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Hook pull / bumped fish

D

Dave Quinn

Senior Member & Supporter
My last three sessions have involved more bumped fish than landed, I must have landed 6 and bumped 7 or 8. I don't remember bumping so many before, I'm wondering if my new rod is the problem

I'm fishing the stick on a small river, size 16 hook to 6lb line, 6mm pellet (although yesteday I was using an 8mm pellet). I'm using a spectron xp when I was using a drennan tench or even a Shakespeare 3xt which is a bit under powered even on a small river with smaller barbel.

I might do some field testing with all three rods, but was with wondering if anyone else had similar experiences or advice
 
Dave,if you are on the section i think you are then they are probably foul hooked. I found that during the winter, trotting full depth or overdepth and dragging, with the head of fish in the sections i was foul hooking lots of barbel.They usually come off in less than 10 seconds.I now trot shallow,layon or try to fish away from the far bank/feed. When i am fishing there i try to avoid the barbel and its almost impossible.
 
Dave.
Mark probably makes a good point.

However I believe your bait size versus hook size could be a major problem. The bait size means you are probably only pricking the fish lightly. Meaning applied pressure is leading to fish coming adrift.

Move up to a size 12 or even size 10 and you will get better hooking to landing ratio. Try it.
 
I met Dave on the upper lea Graham, and some of them swims have 100 barbel living in them,2/3 feet deep 20 feet wide.Someone had 78 barbel from 5 am to 2 pm from one swim back in the summer,its madness.
 
Mark Swaby said:
I met Dave on the upper lea Graham, and some of them swims have 100 barbel living in them,2/3 feet deep 20 feet wide.Someone had 78 barbel from 5 am to 2 pm from one swim back in the summer,its madness.
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Hi Mark, have you had any luck with those big roach, yet?

I only fish the long walk, but you could be right about foul hooking, it's shallow and narrow there and a lot of the fish are hooked by the far bank in shallow water and come off within the first ten seconds

I'm wary of larger hooks with small pellets, arent the fish more likely notice the difference in the hookbait and the feed and avoid it? But it makes sense as well - I will give it a go
 
Hi Dave/Mark
With that many fish there has got to be a foul hooking element. Probably as Mark says the key problem. I woukd have thought some of the fish landed would be foul hooked as well though.

I normally use a size 9 with banded 8mm pellet. There will always be an element of masking with that size hook (16) and a bait that size.

Give it a try and dont worry if it looks a bit unbalanced.
 
Don't think you're doing yourself any favours using a 16 with big pellets, maybe with a 4mm. Try using maggots or casters, the Barbel there love them, as Mark has said.
You'd get all sorts of bonus fish too, Roach, Chub Perch, Dace and even Carp.
 
Mark is spot on with his answer. Knowing where Dave is fishing it happens all the time on there. You will land the odd one if the hook finds the pectoral fin, but most just bump off.
 
Dave, because the river is so low most of the bigger fish population is Jammed up in the few slightly deeper swims or cover,they are hardly moving and its easy to foul them.If its any consolation i foul hook about half a dozen barbel every session.On the Roach,its been a terrible year, too many barbel and chub and a clear ultra shallow river,i get lots up to a 1lb but only a few bigger,the bigger roach just will not settle or feed confidently.You might try using hookable pellets and burying the hook in the pellet,you might then bounce the bait over the fish,you also do not hookup in the rushes, if you can flick the pellet out carefully
 
Mark Swaby said:
Dave, because the river is so low most of the bigger fish population is Jammed up in the few slightly deeper swims or cover,they are hardly moving and its easy to foul them.If its any consolation i foul hook about half a dozen barbel every session.On the Roach,its been a terrible year, too many barbel and chub and a clear ultra shallow river,i get lots up to a 1lb but only a few bigger,the bigger roach just will not settle or feed confidently.You might try using hookable pellets and burying the hook in the pellet,you might then bounce the bait over the fish,you also do not hookup in the rushes, if you can flick the pellet out carefully
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Cheers Mark, hopefully we'll get some rain after the cold snap that's coming, although like we were saying recently it doesn't seem to stay in the river for long when it does come
 
Andrew Richardson said:
i thought all the otters had ate all the barbel down south? 100 in a swim!!!
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.Two of the swims are so full of barbel you would not believe.Its a very tiny river, they breed well, little predation,no cormorants or pike and no otters.Imagine a bath full of water with 20 barbel in it,that's the kind of fish density in these two swims, Unique in this country,but hammered heavily and fished every moment of every day.A young lad came down just before Christmas wanting to catch his first barbel,i put him in one of the swims,his first fish was 9lb and he had 12 others.
 
I would think that any fishing with the point exposed and a light bait increase your chance of foul hooking.
Just an idea, as I am no barbel float fishing expert but would a soft heavy paste fished with the hook buried reduce the chance of foul hooking??
 
I do quite a lot of float fishing for Barbel on the Trent and foul hooking is a problem. I have hooked them in the tail, dorsal and mostly the pecs. I do pull out of quite a few too. This can be a major problem, sometimes if I catch 10 Barbel I can foul hook 5 and thats the problem. I have used another method to alleviate the problem and it works. I would like to hear other float anglers views on this too.
 
I've had that problem...and solved it by fishing with small 'tubes' of luncheon meat with the hook buried in it.
 
Burying the hook in the bait helps as does trotting shallower than the swim if you are within 6 inches(or more in deeper swims) of the bottom than the barbel will still take and the hook bait will tend to lift over fish.Dragging the bait along the bottom causes the foul hooking to happen more.If you are good at trotting then holding back severely and overdepth can work.
 
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