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What are the chances?

A

Adam Francis

Senior Member & Supporter
I was fishing last night with my mate on the middle Thames. There has been the odd barbel coming out recently but no real numbers of fish as yet.

9.30pm his rod rips off & after a very spirited fight we slip the net under a fat but well proportioned fish of 10lb 10oz. It put up a real scrap so we didn't mess about with pictures & after 5 minutes or so in the net in the side swam off strongly to grace someone else's net. I had a small bream & when he left around 11pm decided, as any angler would, to immediately reel in one of my rods to ping it off in the direction of where his bite was on the river, he'd caught one from the same sort of area last week.

Literally 10-15 minutes later my rod ripped round & after a less spirited fight I slipped the net under a fat but well proportioned fish of, you guessed it 10lb 10oz. For the life of me this looked like it was the same fish, it was from roughly the same spot & was exactly the same weight & proportions. It's the first time we've had 2 barbel bites in an evening this season & I find it hard to believe that only 2 hours after being captured that it could have been back munching on boilies again?

A repeat capture, a doppelganger or had someone slipped something into my coffee? As the title says, "What are the chances?"
 
Good chance it was the same fish. Iv had the same fish twice in a night this season but was only about 5lb.
 
There's no chance of crediting the 2 anglers with more intelligence than they need, I can assure everyone of that!!

Thanks for the feedback, I did think it was an incredible coincidence that there would be 2 such similar fish in the neighbourhood. I guess it was how well looked after he was when he was in the net that he didn't mind coming back again :)

Quite a tale to tell his mates,

"You'll never guess what happened to me earlier......"
 
Almost certainly the same fish. I have had it happen with a friend on the Cherwell many years ago when he landed a 10.12. He didn't fish nights very often and that was a known swim so later in the night I dropped in and caught a 10.12. Big fish like that were not very common on the Cherwell in those days and I was convinced we had discovered a hotspot, because no way could I see it being the same fish so soon. But speaking to my friend later, who was a much more experienced barbel angler than me, he said almost definitely the same fish. I also recall a pike around 12lb coming out three times in a couple of hours on Banbury Reservoir.
 
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I left a hook in a barbel whilst rolling meat on the Teme (line abrasion). Had had enough after that so set of walking back to the car. 50 yards away a guy was landing a barbel so I went to watch and bailiff him. Yep, it was the fish that I'd lost less than 15 minutes previously ...the guy was a member, and gave me my weighted hook back 😃
 
I once caught the same rainbow trout on consecutive trots through the swim (trotted maggot).
I know rainbows aren't credited as being the einsteins of the fish world, but was still quite surprising.
 
Heres a strange one , and the chances of this are a million times greater of never happening.

Some years ago we were on a charter boat out of Whitby, a friend was using his own home made “ 3 hook flasher “ rigs , and was catching , he hooked a fish on the rig , the fish put up a fight but the snood on the flasher parted and he lost it , just leaving two hooks remaining . We carried on fishing and eventually moved to new grounds , we fished several different rough ground areas in the day, returning to port we stopped off to have a final few drifts over a bit of rough ground.

You have probably guessed, he hooked a Cod of about 7 or 8 pounds, in its mouth was firmly embedded the flasher snood he had lost earlier in the day.

David
 
I know its not Barbel !
about 30 years ago I had a boat at Newhaven and went bass fishing on a close inshore wreck unusually at that time I used to use shrink wrap over the knot on the fine wire 6/0 hook I had a good bite something heavy dived into the wreck and cut the line after about 30 mins my mate said lets go to the other mark that was 6 miles away ! it always fishes better so we did just over an hour on the new mark my jammy mate reeled in a Bass of 12lb with my hook in it !!! it was no mistaking the shrink wrap on the hook it definitely was the fish I had lost 6 miles away
 
Was fishing the Middle Trent years ago. My pal cast his Brass Reuben Heaton thermometer (tied on the line) to record the temperature nearside at 7ft depth but his line broke and he lost it. Downsteam of him was a tree with branches into the water, downstream of that was another pal. After an hour or so the other pal came round and showed what he had caught 😆
 
Fishing the Wye for two consecutive days a few years back I lost a barbel to a snag on day one and caught it on day 2 with the hook still lodged in the corner of its mouth.

On the same trip my better half had a 17lb pike after it grabbed a 2lb chub she was playing. Both chub and pike went back ok although I think the chub was a bit shocked and I moved the pike 50 yards upstream before releasing it. Next day she caught the pike again from the same swim as day 1.
 
A few years back I was trotting for Grayling and hooked a fish, which on inspection was very distinctive, it had some damage on one side towards the tail.
About half an hour later, I caught it again from exactly the same lie.
When I returned it for the second time, it decided to rest just downstream on a concrete ledge in a couple of feet of water.
It was still there about 10 minutes later, so out of interest I ran the maggots past it and it took them immediately!
I've had the same thing with a Salmon Kelt, which I caught 3 times from the same spot in about an hour, it was a right menace on the trotting gear!
 
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