Biggest barbel of the year landed
You're looking at the biggest barbel of the season – a mighty fish of 19lb 10oz caught by Adrian Eves.
Adrian Eves’ Five tips for barbel success
1) Research the water you’re wanting to fish. Local knowledge is paramount, and many tackle shop owners or locals will put you on the fish.
2) Fish where you wouldn’t normally fish. In flooded water the barbel will be in an area where they wouldn’t have been in low water.
3) Fish less pressured waters. Barbel will often shy away from an area receiving lots of feed, activity and attention.
4) Prebait selectively – if you’re feeding a swim with lots of bait, feed more. If there are only a few fish in your swim, feed less.
5) Don’t give up if you blank. Keep ringing the changes and fine-tune your rigs. The results will come!
The Fox and Dynamite Baits-backed angler smashed his pb by 2lb 5oz when the huge fish picked up his paste-wrapped 15mm The Crave boilie on an undisclosed southern river.
Adrian, who has only just revealed details of the fish he caught towards the end of 2017, reckons his success was all down to a prebaiting campaign. He said: “It was mid-afternoon, and after baiting a few swims I settled in front of a snag where I knew there was deeper water. I’d used the same tactics the week before and lost a fish.”
Adrian fished upstream of the snag so he could use the flow to bully anything he hooked out of the swim. He continued: “I wasn’t fishing for long when I received a single tap and then the whole rod sailed around.
“The fight was ridiculous. The fish immediately bolted downstream and I just had to keep holding it and holding it.
“I knew if I gave it any leeway I would lose it, but after what seemed like an eternity (but was probably only a couple of minutes) I managed to pull it to the surface.
“At this point I realised it was a new personal best, as the girth of the fish was massive.
“The landing of the barbel was very fraught, as there’s a 5ft drop to the water, but luckily I was able to scoop it into the net.”
Adrian used a Fox Duo Lite multi-tip rod coupled with 15lb mainline, a leadcore leader and a Fox 15lb Camotex hooklink to land his new personal-best barbel.
He concluded: “I’ve caught lots of big barbel in the past, but this beats them all. Most of my catches have been made at night, so it was fantastic to see its colours and how immaculate this fish was in the full light of day.”
