I’d been unable to go fishing for 5 weeks due to work demands but I finally got out on Dec 28th.
I went to meet up and fish with a mate on the middle Trent on our clubs water, a very hard stretch but we take the blanks knowing it’s potential. I arrived as It was going dark about 4:30pm with a view of fishing through to the morning.
I quickly baited up a number hooklengths with a test bait dumbell to get me though the night, I went upstream to the next peg to put a handful of Small Elips Pellets in that I was hoping would settle around my chosen peg below.
The peg had a bit of slack water in front of me being protected by a tree partly hanging in the water which would help stop build up of debris on the line.
I fished slightly upstream in the flow just beyond the crease in about 8ft of water.
The night was very quiet with the only action being me recasting around 3-4hrs apart.
At 7:45am as I was beginning to pack up my alarm bleeped twice, fishing slightly upstream something had dislodged the feeder, I quickly lifted into which immediately started shaking its head, my initial thought was it was a chub but then it decided it was going to take line and get well into the main flow, definitely a barbel.
The fish stayed deep throughout the fight often a sign of a big barbel taking line several times eventually I started to get some control and managed to get the fish up and after hitting the surface it thankfully went straight into my net at the first time of asking.
I gave the fish a good rest before and after weighing and photographing.
The fishery came good with a wonderful 16lb 10oz belated Christmas present!
Ade
