Barbel From Yorkshire Rivers – Part 7 Winter

Fishing the Yorkshire Rivers for Barbel – Winter

WELL HERE I am writing another barbel article! I had intended to concentrate on chub and pike this winter, but the mild wet weather and coloured rivers have made life difficult. I finally succumbed and had a barbel session, although it was a bit of a last resort. Here’s what happened.

A flooded river Wharfe. This is my first swim and thesecond is below the tree downstream of me

Early one Saturday morning just after the recent storms I’m loading my car with tackle. Through a combination of work, personal circumstances and weather I’ve not been fishing for nearly a month and I think I’m getting serious withdrawal symptoms. I’ve been checking River Line for the past few days and whilst most of the Yorkshire rivers are bank high and still rising the Wharfe has dropped to about 2ft above normal and looks to be worth a try. I load my chub gear into the car, think for a moment and go back for a barbel rod and some pellets. This at least will give me an option if the river starts to come up again.

Where to fish?

I’ve got to go into work for a while, but work is on the way to the Wharfe and my plan is to do an hour or so then head for Easedyke later in the morning. When I’ve had my fill of jet engine components I ring round a few mates to see if any of them have up to date news of the river levels. Mick Beecroft informs me he’s at Easedyke where the river is rising rapidly and is already over 6ft up. Damn!

I contemplate heading for home, but decide to head down to Pool which is only 10 minutes away and have a look for myself. When I arrive the river is just starting to lap over the flood bank into the field so the whole of the middle and lower Wharfe will be a raging torrent. Again I contemplate heading for home, but I need to fish so I have another think before making a decision. This water is probably from last night’s rain which has swelled the last of the run off from Thursday’s storm. The weather has been mild so the water temperature will be high enough to give me a chance of a barbel, but where shall I fish? Mick is already at Easdyke and there aren’t too many swims on that stretch that will be fishable with the river at this height. After a bit of thought I decide to have a look at a club stretch above Boston Spa, which might be fishable.

It’s a lovely drive along the lower reaches of Wharfedale. The road plays tag with the river and I can see it gleaming across the fields to my left. As I approach Harewood I keep an eye open for the Red Kites which have been successfully reintroduced here, but I’m unlucky today. I’m soon pulling into an empty car park and I take a quick walk along the river. There looks to be a few fishable swims so I head back to the car for my gear. On closer inspection there are three likely looking swims, but this is a length I haven’t fished much before so I’ll be fishing blind without any prior knowledge of the fish holding spots. I decide to start in the top swim of the three and I put a handful of pellets into the other swims as I walk past. The area I’m fishing is a typical middle Wharfe ‘flat’. In normal conditions it’s wide, relatively slow flowing and not very deep. What near-bank slacks there are, if I remember rightly, are relatively shallow and there aren’t any ‘barbel bushes’ to act as obvious fish holding spots. In the present conditions the river is tanking through and very turbulent. I’m targeting crease swims with slightly slower smoother water on the near side.

Tackle and Bait

I tackle up with my standard floodwater rig of a cage feeder with a dead cow, a short hook length and a size 12 hook. In the feeder I’ll be fishing a mix of 4mm pellets, soaked for five minutes, drained and glugged with a generous helping of Source liquid. My hookbait will be an 11 mm halibut pellet.

Checking it out

Before fishing I cast around the swim with the empty feeder, counting it down to get an idea of the depth and leaving it out for a minute or so to check how it holds and how much rubbish is coming down. The feeder holds nicely just past the crease and counting it down shows a depth of about 6ft. Leaving it out for a couple of minutes I take the water temperature at 7.5C, convert this to Farenheit (46 F) and text it to Mick who hasn’t got a thermometer and still thinks in pounds, shillings and pence. Retrieving my feeder shows very little rubbish on my line, so I fill it with the pellets, band a halibut pellet on to my hook and recast.

Mick scores and I get a bite

I settle back in my chair, shielded from the brisk wind by the high bank opposite, and enjoy the weak warmth of the winter sun. Mick telephones me to tell me he’s had a barbel and while we are talking I see a slight twitch of the rod tip which could have been a fish. Nothing develops over the next 20 minutes so I recast and give it another half an hour without any action. Time to move.

The second swim is in a slight bay with a large alder at the upstream end. It looks a bit more turbulent than the first swim, but seems to be about a foot deeper. The turbulence looks to be caused by the trunk of the alder so I think the bottom layers of the water might be smoother. Again I cast around to check the contours of the swim and decide where I’m going to fish. This time I fish on the inside of the crease as the flow seems a bit smoother there.

Another move

Another hour without any action and I move to my third swim. This looked to be the best bet of the three, but it’s actually significantly shallower and my line collects a lot of rubbish. Twenty minutes convinces me I don’t stand much chance here so I go for a wander. The stretch is set in beautiful parkland, but the banks have been well tended in the past and there are few obvious features. I decide that I’ll have to try one of my first two swims again, but which one? I did have an indication of sorts in my first swim, but instinct tells me that the second swim is a better bet. Hmm….. Let’s go for the second swim then.

Back to the second swim

I move back upstream and settle into the swim. I notice the river has dropped a bit by now and the crease is less swirly. This time I drop the feeder just outside the crease into the main flow. I settle back again into my seat and wait. About 15 minutes later the rod tip nods twice and I lift into a fish. Initially I’m not sure it’s a barbel, but then it wakes up and sets off on a powerful run, nearly making the tree about 20 yards below me. I manage to turn it and it plods upstream on the edge of the flow. A few minute later I net a good fish which goes 8lb 5oz on the scales. The fish is very pale for a Wharfe barbel, probably due to the sustained high and coloured water over the past weeks. I take a quick picture and return her.

A nice winter Barbel

As I return to my seat I realise that it has gone very dark. A bright flash spikes my peripheral vision, is someone else taking a photo? A loud rumble indicates that it was probably lightning. Lightning? In January? More flashes and bangs announce the approach of a violent storm which I have the misfortune to be sitting directly in the path of. A loud splash to my left causes me to look round. Another splash to my right then a painful whack on my head.

No I haven’t spilt my White Chocolate boilies – it’s hail!

Lessons Learned

• River Line is a useful tool, but nothing beats a live report. I have a network of friends who I can call on, most of whom can be guaranteed to be fishing at sometime during a weekend. Build a network and use it.
• I’ve said it before, but it’s worth repeating: if you don’t go you don’t catch. I’ve now got into the habit of taking another set of gear to use if conditions change and, as I’m fishing spate rivers, they can change rapidly. In reality my chances of catching were probably less than 50:50, but if I hadn’t gone they would have been zero.
• I didn’t know the stretch I was fishing so had to be prepared to keep moving until I found fish. In the absence of any obvious fish holding features I looked for crease swims, preferably with smoother, steadier water on the inside of the crease. I explored each swim by casting around with an empty feeder before deciding where to fish.
• In situations like this I always use a feeder. I can feed lightly, but always ensure that there is a small patch of free offerings around my hook bait. probably cast less than 10 times during this session as I wanted to keep the feed to a minimum.
• I added to the smell of the pellets by glugging them with a flavour. In the relatively cool water temperatures this gave me a good trail of flavour to attract fish, but kept the amount of food in the swim low. If I was fishing to a known, or obvious, fish holding feature I wouldn’t bother with the flavour as the pellets would be smelly enough in their own right.

Well that’s probably it for my barbel fishing until the Summer. I’m going fishing again this weekend, but the forecast looks good for chub so I’ll be back on the trail of a Yorkshire 6 pounder. I’ll be packing my barbel gear just in case though…..