of them and watched it drift gently beneath the commotion. A decent chub calmly peeled away from the cover and inhaled it without hesitation, proving once again that simple fishing often works best.

All in all it was only a couple of hours on the bank, but it was time well spent. Good company, a handful of lovely chub and plenty of laughs are more than enough to keep me smiling. Roll on the next trip because if retirement is going to look anything like this, those remaining four years might just fly by.

Warwickshire Avon - Salt-Guns and Salamandroids

Well, if the Met Office are to be believed, Stratford-upon-Avon could be nudging 40 degrees this week. Forty! That's not weather for Warwickshire; that's weather for lizards, tourists with regrettable sunburn, and blokes who insist on wearing socks with sandals. I spent most of the morning wondering whether to fill the bird bath or simply climb into it myself.

The talk everywhere seems to be air-conditioning. A few years ago, buying an air-conditioning unit in Britain felt about as necessary as owning a snowplough in the Sahara. Now I'm finding myself browsing appliance websites with the same urgency normally reserved for bait orders and discounted fishing tackle. The nation's gone from discussing drizzle to comparing BTU ratings in the space of a fortnight.

As for the fishing, common sense may have to prevail. When the river feels more like the warm shallow seas of Ayia Napa than a flowing watercourse, it's hard to justify chasing barbel around. They fight like demons at the best of times, and in these conditions with lower oxygen levels you can't help but wonder who's really enjoying the experience. Probably not the fish. Probably not the angler either once he's melted into a puddle on the riverbank.

So, for now, the rods may remain in the garage after this session while I seek refuge in the shade, clutching a cold drink and keeping one eye on the thermometer. If this carries on much longer, Shakespeare's birthplace will need palm trees, and I'll need that air-conditioning unit after all.

Now ordinarily, I’m a man of absolute peace. Give me a lukewarm flask of tea, a pack of maggots that are crawling suspiciously faster than they should, and a quiet swim on the Warwickshire Avon, and I am content. But during a recent heatwave session on a sneaky stretch of the canal, I wasn’t just doing battle with the local zander. I was the primary target for a merciless, bloodthirsty squadron of Warwickshire mosquitoes. 

I’m talking about the kind of airborne pests that laugh at insect repellent. After stopping counting at about 35 bites, I sat on my chair, scratching like a dog with fleas, and thought: there has to be a mechanical solution to this biological warfare. Enter an engineer mate of mine. Engineers don’t look at bugs the way normal people do. They don’t see an annoyance; they see a ballistics deficit.

“Mick,” he said, eyes gleaming with the manic energy of a man who spends his lunch breaks analysing stress-strain curves. “You need a laser guided Bug-A-Salt 3.0. It leverages compressed spring kinetics to atomise standard sodium chloride crystals. It’s pure mechanical genius.” Naturally, I was sceptical. As an angler, I’m used to precision mechanics the buttery click of a high-end centrepin reel, the perfect taper of a carbon Avon rod.

But watching an engineer examine this plastic fly-swatter alternative is a different sort of entertainment altogether. 

When it turned up a few days later I was practically drooling over the tolerances of the pump-action mechanism and the fluid dynamics of the salt hopper.

“Look at the safety cross-bolt engagement,! Look at the elevation on the Patridge sight!”

Then a massive horsefly landed squarely on my bait box, eyeing up my red maggots like a hungry Brummie at a kebab van. 

I racked the pump a satisfying clack-clack that felt like closing the breech on an expensive piece of kit sighted down the barrel, and pulled the trigger.

Pfft!

No toxic spray. No chemical stink to ruin my hookbaits. Just a tiny puff of table salt and one very neutralised horsefly dropped onto the towpath without a single splatter.

Clean execution.

If I can’t bait-boat my way out of a mosquito frenzy, at least I can anti-air weapon my way through it. It leaves a pinch of salt on the grass, but frankly, if a few grains land in the water, I’ll just call it pre-baiting for the next incoming shoal. I might even try loading it with fine garlic salt next time give the canal roach a bit of seasoning before they even see the hook.

Tight lines, and keep your hopper dry.

Anyway over a week now into the river season and, as is traditional, I found myself undertaking what sounded far grander than it actually was: a reconnaissance mission. In reality this involved driving around Warwickshire in a Suzuki Jimny looking for somewhere nice to sit and occasionally throw bits of fish food into a river.

This new venue (to me)  in question came recommended by a blog reader whom I've bumped into on a couple of occasions. Hi Baz !!

This is hardly surprising as we both seem to suffer from the same affliction: an overwhelming desire to avoid other anglers. 

If there were a syndicate called "The Society for the Preservation of Peace, Quiet and Not Being Bothered" we'd probably both be committee members.

The stretch itself ticked all the important boxes. It was less than nine miles away, fifteen minutes from home and involved a route consisting mainly of country lanes narrow enough to make you question whether modern vehicles were a mistake and be thankful the Jimny is unconventional . 

Most importantly, it offered that rare combination of solitude, wildlife and the realistic possibility of not hearing somebody else's bite alarm rendition of a submarine emergency.

What had really piqued my interest though was the untapped zander potential. The thought of improving my personal best had lodged itself firmly in my mind. This is dangerous because anglers are remarkably skilled at convincing themselves that fish they've never seen definitely exist and are probably enormous.

Google Maps only tells you so much, but what I could see looked promising. Better still, the entire 600-metre stretch was accessible by vehicle. The little Jimny would be in its natural habitat. Some people buy four-wheel drives to conquer mountain ranges. Mine spends most of its time transporting pellets, flasks and unrealistic expectations, but unlike many 4x4 users these days, it often does what it is designed to do.

Being able to park virtually on top of the swim is a massive advantage for short sessions. The older I get, the more I appreciate a fishing venue where the walk from car to river doesn't require expedition supplies, sherpas and a farewell letter to loved ones.

There was no rush. Dusk wasn't until after 10.00pm and with the heat wave kicking in soon about the best opportunity I had all week for a dangle, leaving plenty of time for a proper look around. I checked the water temperature which was 23 degrees 😯 I wandered from swim to swim, peering into the water with all the confidence of a man who was largely making things up as he went along. Every crease looked fishy. Every glide looked fishy. Every snag looked fishy. In fact everything looked fishy, which was fortunate considering it was a river.

I scanned the deeper in a few areas and it's a fairy uniform depth with lots of character, lily pads and weed in lots of area but clean gravel also which was nice to see.

Eventually I settled on a swim that looked suitably fishy. I can't adequately define what "fish" means but experienced anglers will understand. It's a bit like house hunting. You walk in, look around and immediately decide whether you'd live there despite having absolutely no logical basis for the conclusion. Well, ok I confess I had a few swims to try from Baz. 

Tactics were kept pleasingly simple. A concentrated patch of bait delivered via a PVA bag, some homemade paste making its appearance again and, on the hair, an ever-reliable Robin Red pellet. It had served me faithfully last season and I see no reason to abandon a successful partnership. Unlike several football managers, the pellet has never let me down.

To get things started I introduced a bait dropper full of hemp and small pellets before allowing the swim to rest. This sounds wonderfully tactical and scientific. In truth it mainly gave me an excuse to sit down, drink cold water and stare at the river whilst pretending important things were happening beneath the surface.

The jungle drums on the WBAS WhatsApp group had been beating loudly since the start of the season. Rumours suggested the barbel were preoccupied with spawning activities when the drawbridge came up on the 16th and therefore maybe less interested in my carefully prepared offerings. They may well have more pressing matters on their minds than helping me improve my catch reports, but to be honest with the water temp as it is, they can wait for a while. 

It's difficult to compete with romance.

Still, I remained optimistic. If sure the barbel still could well be engaged in their annual bout of bukkake despite waiting over a week since they had been spotted on various rivers, that or chilling in the weirs because of the heat, perhaps a bream might wander past or a nice bream, Chub are wonderfully accommodating creatures. While barbel often behave like celebrities surrounded by security staff, chub are more akin to that bloke in the pub who'll happily stop for a chat with anyone.

Anyway as the evening settled and the shadows lengthened, I sat quietly beside a stretch of river I'd never fished before. Not that much traffic noise. No crowds. No distractions. Just birdsong, flowing water and the comforting knowledge that somewhere beneath the surface there might be a specimen fish, absolutely nothing whatsoever.

Which, when you think about it, is one of the many reasons fishing remains such a splendidly ridiculous pastime.

With the heat of the day finally ebbing away, it was surprising just how quickly the water temperature dropped. Over a couple of hours it shed more than two degrees, helped no doubt by the steady rain that accompanied the first part of the session. Despite looking promising, very little happened early on and the river remained stubbornly quiet.

Things livened up when the bats emerged. For the best part of half an hour they seemed intent on colliding with the line, rattling the rod tip often enough to keep me guessing. More than once the tip flicked round in a way that would have convinced anyone a fish was attached. Eventually dusk deepened and the bats moved elsewhere, leaving the river to settle once more.

Not long after came a proper whack on the rod. The tip sprang into life with a series of sharp knocks, though nothing really committed itself. A strike connected with something, but the culprit proved to be a tiny chublet whose ambition far outweighed its size. It was quickly swung to hand and admired before being returned.

Another fifteen minutes passed without further action, so that was that. Even so, the stretch looks full of promise, particularly for predators, and I'm keen to spend more time exploring it when conditions improve. For now, with the heatwave set to tighten its grip again, it's a case of sitting it out and looking ahead to a cooler weekend.

Canal Roach: Trapped in a Sisyphean Loop - Pt.5

There are moments in life when you begin to question your own sanity, and mine came somewhere between the carrot shelf and the reduced meat section in Aldi. Now, I’m not saying I’m easily excitable, but when you see perfectly respectable vegetables—carrots, garlic, swede, and potatoes (8p) practically being given away like unwanted raffle prizes at a village fête, you do start to wonder if you’ve accidentally wandered into some sort of alternate universe. 

Naturally, I filled the basket with the urgency of a man preparing for the apocalypse. Then came the beef—half price, £7 a kilo, practically winking at me. It was destiny. That beef didn’t choose me, I chose it… repeatedly… until it was in the trolley.

Of course, all this bounty would usually signal one thing in our household: the sacred Sunday roast. A ritual so consistent that even Ben knows to loiter strategically near the table around 5:30pm. However, fate had other ideas this week. 

While the wife and kids were likely dreaming of crispy roast potatoes and gravy lakes, I had other commitments—namely, a jaunt to Brum to meet my mate Simon. Plans included a few drinks (purely for hydration purposes), some Korean food, and an ACID house gig where 808 State would be twiddling knobs with the sort of enthusiasm usually reserved for men assembling flat-pack furniture. The legendary Hare and Hounds in Kings Heath would be our playground. Roast pork, therefore, has been unceremoniously postponed to Monday. The family will survive. Probably.

Now, before all that urban revelry, I had a far more noble pursuit in mind: fishing. The South Stratford Canal has always been a bit of a favourite—intimate, peaceful, and just the right amount of “I might actually catch something here.” But in a rare moment of adventurous thinking (clearly a mistake), I decided to try a different stretch on the Grand Union Canal. 

It offered a bit of shelter from the wind, which, after the previous night’s visit from what I’ve decided to call Storm Dave, felt like a sensible move. At one point the wife and I stood outside with a glass of wine, staring into the gale like extras in a low-budget disaster film, fully expecting the roof to take flight.

I arrived at the canal at the ungodly hour of 6:30am, which for me is essentially the middle of the night. Spirits were high, optimism intact, and my back… well, my back had other plans. In a spectacular display of athletic incompetence, I managed to tweak it while getting the tackle out of the car. Nothing dramatic, just enough to remind me that my body is now less “elite angler” and more “fragile antique.” Still, onward we marched—or shuffled—into battle.

The first swim is usually a banker. A few casts, a bit of groundbait, maggots doing their thing, and before you know it, you’re into a nice run of fish. Not today. Forty-five minutes passed with absolutely nothing happening. Not even a courtesy nibble. It was like fishing in a bathtub. Normally I’d have moved on much sooner, but the combination of sunshine and a mildly broken back made sitting down seem like a tactical masterstroke rather than laziness.

Eventually, I embraced the inevitable and went on the rove, trying swim after swim with the same result: absolutely naff all. The predator rod sat there looking decorative, the maggots remained insultingly untouched, and I began to suspect I’d somehow offended the fishing gods. Perhaps they’d heard about the Aldi haul and decided I’d had enough luck for one weekend.

In a final act of desperation, I headed to a known zander spot. The “last throw of the dice” scenario. A smelt went out on a circle hook, and for a glorious moment—finally—the float twitched, dipped, and sprang to life. 

Fish on! The zander, clearly unaware it was supposed to behave like a zander, fought like an overexcited chub, darting about under my feet as if auditioning for a circus act. I guided it in, heart pounding, net at the ready… and off it came. Gone. Vanished. Probably laughing.

To be fair, it wasn’t a monster maybe a 2lber, but it would have saved the blank and restored some dignity. Instead, I was left staring at the water like a man who’s just dropped his last chip down the side of the sofa. One final swim on the way back to the car yielded exactly what I’d come to expect by this point: nothing. Not a bite. Not a flicker. Not even a fishy insult. Just me, my thoughts, and a growing suspicion that maggots had suddenly become deeply unpopular overnight.

So there we have it. A morning that promised much and delivered the square root of absolutely nothing. Still, there’s always next time… assuming my back recovers, the fishing gods forgive me, and Aldi hasn’t sold out of everything worth eating.

And if not, well, there’s always Monday’s roast pork to look forward to. Assuming the rabble haven’t staged a revolt by then.

Warwickshire Avon - Magniloquence and Marginality (PB Content)

Fishing, I have long suspected, is a sport designed specifically to test the structural integrity of a man’s optimism. It lures you in with pastoral promises and then batters you about the head with wind, rain, rising water and the occasional two-ounce gudgeon that hooks itself in the nostril and looks at you as if to say, “Really? This is what you came for?” And yet we persist. We watch river levels like Victorian astronomers scanning the heavens, convinced that this time this precise alignment of rainfall, temperature and domestic scheduling will produce something magnificent.

The week in question had been one of those dreary, damp sagas where every river within sensible driving distance had decided to impersonate a minor ocean. The Arrow and the Alne were not merely up; they were exploring neighbouring counties. The only sliver of hope lay with the dear old Warwickshire Avon, which was high, yes, but not yet in the sort of mood where it tries to repossess your landing net. It was creeping upward, slow and ominous, like a cat preparing to leap onto a shelf full of heirlooms.

Now, I am not a man prone to gossip, but when Nic of Avon Angling was messaging me 24 hours before and  he'd “bagged up” to the tune of 30lb of chub, including a brace of fives and a four, trotting maggots one listens. One leans in. One abandons all previous life plans and begins reorganising the boot of the car with the urgency of a Formula One pit crew. “Get out there,” he said. “It’s great conditions.” Which, translated from Tackle-Shop Optimism into English, means: “You might catch something memorable, provided you don’t drown.” I tend to fish maggots now rather than bread for chub as it's less messy for starters but it just works when the conditions are right. 

As luck would have it, I finished work at midday on Friday. This is the sort of blessing that should be commemorated in stained glass. However, fishing time was to be rationed like wartime sugar because my wife had yoga at 5:30pm, meaning I needed to be home by 5:15pm to assume control of the household orchestra, conducted entirely in the key of chaos. Thus the window of opportunity was narrow more arrow slit than bay window.

Undeterred, I selected a stretch known for barbel, reasoning that the double-figure temperatures might have stirred them from their winter sulk. It was a 45-minute drive, which in angling mathematics leaves approximately 23 minutes of actual fishing once you factor in faffing, tea-pouring and the ceremonial staring at the river as though it might offer guidance. The upstream gauges were rising at a pace best described as “ambitious,” but hope is a stubborn weed in the angler’s garden.

Upon arrival, the car park resembled a modest trade fair for waterproof clothing. Vans lined up like damp pilgrims. Two of my favoured pegs were already occupied by men who clearly shared my hydrological obsession. I performed the customary wander hands in pockets, nodding sagely at nothing in particular before trudging downstream to a wider, steadier stretch. Here, the river flowed with a lovely, even pace. Upstream looked like it was auditioning for a disaster documentary; down here it was positively civilised.

Trotting it was, and then a go for the barbel at the end.

I fed maggots for a good fifteen minutes, sprinkling them with the reverence of a man sowing the seeds of destiny. A size 20 Guru hook nominally a 20 but in reality something closer to a 16 unless you’re measuring with electron microscopes adorned with two bronze maggots. First trot: nothing. Second trot: the float dipped with purpose and I lifted into a solid, reassuring thump.

A chub of about a pound and a half.

Reader, after a run of blanks that had me contemplating selling my rods and investing in a set of golf clubs (imagine the horror me discussing handicaps rather than hooklinks), this felt like redemption. Next cast: another. Then another. 

The float buried with cheerful regularity, and soon I was in that rare state of angling bliss where you stop thinking about river gauges, domestic curfews and existential dread. In the first hour I landed six or seven chub of similar stamp solid, silvery, obliging creatures with faces that suggest mild disapproval.

And then, just as I was congratulating myself on my tactical brilliance, the float vanished in a manner that suggested something far more serious than another pound-and-a-half specimen had taken an interest. I struck into what can only be described as a moving sandbag. No rattling head shakes, no frantic darting just immense, implacable weight hugging the bottom.

“Barbel,” I whispered to myself, because hope is incurable.

I coaxed it upstream, rod hooped, heart thundering. Inch by inch it came, resisting with the quiet authority of something that has paid its council tax for decades. And then, in the olive-green water beneath the rod tip, it surfaced.

Good grief.

It was a chub. But not the sort one casually swings in while discussing the weather. This was a chub that had clearly made excellent life choices. Long, broad-backed, pale flanks gleaming in the muted light. When it saw me it bolted, as if suddenly remembering an urgent appointment elsewhere. I managed to turn it somewhere between panic and prayer and gradually it conceded. Into the net it slid, vast and magnificent, like a bronzed log with opinions.

On the bank it looked even bigger. The sort of fish that makes you glance around to ensure witnesses are present. Surely this would be a new personal best? The scales were produced with trembling hands. 6lb 1oz.

It didn’t beat my all-tackle PB. But it did nudge past my float-caught best by a 6 ounces. The narrowest of margins it didn't beat my overall PB, but in angling terms that’s the difference between “quite pleased” and “insufferable for at least a fortnight.” I admired it in the rain because of course it had begun raining properly now, the heavens choosing this moment to re-enact the Great Flood before slipping it back to sulk beneath some tree roots.

With the maggots becoming increasingly enthusiastic about escape and the swim beginning to resemble a developing wetland, I switched to the barbel gear. By now the river was rising with alarming enthusiasm. The margin crept closer. The bank grew softer. Each step made a noise like a sponge contemplating its life choices.

I persisted.

A two-pound chub took the barbel bait with surprising gusto, followed by a bream that bit like a steam train and fought like a resigned cushion. 

The water continued its climb. Debris sailed past with increasing frequency twigs, leaves, possibly someone’s garden furniture. 

I fished right up to curfew, glancing at my watch with the anxiety of a man who knows yoga ends promptly and children expect dinner with alarming regularity.

No barbel came to the net.

And yet, as I packed away in the drizzle, boots squelching, net dripping, I felt absurdly content. 

Because fishing is not, in truth, about the relentless pursuit of whiskered leviathans. It is about moments. The float sliding under. The sudden, immovable weight. The sight of a truly exceptional chub materialising from coloured water like a myth made flesh.

The Warwickshire Avon will likely be over its banks tomorrow, strutting about the floodplain like it owns the place. I will no doubt be poring over gauges again, convincing myself that floodwater barbel are not just possible but practically inevitable.

I will probably get soaked. I may blank. I may once again threaten to take up golf.

But somewhere beneath that rising water swims a 6lb 1oz chub that, for one glorious Friday afternoon, made all the damp socks, frantic dashes home and hydrological obsessing entirely worthwhile. 

And that, dear readers, is quite enough to keep a man gloriously, hopelessly hooked.