A Hard Habit to Kick

Wednesday night was intended to be my last Barbel session for a while and with the nights drawing in my last chance for an evening by the river. The chosen venue was my usual stretch of the Warwickshire Avon but this time I set up in a swim that I have never fished before. Pellet on one rod and luncheon meat on the other. Within half an hour the luncheon meat was snaffled and a powerful fish set off on a run so powerful that I had to put on a huge amount of pressure to slow it down. It worked to an extent but then the unseen adversary ran again and then again for a third time which took it through some snags and the ten pound line parted, gutted! It felt like a big fish.
I fished on but that was the only action of the night apart from a few visits from a cute wee mouse who was after some luncheon meat and I didn't disappoint him.

That lost fish reignited my waning passion for fighting Barbel so on Friday I returned to try and gain some revenge for that lost specimen.

I started in the same swim but after several fruitless hours I moved to try and salvage something from the session. The second swim proved equally quiet but then the third area I visited finally produced. By now the luncheon meat rod had been ditched and I was fishing just the one rod. Two eight millimetre pellets glued onto the hair, a pva bag of free offerings on the hook and an open ended feeder filled with more pellets and ground bait creating a stream of attractant flowing down to the bait.
First to the bait were Chub and I landed a small one of about three pound.

Twenty minutes later and I finally hooked into the target species, no monster but I was relieved to land a Barbel after a not inconsiderable amount of effort.

I fished on and whilst the rod twitched a bit there were no more hittable bites before home time but I think the Barbel addiction will continue for a little while longer.