The Sessions - August 2018

Long drives with mixed results

I signed off last month with England experiencing the best summer we’ve had in years, the rivers very low and clear and my first visit to Johnsons, a place I was planning to visit again in August.

Julie and I spent the first weekend of August in Conway, North Wales with my family and had a lovely relaxing time eating, drinking and a lot of walking. The weather was perfect and the area beautiful and it was shame to have to come away so soon, but as ever in our busy lives work beckoned.

10 August – River Trent

Work continues to hamper my fishing and with our trip away it was a fourteen day stretch without wetting a line so the first chance I had I was in the car driving up the A1 to the Tidal Trent. It was my second trip to the new club section, although I am familiar with the opposite bank, and I knew it was risky going on a Friday and hoping to get a decent peg. However the fishing gods were looking down and arriving at 20:30 hours I still got a good spot.

I got set up and put both rigs out on double 14mm Pandemic with pva bags and put 30 boilies through the area. Fortunately the other side was not too busy so I had a good section of water without being disturbed.

The first take took only 20 minutes and melted away, it felt a big fish and would not give up; eventually she went in the net and was great start at 11-13.

The takes came at regular intervals and I landed another eight Barbel but surprisingly no more doubles with all the fish being in the 8 and 9 pound range, but after a two week break it was great fun and good to be out. The night went down to 6 degrees, ridiculous for August and hopefully not a sign of things to come.

14 August – River Nene

I’d had an evening session earlier in the week on the Ouse and caught a 4plus Chub before getting rained off after only an hour, a lesson learnt for travelling to light.

I’ve been a member of two clubs on the Nene for two seasons and not fished them, I’d done plenty of looking but it was just not grabbing me like some other places do. To add to that further the big two fish appeared to have gone, very likely succumbing to the Otters that are seen regularly there.
I want a double from the river so after an early finish at work I decided to go and look at a section of the Nene I fished in 2015. I got there for about 16:30 hours and parked up in the village, loaded my tackle on my back and walked to the river. It is a bit of a walk and when I got to the first bridge I found work men working on the bridge and lock, and I found the first few areas I had fished before had changed due to the work so I carried on walking. The river was low understandably and clear which made spotting clear areas and hopefully fish easy.

Well I walked and walked and it was 90 minutes before I settled on a swim for the evening, the spot I had chosen was a deep area with good flow and clear of weed, my thinking was the fish would be there in the cooler water and the deep area would be a holding spot for food coming down from the shallower areas.

I put both rods out on double 14mm Pandemic with pva bags and put a few broken boilies on the spots. I had approx. four hours fishing so was hopeful of a bite. The rods tops were going constantly but the guilty parties were small Chub in the 6-8oz range. I fished to 22:30 and packed up for the walk back to the car planning a return trip to the area in the winter where I think they will hold up in the deeper water.

17 August – River Trent

I was testing my luck on a Friday night again but took the chance arriving at 21:00 hours, I was lucky again and got the swim I wanted so was quite happy setting up in the dark.
I put both out on double 14mm Pandemic and put 30 boilies through the swim.

It was still warm with a light south easterly wind and showers but it was good to be out and I felt confident so on went the kettle and I sat watching the rods.

22:25 hours – it didn’t take long and one of the rods hooped over and I was into my first double of the night at 10-11. I never get tired of catching Barbel, I just love it and they do tend to reward the effort put in.

Both rods were recast and another 15 boilies put in to top up the area. It only took an hour and one of the rods went again, this fish did not feel heavy and came in quite easily so I was pleasantly surprised when I lifted the net and it went 11-04. More bait was put in after recasting.

It only took 20 minutes before the same rod went again and I landed another double at 10-05. I was loving it and appeared to be the only person catching. I topped the swim up again.

I started to catch Bream just after midnight so swapped one rod over to a 30mm dumbbell that I had made, leaving the other on the 14mm.

01:50 hours – I’d had an 8plus on the smaller baits when the same rod went again, this was bigger and my forth double of the night at 11-13.

The rod with the smaller baits went twice more resulting in and 8plus and a long lean fish at 9-02, but the bigger bait didn’t go. I packed up in the morning for a weekend with Julie and drove home very happy with my result.

20 August – Johnsons Lake

Leaving home on Sunday afternoon made the journey a lot less painful than my first trip in July. I arrived in good time, loaded up the barrow and walked round to the area I wanted to fish. There was a couple of people Crucian fishing and as before very friendly, the one chap was telling me it hadn’t been busy which was good to hear as there wouldn’t have been much bait going in. After looking I chose a different swim to my first trip and started to set up camp, my plan was to fish the last couple of hours of the evening and get up early to fish all day. As I was setting up the chap I’d been talking too had a 3-09 which was good to see and I duly did the photos for him.

It had been warm at 24 degrees, muggy and cloudy so good conditions and I was really looking forward to the session. The evening was a total blank this time so I got my head down with the alarm set for 04:30 hours.

I was up and fishing as planned, the changes I made were to not bait up with freebies as last time I caught so many other fish and just to fish with the method feeder and my little mix. I did make a little addition to my mix which was some 2mm halibut pellet to give it some different colours.
I fished the margins all morning and it was a lot slower than my first session, I had a 5plus Tench and a few Rudd and didn’t catch a Crucian until late morning weighing 2-08.

Instinct was telling me to change my range so at lunchtime I made the decision to fish both at 30 yards and recast every 10 minutes if I hadn’t had a bite. Another little change was to make the ground bait more sticky to make it harder to get of the feeder.

This proved a good decision as the bites started to come with a number of good Rudd to 1-10 and a few Tench. One of the locals was stood talking to me trying to help and advise me when one of the rods was away, the tell-tale fight gave it away this was a Crucian and a good one, everything was going to plan but as it came towards the net the other rod was away. I was fine but my new friend started to panic, “what shall I do?” and went to grab the rod, I calmly told him to leave it and slipped the net under the first fish put that rod down and picked up the other which clearly had another good Crucian on . He was still flapping and went to lift the net out, again I told him not to worry and that I’d land the second one in the same net. It all went ok and I was looking at a brace of three’s in one net. Suddenly I wasn’t getting advise, he was asking how I was catching.

I’m always happy to help people so explained most of what I was doing just not my special little ground bait mix. We did the weighing and I was buzzing with a 3-01 and new pb of 3-04.

The bites kept on coming and annoyingly I had two fall off as I was about to scoop them up in the net, one of them was clearly a good fish but I tried to block that thought out of my head and was rewarded with another good one at 3-02.
So that was the end of another good trip and I hoped to fit one more in before the cold weather took hold.

28 August – River Trent

I’d done a midweek night on the Ouse catching another of its prize jewels at 9plus, that was my third of the season but I’d not been lucky with the big girls but hopefully they will come.

I set off up the A1 for a three night road trip, two of which would be spent on the River Mersey but more of that in a bit; my first stop was the Tidal Trent

Arriving in the dark at 21:00 hours on a Tuesday night I was gutted to find it busy both sides leaving me only two options, neither were great so I took the best one and got set up. I wasn’t expecting much so got the rigs out and put twenty 12mm pandemic on the spots. It was pleasant at 16 degrees and cloudy so good conditions and the pandemic didn’t let me down when the rod went within 10 minutes resulting in an average fish at 8plus.

This was followed by a double hook up, again both 8’s.
The bites kept coming with fish to 9-06 when finally at 04:10 hours I got some heavier resistance with a fish that looked bigger than it weighed at 11-07.

I had another two to 9plus before packing up for my drive to the Mersey. After catching nine fish I had to ask myself if I was doing the right thing as the Mersey was not going to be easy!!

29 August – River Mersey

Jerry had been targeting his local river with some success with a good few doubles this season and invited me up for a session. I like to travel around a bit and do want to catch Barbel from different rivers with my target always being a double so I committed to having a go.

Now the Mersey has historically been a dirty un-kept river with little history of big Barbel so it was good to hear it was fishing well, this could only mean work had been done to clean the river up which is always fantastic news.

I arrived at lunchtime after a nice drive across the Pennines and met Jerry at his house, after a brew and a catch up we went down to the river for a look. I can’t give too much away but it was a shock and very different to where I fish, totally urban fishing!!

We looked along the section and I made my choice, my plan was to fish one peg and move if I didn’t catch. If I got my double we would move to the River Goyt.

In my normal fashion I used a 1oz lead to explore the swim, I had a lovely deep run in front of me at 11 feet that started to shallow up at the end of the swim, a perfect holding spot for food. I fished both on double 14mm Pandemic and under arm cast them out followed by 15 12mm boilies and sat back pretty confident.

30 August

Well I went through the afternoon and night without a take, Jerry and his mate Mark both blanked too which both said was unusual.

As planned I moved at lunchtime and again explored the new swim, this one was shallower at 6 feet but a lovely slightly faster run. Again I fished in my normal manner and blanked again, this wasn’t going to be easy. I was getting regular calls from Phil for updates, he caught his double within an hour of casting out only a week before I went up which he and our friends loved to keep reminding me of!
To rub it in that this wasn’t my trip, Jerry moved into the swim I vacated and had a 10-00, I think I used all my luck in Scotland in June for this season. Any way as I was packing up I was already planning a return trip…

Until next month tight lines and be lucky

Julian Barnes