Hello again and welcome to the latest installment in my monthly(ish!) series. Sorry about the delay as I’ve been a bit lazy lately. I hope your fishing has been going well and you’ve managed to put a few on the bank. Our local rivers have been pretty unproductive for the past few weeks. One or two barbel have been caught here and there, but nothing to write home about, with the lower Severn in particular still being a cause for concern.

I’ve started fishing a few sessions on the lower again lately, and it’s worrying how little activity there is not just from the barbel, but in general. I’ve managed a couple of chub, and that’s it. This time last year I was catching plenty of barbel as well as countless bream, chub, and a few carp washed in by the floods. With some matches on the Severn being won with 12oz of Eels, the river seems to be in a sorry state at the moment. One thing I’ve noticed is how few anglers are venturing onto the banks of the Severn now. Swims on popular stretches that are usually bare patches of earth at this time of year are still under four feet of nettles, a testament to how many anglers are prepared to brave the conditions.

It’s not all doom and gloom though! If you happen to be a Wye angler you’ll know things have been very good over the summer, with loads of barbel being caught. I said in my last article that I was planning to explore more of the Wye, and explore I did. I have managed to find myself a couple of nice stretches that have kept me very busy over the past few weeks. Plenty of barbel have graced my net, and I was lucky enough to catch my Wye P.B at 10lb 12 oz (pictured below) at the beginning of August, on one of those days when everything seemed to be wrong. Yet the barbel were queuing up to have their pictures taken! I still can’t work out why the river fished so well that day as the river was low and clear with canoes everywhere on one of the hottest, brightest days of the summer. I’ve fished the river in the same area since in what I’d consider to be perfect conditions, and not done that well - just one of those red letter days I guess!                            

Anyway, as I write this September has just begun, and so the barbel season “proper”, as I like to call it, is upon us. The autumn and Winter are my favorite times of year as when the temperatures fall and the daylight hours decrease, so do the amount of anglers on the riverbank. Boat traffic also tends to quieter down, and my favorite flood conditions come into play more often. I’ll talk in detail about flood fishing next month (and it will be on time, I promise!) but this time I’m going to cover the variety of baits available to the barbel angler, and the conditions in which they are most effective. 

Well, where do I start?! There are so many different baits available to the barbel angler nowadays it can be hard to know where to begin. To be honest, pretty much any bait you can think of will catch you a barbel, it’s just a case of when and how that particular bait is used. So here is a rundown ot the most commonly used barbel baits, and also the river conditions in which they can be most effective. 

MEAT

I thought I’d start with the old favourite! Luncheon meat is a brilliant barbel bait, but I only tend to use it when the river is coloured. In clear water, a big lump of meat is a bit blatant for my liking. Meat is my number one flood bait, and usually I’ll flavour the bait further by coating it in hot curry powder. The best way to do this is to put the meat into a sandwich bag, add the powder, blow the bag up and give it a good shake. Ideally you should do this the night before you fish to give the flavours an opportunity to soak into the meat. I find this a superb bait for roving in floodwater, with soaking meat in hemp oil to be a close second.

BOILIES

Another minefield! There are countless makes and flavours on the market, but how many are genuinely good quality, effective baits? The difference in quality between baits can be vast, so it’s important to think carefully about which one you choose. Personally I use Bankside’s Team Barbel and find this to be an outstanding bait in both summer and winter, and is always my first choice boilie in both clear and coloured conditions. Bankside’s Grubber boilies are also well worth looking at, with a recent addition to the range the Balanced Grubber Hookbaits which I think will prove to be a winner for finicky barbel, and also the new shelf life Grubber Paste. Whenever I use a boilie I will paste wrap it as this gives a much improved flavour signal, and in my opinion vastly increases the attraction of the bait. I make my own paste using the Base mix and the Team Barbel flavour, as well as Boozy Yeast and Aqua-Pro, although it is available ready made in the freezer. Try winding in after five minutes or so and see how your bait looks and smells.

PELLETS

One of the most commonly used baits for barbel, and one of the most effective. The vast majority of my River Wye barbel this season have fallen to the Grubber XL pellets, and lately I’ve started wrapping them in the new Shelf Life Grubber Paste, which has proven to be a deadly combination. Pellets are such a versatile bait; they are great on the hook and as a loosefeed. I’ve found a Funnel Web bag with a small handful of Bio-Feed or Grubbers along with a few crushed and whole boilies very effective on the Severn and Avon. Alternatively, a good method is to scald some pellet in boiling water, and then tightly pack them into a cage type feeder. This gives a huge flavour signal without too much loosefeed in the swim, very effective in all conditions. Another of my favourite methods is to use a Korda Grippa Lead as a method feeder, ideal when you want to get some bait in your swim but can’t quite hold bottom with a feeder! 

GROUNDBAITS

As I’m talking about feeders and method balls I thought I’d give groundbait a mention. It’s a great way to attract barbel, and is versatile too. You could use a small, heavy feeder, tightly packed to create a strong scent trail, or use a large feeder with plenty of freebies if you want to pile the bait in. I’ve been using a feeder for 90% of my Wye fishing this summer. Bankside’s Oysta Crunch is a cracking groundbait, and you can always increase the flavour signal by using liquid additives if you wish. 

HEMP

One of the all time classic Barbel attractants, although not too many people use it as a hook bait, mainly due to the difficulty of presenting a few grains of hemp. If I use hemp it is always via a bait dropper to guarantee it reaches the bottom exactly where I want it, and I usually fish a small, dark bait like a 14mm Team Barbel nugget over the top, or maybe a paste wrapped cork ball - a good method in clear conditions. It is possible to hair rig hemp and tares, but it’s a bit fiddly for my liking, but for big, pressured fish it has proved to be very effective in the past. You could also increase the attraction of your hemp by adding Chilli Hemp Oil, or a little sugar and salt is good too! 

NATURAL BAITS

In my opinion naturals are a much neglected bait. Take a walk along the riverbank and have a chat to some anglers and finds out how many would be using lobworms, slugs or even minnows? It can depend on the river, but usually the answer would be none! I’m guilty of this myself. I never use naturals, but through chatting to a couple of people lately I’ve been inspired to give them a go. Not so long ago, before the days of spam and pellets, worms and such were the first choice bait for barbel, so why should they be any less effective now? The only thing that puts me off is the potential to catch loads of “nuisance” fish. I think I’d use natural baits all the time if I could see and target the barbel I fish for. 

Well, I could carry on, but I think I’ve covered the most commonly available baits. Of course there are many variations that you could try, and plenty of other baits that are effective like sweet corn and cheese, so why not experiment a bit?That’s it for this month. It’s been lashing down for the past two days and I’m looking forward to the first flood fishing of the season tomorrow. I can’t wait! I’ll let you know how I got on next time. 

Cheers

Andy