Will the Barbel record ever be threatened....?

[Rich Frampton]

And what of yourself, your fishing and your life if your scales aren't "amazing" but actually real? Catapulted into a nanosecond celebrity, then eternal envy and sniping internet hatred.

Just go fishing, for yourself, and f- the rest.

Agree 100%.

 

[Simon Haggis]

the fun of the hunt is always more satisfying than the kill(or capture and release)modern times.

Are you talking about women again?

 

[Mark Anderson]

Hi men ,

Anyway , back to the real world . if someone catches a new record fish , bloody good luck to them . If they are fishing for it , all the better , because people have different aims in life . I know someone who fishes a big lake with 4 carp in it . Took him years to catch the one he wanted , but was just as happy catching a few fish from a local dayticket water , why should barbel fishing be any different ?. There seems to be a bit of snobbery involved at times in barbel fishing , I dont fish for big fish , and the closest bit of fishing to me is Adams Mill . I would not pass judgement on those who fished the stretch at its heigth , because its their fishing , and im sure they enjoyed it as well . We talk of Dick Walker , surely a early fish chaser?, but not thought of any the less I hope . Crabtree book shut.

Back on subject , Wensum ,Loddon , Ouse are top of my list .


hatter

 

[David Hall]

Are you talking about women again?

that as well.
men are natural hunters, it's in our jeans.....pardon the pun...

 

[Paul Boote]

The Chairman on Wednesday


Absolutely!

Grunting as ever,

B.B.

 

[Robin Bowes]

And what of yourself, your fishing and your life if your scales aren't "amazing" but actually real? Catapulted into a nanosecond celebrity, then eternal envy and sniping internet hatred.

Just go fishing, for yourself, and f- the rest.

Oh I do Paul, I do. I've had my moment of enlightenment.

I returned to angling 4 years ago after a long break (mad keen in my youth, but moved on to other things). I spent the first couple of seasons driven by the thought of big barbel. Then I caught one; 11lb 10oz - big for the Yorkshire Ouse. After the initial euphoria, I was thoroughly deflated. What now? I had to seriously re-think my motivation. I now fish for pleasure & don't just chase barbel. Life is much better.

R.

 

[Simon Haggis]

I spent the first couple of seasons driven by the thought of big barbel. Then I caught one; 11lb 10oz - big for the Yorkshire Ouse. After the initial euphoria, I was thoroughly deflated. What now?
R.

A bigger barbel?

I do try and catch bigger barbel now and love it, but that's been a graduation process over many years. I still get a buzz out of memorable captures frankly when I think of them, so quite the opposite to your deflation.

 

[Robin Bowes]

A bigger barbel?

Simon,

I have very little time to fish these days since children 4 & 5 came along. So I simply don't have the time to put in to an extensive barbel campaign. I'm lucky in that the Yorkshire Ouse is only 5 mins way so I can pop down at dusk for a 2-3 hour session, but I can't really justify spending hours on the bank in search of a "big" one.

Of course, I still fish for barbel, and I still enjoy catching them, and I'd love to catch "a bigger barbel". But I've come to realise that I'm just as happy going after "big" chub (3lb is a monster) in a local beck (8-10ft wide, 1-2ft deep), or trying to catch a Tommy!

R.

 

[Jon Frisby]

Tbh. I would rather see a new record fish come from a larger river, Trent, Severn or Thames. As the fish couldnt be hunted to extremes, due to the size of river, as they have been on small rivers in the past. My enjoyment in barbelling is through solitude and variety, by this i mean. Finding a new area and trying to work out its secrets. Its moods and catching possibly virgin fish. I would soon get bored with fishing the same one or two areas or pegs. On the solitude side, i dont need a friend to hold my hand, but i do enjoy company from good friends. i much prefer a seldom fished area and to watch the world go by. Going back to the record Barbel dont discount the lower Tidal Trent.

 

[Paul Boote]

I agree - Thames or Trent could produce a mindboggler. I have long had this personal, onboard, mental video of a 20-plus barbel living in, around and under the snag-filled, unfishable sills of a big Thames weirpool, disappearing under the concrete and masonry when canoeists paddle the surface foam, only coming out as darkness falls...

 

[Gary Downie]

Broke a record myself last night....
For the smallest barbel I've ever caught (around 3lbs) and it was the cutest fish I'd ever seen.
Can honestly say enjoyed catching it as much as any bigger fish I've been lucky enough to land.
Records are not just about biggest.

 

[Colin Gordon]

. We talk of Dick Walker , surely a early fish chaser?, but not thought of any the less I hope . Crabtree book shut.

Yes indeed he was an early 'fish chaser', some would argue one of the original.

These days its not just Dick and a few of his cronies, the specimen scene has exploded.
Now you'd get a Billy-no-name catching the first mahoosive fish, followed by a whole heap of 'named' angler (journalist tackle consultant types) and then by this point the stretch will be hard, very hard......... The names will move on and the thrones of hopefulls decend............ An all to familiar scene, I'd say?!

And yes all (well most) of us are guilty to greater or lesser a degree of 'fish chasing'.
Me, when looking at a new water for tench, I'll always ask about a bit to establish how much potential it has because yes to me pounds and ounces DO count, sad but true!

Back to the thread question:
Apart from the known stretches the Thames, like touched on by Paul, has huge untapped potential.
Up here in Oxfordshire, excluding one stretch where it is possible to drive to your chosen swim and fish out of your car, none of the other areas ever saw another angler (unless they only ever fished on my old swims, poor buggers!).

Why is this, for a river that produces 9lb chub and barbel into high teens, easy answer; fish chasers like the easy option, i.e there's a 18lb barbel on this weir or that gravel run and not there may possibly be a barbel somewhere along that three mile stretch of river.
Also the river is usually so murky fish spotting is hard, if not impossible.
Therefore putting many off, sorry, no recent form, can't see the fish, doesn't put many off it puts nigh on everyone off!

 

[Alex Gowney]

The bigger rivers as mentioned would seem the most likely to have a monster hidden somewhere, possibly inaccessable as Paul described, but did not the current "crop" of mega barbel start appearing from the Medway first? I may be wrong, it may have been the Severn, but the Medway was producing record fish not so long back and that's a quite small river.

Also, other Cherwell fishers (Colin?) may remember back in the very early 80s' a TWA dredger (or similar) hit and killed a barbel that was estimated (by one very notable angler) to be between 15 and 18 pounds. That would be some fish today anywhere, but 30 years ago from the Cherwell would have been mind boggling

 

[Jon Berry]

So many points to comment on here, where do i start?

Dick walker - fish chaser, yes, instant one-fish megastar, never in a million. There was more to the man - good and bad - than Clarissa. It would be a little harsh to blame him for the excesses currently in evidence in the sponsored speccy scene...youtube, tackle companies, bait companies and the like are all culpable for awarding fame to those who seek it. We can choose to deify/ignore as we see fit. It is pretty meaningless in the grand scheme.

The carp hierarchy is in a league of its own. Once upon a time, it was Maddocks (if you were serious-minded), Hutchinson (if you liked to smell the hops along the way) and Gibbinson (if you also fancied some pike in winter). Now the list of big names is incredible, in the true sense of the word. Can there really be that many 'top' names? And are we daft to enough to buy in to every advertorial they write? Not me, far too skint...

As for record barbel, i'm inclined to agree with PB, I fish just because I like to, and the thought that there may be an unseen monster under a Thames sill or a Trent barge is what keeps me thinking 'maybe, just maybe...'. I won't go mad looking for them, but I will keep fishing in the knowledge that they (it) may be out there.

Many of the smaller waters are in disarray right now - for all sorts of reasons, natural, cyclical and otherwise - but the form shown by the Ouse and Meday in the 80s/90s suggests that their day may come again. The fun, for me, is not in knowing but in wondering.

I just hope that when/if it happens, the stampede is a mild one, and the herd are put off the scent from the outset. You can rest assured that if I ever broke the record, i would publish its exact location, in great detail. I would lie my socks off too.

JB

 

[Chris Jones]

Move north, my friends, you'll never have to worry about record fish (with the possible exception of the odd rogue chub) ever again.
The talk of 20lb barbel is so much hot air when you live this far north and won't travel too far. A 10lb fish, that seem ten a penny to many of you, is likely to be a fish of a lifetime for many up here. Many of you are, rightly, bemoaning rivers on the wain but you've still got a better chance of bigger barbel than have ever been seen up here. While sometimes envious glances are made it's not actually a bad situation to be in. It's certainly better than the situation many of the hardcore carpers up this way find themselves in. They are either scrabbling furiously to get into syndicates that mostly have 20s with the vague chance of 30s and the very, very vague chance of a 40 or are making weekly pilgrimages to the Oxford and Peterborough areas.

I sometimes wonder if some of you realise how lucky you are, purely from a big fish perspective.

 

[Ian Hugo Arnott]

So many points to comment on here, where do i start?

Dick walker - fish chaser, yes, instant one-fish megastar, never in a million. There was more to the man - good and bad - than Clarissa. It would be a little harsh to blame him for the excesses currently in evidence in the sponsored speccy scene...youtube, tackle companies, bait companies and the like are all culpable for awarding fame to those who seek it. We can choose to deify/ignore as we see fit. It is pretty meaningless in the grand scheme.

The carp hierarchy is in a league of its own. Once upon a time, it was Maddocks (if you were serious-minded), Hutchinson (if you liked to smell the hops along the way) and Gibbinson (if you also fancied some pike in winter). Now the list of big names is incredible, in the true sense of the word. Can there really be that many 'top' names? And are we daft to enough to buy in to every advertorial they write? Not me, far too skint...

As for record barbel, i'm inclined to agree with PB, I fish just because I like to, and the thought that there may be an unseen monster under a Thames sill or a Trent barge is what keeps me thinking 'maybe, just maybe...'. I won't go mad looking for them, but I will keep fishing in the knowledge that they (it) may be out there.

Many of the smaller waters are in disarray right now - for all sorts of reasons, natural, cyclical and otherwise - but the form shown by the Ouse and Meday in the 80s/90s suggests that their day may come again. The fun, for me, is not in knowing but in wondering.

I just hope that when/if it happens, the stampede is a mild one, and the herd are put off the scent from the outset. You can rest assured that if I ever broke the record, i would publish its exact location, in great detail. I would lie my socks off too.

JB

I find myself in total agreement except that I might go further and lie about the river, especially if it were the Pinn or Hamster.


regards


Hugo

 

[Paul Boote]

The Chairman blowing out bits of his lunchtime hippoburger, Wednesday


Absolutely!


As ever,

B.B.

 

[Jon Berry]

Hugo, all my fish (coarse, game, salty or inbetween) have come from the Tidal Humber, half-way along the road bridge. It's a great peg.

 

[Ian Hugo Arnott]

Hugo, all my fish (coarse, game, salty or inbetween) have come from the Tidal Humber, half-way along the road bridge. It's a great peg.

Noted with thanks

Regards

Hugo

 

[Simon Lush]

The bigger rivers as mentioned would seem the most likely to have a monster hidden somewhere, possibly inaccessable as Paul described, but did not the current "crop" of mega barbel start appearing from the Medway first? I may be wrong, it may have been the Severn, but the Medway was producing record fish not so long back and that's a quite small river.

Also, other Cherwell fishers (Colin?) may remember back in the very early 80s' a TWA dredger (or similar) hit and killed a barbel that was estimated (by one very notable angler) to be between 15 and 18 pounds. That would be some fish today anywhere, but 30 years ago from the Cherwell would have been mind boggling

Alex, the "notable angler" you mention told me at the time that he reckoned about 14lb ! thats inftation for you Having seen the pics, (the bloke that took them lived in the same village as me), i would say that even that was pretty optomistic.