UK Coarse
Species
Barbus barbus
The prize of running water after 16 June. A fish of creases, gravel and a bait put in the right seam — not a stillwater method with a bigger lead.
Barbel belong to rivers. A few commercials stock them in lakes, which is a different, often shallower game. On a proper river they sit in the crease, under streamer weed, on gravel runs and at the tail of a weir pool.
Pellets, meat, hemp, maggot and a simple running leger or maggot feeder still catch more barbel than fashion. The statutory coarse close season on rivers in England and Wales is 15 March to 15 June inclusive. This app will not tell you to fish a river in May.
River creases, gravel, weed rafts, weir tails, and the inside of a bend where food is funnelled. Lake barbel hug features and the bottom.
From 16 June. Warm, coloured water after rain is a gift. Autumn fish are often the biggest. Winter barbel are a specialist game.
They face the flow and take a bait that comes to them. A three-foot twitch is a take. They run hard for weed and snags.
Big mat, always. Support the belly. In summer heat, keep them in the current to recover before you even think about a photo. Never hold a barbel upright by the head for a long pose.
Hemp and pellets little and often, or a feeder that puts maggots in the same seam as the hookbait. Accuracy of the crease beats a bucket of bait in the slow water.
Fishing a river in the close season. Too light a lead in a heavy crease. Hair-rigging a bait that should be running along the gravel. Poor fish care in a heatwave.
No taps: you're not in the seam. Taps, no fish: smaller bait or a longer tail. Weeded: move an inch, or come upstream of the snag with a stronger hooklength.
Technique
Maggot feeder
A crease full of maggots
Technique
Bomb / leger
Pellet or meat on a running leger
Technique
Stick float
Lighter barbel, open season
Technique
River feeder
A crease that holds a feeder
Technique
Trotting a river
A heavier float through the crease
Technique
Barbel fishing
The whole approach
Technique
Avon float
A heavier trot
Technique
Rolling meat
A cube trundled through the crease
Rig
Bomb / running leger
A straight lead on a run ring or inline, a hooklength, and a bait. The quiet alternative to a feeder.
Rig
Maggot feeder rig
A blockend on a link, a medium hooklength, maggots trickling around a maggot hookbait.
Rig
Hair rig
A bait on a hair of line, not on the hook shank. The reason wafers, corn and boilies get sucked in with the hook.