THERE’S NOWHERE I’D RATHER BE!
Targeting early-season chub and barbel is the ultimate feelgood factor
THE life force of a river draws anglers to its banks as surely as a moth to a flame.
This is why June 16 is a special day. Every year my feverish anticipation to return to these dynamic watercourses builds steadily, until I am once again able to make that first cast into the flow. It feels so good!
Rather than the stillwater carp, bream and tench that preoccupied my thoughts through spring, my thoughts now turn to chub and barbel.
Of all the wonderful species that swim in our rivers, the chub stands almost alone as the fish for all seasons. Resourceful and crafty in equal measure, it will capitalise on just about any food source and, provided the river is not carrying too much pace and colour, there’s always a good chance of catching one.
Although their appetites remain keen right through the angling calendar, mid-June finds chub in a particularly ravenous frame of mind. This is a blessing in disguise for the angler seeking early-season river success.
Their guard drops and the normally cagey outlook they are famed for is replaced by an overwhelming need to feed.
So, as I savour the moment of making that first cast, after having carefully primed the swim with a few choice morsels, I know I won’t be waiting too long before those familiar big white lips engulf my hookbait and a firm strike is met with a
thumping resistance through the rod blank as the first chub of the new season pays for its greedy mistake.
Location is everything so early in the season, and any chub yet to spawn are likely to be found in areas offering fast water running over gravel beds, the perfect place to create the next generation of chublets.
If everything falls right, you can sometimes pick out groups of chainmail-clad backs jostling for position in the dinner queue. It’s as exciting a sight as can be found anywhere in fishing.
Despite the chub’s famously catholic tastes, for me bait choice is pretty straightforward at the start of the season.
Like all species, chub will be desperate to replace energy reserves used up during their closed season antics, and pellets are the perfect food source to help with this vital process of replenishment.
I prefer to target them with a float wherever possible, but here’s a strange thing – for some reason most anglers believe that they can’t floatfish for chub with pellets on the hook. That’s simply not the case. Trotting with a small, strong hook and a banded pellet can be a deadly approach, and not one the fish will have seen very often.
I’ll often make up my loosefeed the night before by barely covering 4mm pellets with water in a bucket, adding a glug of oil. Come morning, these tacky pellets will be perfect for compressing into a ball with a gentle squeeze, and these little parcels of attraction can be thrown accurately down the line of your trot.
Do it right and the ball will remain intact on impact with the surface, then start to break up as it’s washed downstream.
These particles are almost impossible for any chub to ignore, and you’ll be just as excited as the fish as you exploit their feeding spree.
Trundling a float down towards big white mouths frantically gulping in pellets is a glorious way to start the season.
Yet, despite the chub’s earlyseason willingness to feed, most anglers’ first choice on running water will be barbel, and who can blame them, given the
“Early-season barbel will do their best to drag your rod in”
fighting prowess of the Prince of the River? They won’t be at their biggest right now, but does that matter? They’ll still do their best to drag your rod in!
Find them as you would those early-season chub: a weir pool or its run-off, or anywhere offering pace and oxygen, would be my ideal choice.
It’s not impossible to have the entire stock concentrated in a few swims and the rest of the stretch devoid of barbel. As the season progresses they will spread out, but not just yet.
Pellets will again be the bait of choice, and because the barbel won’t have seen an angler for three months they’ll have a bad case of the munchies!
Just remember, if you’re not getting any bites the fish will almost certainly be elsewhere, so being prepared to move can turn disaster into triumph.
A barbel bite is bold and violent, and the ensuing battle relentless from the moment the rod compresses until the landing net is drawn over the vanquished fish.
It’s this never-say-die attitude of barbel that prompts me to explain how you should treat them after the fight. They’ll have given their all, so don’t lift them out of the water the moment they’re landed – allow them to recover first in the landing net.
Then unhook them and take pictures, if you need them, as quickly as possible, laying the fish on an unhooking mat. Better still, unhook the barbel in the water and never lift the net out. Point the barbel head-first upstream and allow the flow to rejuvenate the fish fully before you let it go.
So, enjoy your return to flowing water this week and allow the river to wash away the cares of the last few months. You deserve this trip more than ever before… and here’s hoping the barbel and chub agree!