Recent content by Neil Blood

The Fishflix video covering it is awesome 👍🏻

For me personally its wildlife encounters over the years: The Mole In my youth I was fishing a lake, where I was sitting on a high concrete wall, which dropped down to the waters edge. Something caught my eye as it swam/scurried along the lakebed, exiting the water right below my feet. It was...

Is this the fish caught in the upcoming Fishflix video?

I generally use a size 6 hook, with the hook through the worm’s saddle. I then add a drennan artificial red maggot on the hook, by just about hooking it. They grip the hook wire really tightly and it allows you to push the worm to the back of the hook bend, where it stays put 👍🏻

Congratulations on your capture 👍🏼 Claiming river records won’t have the same stringent rules and claiming a national record. Angling Times would likely cover it, if the other photos look good and backup the claim. One question you’ll likely get asked generally, is what does the sling weigh...

Exactly what I use for Chub and Perch, unfashionable but very good rods 👍🏻

Smart Cast is going back some, a good few years since I had one of them, has Arthur Negus seen it! Deeper is the way to go now and work well. Easy enough with a smart phone and plenty of vids on YouTube.

Horses for courses, when I fish half a tin of spam on a hook, its an 18” hooklength 🙂

If you are ever able to watch Barbel and Chub feeding over a bed of bait, they do so as follows and this assumes you are droppering in bait close in: 1, Boillies and larger pellets they move upstream over the feed area at pace, picking up larger items and turning away, or turning away as they...

Yep whatever you are comfortable with. I’ve rested fish close to 13lb in mine. If I expect bigger fish, then I use my 30+ Middy Barbel net.

Watching Alfie Russle on youtube using a powerful spotlight at night to stalk big Perch with lures changed my opinion! He didn’t just find Perch under the light 👍🏻

Depends what size Barbel you expect to catch? Personally I find the SS 26” perfectly adequate for fish up to 13lb’s in weight on the middle/upper Severn.

There was a recent article in Angling Times, where an angler rolling meat was using Sufix Tritanium line in bright red. The line was easier to track on the eye and made no difference to his catch rates. Sufix Tritanium is a cheap bulk spool sea fishing line.

Size 2 Patridge Barbel hook pulled through the meat and turned 90 degrees. Hooklength material Drennan Dacron, which doesn’t cut through large heavy baits like cheese wire. Both discontinued unfortunately. Just read Lawrence’s historical writings and take it from there.

Not really Ben, when fishing very big baits, you are trying to be selective in terms of singling out the biggest fish. The fish don’t associate massive hookbaits with danger, as anglers don't have the confidence to try it. Its not a new method and it goes back to the 1980’s when anglers used to...