• You need to be a registered member of Barbel Fishing World to post on these forums. Some of the forums are hidden from non-members. Please refer to the instructions on the ‘Register’ page for details of how to join the new incarnation of BFW...

Advice Please

Status
Not open for further replies.
Chris Cheshire said:
I don't have any spare shoes, do you think a sandal would have the same level of success?

Chris
Click to expand...

Chris, I would urge more commitment, so surrender a work shoe. Barbel are stupid but even they know that anglers rarely wear sandals when fishing. When I was a young, desperate and carefree angler, I did sometimes "borrow" a shoe from one of those stands positioned on a path right outside a shoe shop. Hope that helps.
 
Howard,

As a small child I remember vividly the shoe shop in Bewdley that my parents used to run. When stocktaking they ALWAYS would find they had an excess of right shoes - the left (display shoe) seemingly vanished into thin air.

My parents found it hard to believe that there could be 40 or so one legged (left legged at that) people wandering around Bewdley stealing shoes - i mean how would they get away without being spotted hopping off down the road?

I suggest that the 'shoe method' you described is by no means a new method, in fact it may well have been in practice for many years.....

Chris
 
I've just put a Camembert in the oven, it will be delicious with some salt and pepper baguette

(Scuba - sorry wrong forum - oops face)
 
Richard Hamlyn said:
If its OK with everybody I posted this thread politely asking for thoughts and advice on an angling problem I am experiencing and it seems to have turned into a bit of a bun fight. Is anyone interested in helping me out or would you rather just fight amongst yourselves?

Richard
Click to expand...

Its a tough one to answer Richard, but perhaps one that you have answered yourself through your own experiences and those of your mates ie the fish are put off by the sight of a large bed of bait. So it could just be that the feeding pattern of the fish is to forage more, never staying in one place for very long. The competition for food means that when they find a parcel of food, they greedily take it. The answer might just come down to recognising that on that river, that stretch, you just need to be more mobile to find the fish and by travelling light you have a better chance of a multiple catch.
 
Richard Hamlyn said:
If its OK with everybody I posted this thread politely asking for thoughts and advice on an angling problem I am experiencing and it seems to have turned into a bit of a bun fight. Is anyone interested in helping me out or would you rather just fight amongst yourselves?

Richard
Click to expand...

I'll bite, again, I'm a mug-fish. But I will keep to the spirit of the thread.

Richard,

What is more important even than Walkers 5 laws? It is simple and impossible to understand, and forever changing.

:)
 
Chris Cheshire said:
Howard,

As a small child I remember vividly the shoe shop in Bewdley that my parents used to run. When stocktaking they ALWAYS would find they had an excess of right shoes - the left (display shoe) seemingly vanished into thin air.

My parents found it hard to believe that there could be 40 or so one legged (left legged at that) people wandering around Bewdley stealing shoes - i mean how would they get away without being spotted hopping off down the road?

I suggest that the 'shoe method' you described is by no means a new method, in fact it may well have been in practice for many years.....

Chris
Click to expand...

Chris-tell your folks I am sorry. But I was young and wild with a shoe fettish. If we can leave at that and say no more about it, I would be grateful. I mean, it was years ago.
 
Chris Jones said:
What a fantastic thread. :D
Click to expand...

Could you try and breathe more life into this thread Chris, take it into a different but related direction? I have tried with the whole shoe thing but that really isnt going to get us very far. The aim here is to get to 100 posts-this will get us into the accomplished thread zone. We need to treat it like a relay-so if you could take the baton? Cheers.
 
Howard Cooke said:
Chris-tell your folks I am sorry. But I was young and wild with a shoe fettish. If we can leave at that and say no more about it, I would be grateful. I mean, it was years ago.
Click to expand...

I'll cut you a deal then Howard, I promise not to tell the folks - providing you stump up 10 of your own good shoes (i'll no longer need to sacrifice my only pair of work shoes) - furthermore I feel you owe me a full demonstration of this interesting method on my local stretch of the Lower Severn... a flying shoe or two may just encourage the seal to head for home too.

perhaps you could even put toe-gether a short article for the bfw members?

toe-gether... do ya see what I did there? ;) surely that was genius

Chris
 
Howard Cooke said:
Its a tough one to answer Richard, but perhaps one that you have answered yourself through your own experiences and those of your mates ie the fish are put off by the sight of a large bed of bait. So it could just be that the feeding pattern of the fish is to forage more, never staying in one place for very long. The competition for food means that when they find a parcel of food, they greedily take it. The answer might just come down to recognising that on that river, that stretch, you just need to be more mobile to find the fish and by travelling light you have a better chance of a multiple catch.
Click to expand...

Howard,

Thanks for the response. I realise that trying to offer good advice from a written description rather than actually having fished the stretch and experienced the difficulties for yourself is near impossible so I do apprieciate your input. The weird thing is that there is a large biomass of fish on the stretch and so in theory (?) the large bed of bait should attract some interest, but I have now conceeded that this is not the case. I am wondering if the key to this riddle is understand better what the natural food source is and see if that holds any clues to the fishes apparently wandering habits. The water is slow moving, an even 12' deep and the bottom is mostly firm mud with isolated very small gravel patches and the odd rock. I could confirm the source of this information by saying that I have spent many hours trying to map the bottom for features using the heightened sensitivity I get with a 3oz bomb and braid set up but that would only invite a "does braid damage the river bed" debate.

To the best of my knowledge the depth and the fact that the water is normally quite coloured means that there is unlikely to be any significan plant growth or invertebate life present. There is some evidence that there is a high proportion of creatures that live on the bottom detritus as it is not uncommon to find snails clamped onto the line on retreival. I would be interested to hear your thoughts on what natural food source is sustaining such a high biomass of fish.

Richard
 
I think braid may damage the river bed, but only if it's extremely strong and has an anchor, or the like, attached.

On it's own it would probably just float on the surface of the river, so it would be impossible for it to damage the river bed.

So really thinking about it, braid wouldn't damage the river bed, the anchor, or the like, would. You could also use strong mono or even washing line, either of these would also not damage the river bed.
 
Sounds like prime bloodworm habitat too. Imagine that, one big snail and bloodworm bed. Little wonder they are spread out if they only have to yawn in order to fill their chops with natural food.

Good thinking ;)
 
Bob as a boater I take exception to your inference that we boaters habitually damage the river bed. I will grant you that one of those awful finger trapping four pronged affairs with hinges and locking a collar used by uneducated boatmen will have a hugely disturbing effect. However I think you will find most of us boaty types use a breakout Danforth anchor that has absolutely minimal adverse impact on the river bed.
 
Chris Cheshire said:
I'll cut you a deal then Howard, I promise not to tell the folks - providing you stump up 10 of your own good shoes (i'll no longer need to sacrifice my only pair of work shoes) - furthermore I feel you owe me a full demonstration of this interesting method on my local stretch of the Lower Severn... a flying shoe or two may just encourage the seal to head for home too.

perhaps you could even put toe-gether a short article for the bfw members?

toe-gether... do ya see what I did there? ;) surely that was genius

Chris
Click to expand...

Oh dear, I feel duty bound to come clean before I end up in a terrible, terrible mess. The truth is, I have never fished the shoe. There, said it. It was intended as a distraction, a diversion from a thread that seemed to be getting quite out of shape. I am sorry. I didn't steal any shoes either, well not men's. Sorry for wasting everyone's time.
 
Chris Cheshire said:
Oh Howard, ur such a cad!

I fell for that hook line and sinker
Click to expand...

Ah well, It's all out now. I expect he feels a bit of a heel, and no doubt will toe the line in future, probably keep instep with the rest of us. I think normally he is quite a straight laced sort of chap really.

Cheers, Dave.
 
Hi Richard, This topic has certainly created a great deal of interest and deserves further thought. Unfortunately, there are people on here who have created silly, puerile and unnecessary diversions. I can assure you that the bulk of the membership have no time for these time wasters. After all this is a barbel fishing forum, not some site for wouldbe comedians.

I and like minded members would like to consider the issues that you have raised, further. You have described the bottom, mud, the depth 12', little weed but some pondlife. My initial thoughts, are that there are signal crayfish present as these will remove any bait that you put in, in double quick time, especially a carpet of bait. Bait scattered about will have a much better chance. What I advocate is to put ground bait into a wire mesh cage. The ground bait must be very firm to prevent breakdown happening too quickly. I have watched crayfish attacking such a cage which is satisfying knowing full well that is all that they can do. An added bonus is that at the end of the day, you can lift the cage and recover your groudbait. Your post implies that there is very little natural food and that is why the barbel are in that stretch. As you mentioned, it is difficult to consider the various situations in an imaginary way. What would be helpful would be for you to post a few photographs showing the stretch and maybe a photo of yourself holding a capture, that would add to the atmosphere.

Finally, I would not recommend building up a "picture" of the topography of the stretch using a lead and braid. In my opinion this is far too crude a method. An Humminbird Smartcast will do the job more quickly and more accurately. Better still they will detect fish and save wasting time fishing barren areas. Most good tackle shops will hire Smartcasts for a day or a week and very reasonably too.
 
Last edited:
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top