Make mine a Double !

Having a few hours spare I decided to take advantage and squeeze in a session on the Trent. With help from my daughter Hollie the previous day, I had dug up a good bucket full of lob worms from my garden whilst turning over an old vegetable patch. Some of these Worms were absolute Pythons ! so when the opportunity came up to fish, I grabbed it with both hands.

On Arriving about 4:00pm I started by fishing for Perch on a feeder rig using the worms on the hook of course, and more chopped worm and maggot in the feeder. I got a bite on my first cast after about 10 minutes or so. The bobbin stuttered a few times and the alarm beeped. Eventually when it looked like a full blown take had developed I struck. Unfortunately nothing had connected, so I recast expecting some more action. When this didn't happen though, I was a little surprised.

I eventually moved up to the next peg to try another of the "Perchy" swims on this stretch, but this produced nothing either. However the odd fry leaped from the water in this swim, which led me to believe there were possibly some perch present ? I concluded that they must have been pre-occupied with the fry, and so not too interested in my lovely juicy fresh lob worm.

As it was nearly dark by now I decided to give up the Perch hunt to switch to Barbel in a peg not far down stream. I had planned to set up two rods, one on the meat and the other on a pellet or boilie. The meat rod was put together first and cast out towards the middle (I always try to keep my rods set up in the quiver ready to go). I then began sorting out the other rod, but never got any further than fixing the two rod sections together. Within minutes of casting the first rod out I saw the tip whacking over.

I struck and was met with that satisfying solid force of a good Barbel attached. She hugged the bottom shaking her head in a thudding motion. There was a second or two of confusion wen Iwasn't sure if I was gaining any ground on her or not? I then realised that she was coming in towards me at a good depth, the river must being about 8 - 10 feet in this section. With the rod now fully hooped over, I fumbled for the net and got into position ready to land her. When I looked down into the water to locate the fish, I saw she was already on the surface. Far from being ready though, with a almighty thrust of her tail she shot down deep again to my right, stripping line off the clutch. I swear I physically gasped as I held on, fearing the worst for a second or two until I regained control of her again. With the net poised I hauled her to the surface again and she slid nicely over the rim and was mine. Despite my long recital the fight was over quite quickly but this was more due to me bullying the fish in strongly to stop her reaching the snag than her rolling over and giving up. I was using an old 2.5lb TC Diawa Carp rod that used to belong to my friend who sadly died a year ago, so I was well equipped to deal with any large fish and it was good to have caught a good her in his honour. I'm know he would be chuffed knowing it was landed on his old faithful rod.

Peering down at her in the net I knew she was a good size, but I didn't want to jinx myself, so tried not to guess at a weight. I zeroed the scales and then lifted her up and transferred her to the weigh sling. Gently raising her up, I read off a very satifying 10lb 2oz. Amazing! this is my first Trent fish and it's a double, my first Dove fish was also a double, and these are the only two fish I have caught all season whilst barbel fishing, enduring many blanks along the way.By my reckoning it could be viewed as a 100% double catch rate for this season so far! (statistically speaking of course). I had one more cast afterwards but to be honest I was more than happy with the evenings result. As it was now 7:00pm I knew if I hurried I could still get home in time to see my kids before they went to sleep. ( which I did, and Hollie was pleased to hear that Daddy caught a Big Fish, not a little fish, Big fish - but no cardboard box). I packed up and went home with that satisfying buzz you only get after a succesfull session. It just goes to show that one bite is all it takes, between elation and dissapointment.

Water temp was a steady 9.5 deg C

 Fat as a barrel the fish have been on the feed recently !