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This is pretty good, would be even better if some fish were biting…
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Looks rather “tenchy” - I hope whatever lives there plays ball :~}
Tenchy indeed, but they weren’t interested today. Nor were the bream or the crucians☹️
Very pleasant afternoon though.
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I’m wondering how our intrepid barbel hunter got on?
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Well - it was a beautiful atmospheric moonlit night for it, enough in & of itself; but the fish actually played ball for once too (by the difficult standards of this river at any rate) with 3 decent rod-bending adrenaline-fuelling bites in the 6 hours I was on the bank. That’s rush hour for this river!
However, although I could feel the thump-thump of a decent hooked fish on each occasion, it was that dreaded very muted thump-thump cos they’re straight into the streamer-weed. I fish barbless and each fish slipped the hook.
TBH I’m certain they were each a chubster as that’s exactly what they do; whereas barbel will scream off like a steam train. Probably very decent chubsters as I was fishing big bait and each bite was in the dark hours. But not the barbel I’m after.
It’s raining here today but I’ll likely go again tonight as it’s my last chance with us being homeward-bound tomorrow morning. One time it’s going to happen :~}
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Nice. Good luck! A bit of rain might freshen it up.
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And we’re off; an overcast & slightly muggy evening here but very “fishy”. Yup - eternal & resolute [aka naïve & desperate] optimism essential in this game.
Trying a slightly deeper pool just a wee bit down from last night. Thick weed everywhere & a big willow tree. But a lovely glide gravel stretch on the opposite bank.
What can possibly go wrong 
I caught a huge chub here this time last year so I know this place has fish. But are they interested in a date tonight?
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As it turned out, no - they were busy washing their hair and had no free time to say hello.
Despite seeming a very promising evening to start off with, the evening fell flat pretty quickly - first a lot of hungry mozzies were on the prowl; annoying but tolerable. But then huge chunks of dislodged streamer-weed started flowing down the river, meaning fishing in the spot I was in became untenable really. My line was often getting caught up and dragged off, and that was that really. One of the hazards of river fishing.
I did move upstream a bit to a spot where you can sometimes fish close in among the weed & rushes, virtually under your feet - which I love doing - and keep out of the main current, but this year it was just a dense impenetrable weedbed and no viable fishing spot to be found amongst it.
Ho-hum; win some lose some. It is a mighty hard and challenging river to fish, but that’s its beauty. We go again next summer :~}
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Ah - excellent; I shall enjoy that later.
I enjoyed this one last night; and seeing that big clump of weed floating off downstream as they waded into the river made me chuckle - that was the sort of thing crashing through my swim a few weeks back.
The river there - it’s 9 miles upstream of Fordingbridge, or Burgate Farm to be precise - is noticeably smaller and more “manageable”. By the time it’s at Burgate, it’s really quite a size, and more importantly, absolutely chockablock with dense streamer weed. Great for fish but difficult for fishing.
I’d love to see it & fish it earlier in the summer before the streamer weed has taken over; damn those school & Uni term-times! We’ve only ever been there in mid/late-August.
Lovely episode as always - it’s some of the best stuff on TV that programme, I must say. Judging from the state of the trees, it must have been filmed last Autumn or perhaps very quickly released from filming within the last few weeks. Gorgeous colours & river scenes,.
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