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Pete Reading Breaks Hants Avon Barbel record!

Fantastic fish Pete, fish of the season of any species. Were there not Barbel bigger than the British record caught from the Avon back in the 60's. I seem to remember a 17lb fish caught by a Salmon angler in the close season and there were others. I also remember Peter Wheat saying the quality of the hooks and tackle available back then caused the loss of some fantastic fish.
 
Stephen, thereby hangs a tale 'from stickleback netting on the Mexborough canal to barbel hunting on private sporting estates along the middle reaches of Wessex rivers'. As an aside it was Peter (R) who witness and photographed my fish back in 1984.

Mark, I feel in the Walker, Wheat, Stone, Day , Harrigan era (1960's early 70's), it's important to differentiate between the Royalty and the 'Middle Avon' (Winkton to Britford). I'm not sure how far up the Avon barbel had populated by the 1960's but they were certainly at Ellingham and Ibsley. There are many tales of Barbel of between 14 to 17lbs either foul hooked or caught out of season (or both), by Salmon Anglers. Peter Wheat himself, writes of using 9lbs bs mono and size 2/4 Chapman Goldstrike hooks and these should have been more than capable of handling 14lbs+ barbel. When I caught my first barbel as a boy in circa 1972, I used Goldstrike and then later Jack Hilton carp hooks but eventually settled on the heavy gauge, reversed, offset point French Au Lion D'or (this was all pre Japanese chemically etched hooks).

I again have to correct myself in an earlier post, Richard Walkers best Middle Avon Barbel was actually 12.12 (not 12.04 as I previously wrote) he also caught a 12.00 from the royalty.
 
Hi Greg.

If I remember right you were the first winner of the Drennan Cup?

And weren't you in the armed forces stationed at Hamworthy?

And I swore I saw you fishing Throop circa 1986.
 
Stephen, it was a totally different era with the Barbel record at 13.12 and the chub record at 7.06. I recently recovered my specialist angler magazines out of the loft. There is a great article in one from Pete Reading on 'Saving the Avon' (from weed cutting, fish farming, chub parasite etc). The only article I wrote was in No 5 about selective fishing for big barbel. Although there is a photo of my 14.01 in that edition, the only article I wrote on the capture was "Spells, Wild Dreams and Autumn Gold" published in a special Big Fish addition of Course Fisherman. Definitely a more slower paced innocent, but as you say exciting time!
 
Hi Greg, my copies are in the loft too! I do remember Pete's article on Saving the Avon and obviously yours too. I didn't keep my Coarse Fishermans, Coarse Anglers, Dave Hall's Coarse Fishing, Coarse Fishing Handbooks or the various Big Fish specials - just Specialist Angler and Coarse Fishing Monthly - both terrific publications at the time. If only I knew then what I know now..............
 
Dave

that's correct I'd never heard of the Drennan cup when I caught that fish, as you say it was the inaugural year. I did serve 9 years in the Royal Marines in various Commando Units and ended up my service in RM Poole (Hamworthy). I think I was still fishing Throop in 86 so you may well have done!
 
I'm not sure about salmon anglers of bygone days but modern day salmon anglers do not weigh their fish but estimate them from length.
I've seen barbel caught by modern day salmon anglers well over estimated.
If I would hazard a guess this probably happened many years ago that barbel were over estimated.
Barbel have increased in size over the years due to modern baits being introduced probably at excess levels by many anglers.
 
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