Avon Barbel

hello all,i have done this subject to death over the years[on another site]so if any one has missed it here goes.
i have fished the h.a since the 1960,s,and the very first thing i do is to find the fish,nothing is more important than that,in fact if i havnt seen any fish then i dont fish.not every one can do that i know,as you may have to travel long distances to get there,like i used to,so you have to hope that there are fish in the area that you choose.i now live 5miutes from the h.a.

running rig or bolt rig,well it depends weather you want taps and little pulls or the rod heading for the river,so i fish a rig[bolt rig]that gives me a wappround every time,there are no twitches or taps with this rig.
what made me fish this tpe of rig and not to use any other,well i will try to explain.

countless hours of fish spotting over 40odd years on the avon,and watching fish behavior,and how at times they can and do mouth a bait without moving off with it never seems to amaze me,so unless you have the correct rig to deal with them when they are in this mood,and worse still you cant see the fish,to sight fish for them[like terry lampard]you will never catch them.

of course there will be days when they will show no caution at all,and go straight to the bait pick it up or suck it up and move off with it.
this is all well and good if they move off with it as this is what gives you the bite or wappround,but as i have just said they dont always move off with the bait,so you have to make them move off.

this is where the bolt rig comes in[hence the name]they only have to mouth the bait or hold it in there lips without moving and the rig i use will make them bolt or move away with the bait.

i will explain a bit more about the rig,when i see your reaction to this post. cheers derek.

Why not just tell everyone what your " wonder rig" is ! You either want people to know or you wouldnt have posted, I'm not begging , I couldnt give a monkees what you use , I just get a bit fed up with seeing i might tell you i might not!

Hi Derek

Thanks for your response, I would be interested in your bolt rig set up. I have started to used a lead clip with a heavier than required gripper lead, no tubing or back leads and approximatley 12" of flurocarbon hooklength to a size 10 barbel hook. Only managed chub on Sunday but the bites were much better than the running lead method that I always used before.

Cheers

Jedd

Thats about the same setup I use , only I have used longer hooklinks upto 5ft in some places. This is mainly when its low and clear. I picked this up whilst watching some match anglers at Collingham
At Muskham when fishing near the sunken barge I've gone down to a short as 6"'. Always semi-fixed, never lower than 4oz and occasionaly use backleads when on the tidal when boat traffic is busy.

99% of the time I use korda semi fixed rig, grippa lead, 10" braid hooklink, flip bait runner on & wait for the music, or not .
I do like to freeline a big bit of meat in the summer using a 1.25lb rod & then just hold the line with my finger. It is amaizing just how much you can feel, a bit of weed catching the line, or a fish just playing with the bait you soon work out what is going on & makes a nice change from just watching the rod in the rest. Its all about confidence, my view is with a bolt rig you are only going to strike when a fish is on, rather than having to decide what to stike at & what to leave when watching the tip with a running rig.

Cheers

James

hi,in my view if using a bolt rig the fish will be hooked already,and just picking up the rod and to play the fish in,is all that is needed.if you strike with the fish already hooked from the bolt effect you are liable to have the hook pull out.
derek.

Hi All - I tend to use a Korda semi-fixed too, though sometimes with the lead jammed onto the Korda rubber. In terms of hooklength; shortish (12") with a feeder and longer (18"-24" or more) if using PVA. The reason for the shorter length with the feeder is that I don't want a huge distance between the feed and the bait. I'm not sure how sound this logic is to you all, but it makes sense to me. Any comments?

My local river (the Goyt) is about as far removed as you can get from the Hants Avon, i.e. you can't see the fish and have to fish blind into likely swims. This is probably the same on most rivers apart from the aforementioned and the Gt Ouse.