Don’t
miss out on the the barbel magic
These
are exciting times for anglers because for a variety of not very much
understood reasons, fish of several kinds are growing to a much larger
ultimate and average weights in freshwater habitats in England now.
Included are carp and chub and tench and perhaps most exciting of all
barbel.
Undoubtedly the most hard fighting of all our so-called coarse fish barbel
have fascinated me and countless other anglers for many years but we old
timers never dreamt of the size that barbel would grow to nowadays.
When, a century or so ago, J.W. Martin wrote about fishing for barbel
on the river Trent though just a few big ones turned up occasionally the
average size of Trent barbel then was under three pounds.
Then came a period of many years when the river became so badly polluted
that the barbel became almost, and perhaps totally, extinct.
A revived river benefited from some restocking with barbel that were removed
from a game fishery where they were not wanted in the late seventies and
early eighties and in more recent years these fish and their descendants
have suddenly started being caught at colossal weights.
The average weight of the barbel landed from the Trent now must be between
five and seven pounds and double figure fish are being landed often by
barbel specialists.
Where not so very many years ago the rod caught record weight for the
species was shared between three different barbel each weighing 14lbs
6oz hundreds of barbel over that weight have been caught in recent seasons,
and the best so far (from another river) weighed just over 21lbs.
Barbel feed best in the summer and early autumn months though odd ones
are taken in winter.
My advice to any anglers who live within reach of the Trent, is to make
sure that they join in the barbel bonanza next summertime. It probably
will not last forever but take advantage of the really exciting sport
while it lasts.
Please use very strong tackle though because weak tackle lets barbel break
free, and if you take too long playing them to exhaustion they sometimes
do not recover when you put them back in the river.