Dan O’Neill from the Mount Juliet Estate was back on Barrow at the weekend…

River Barrow
River Barrow

Starting out early on Saturday morning we headed to find some deep water in search of some hybrids and roach. After traveling downstream for 30 minutes we plumbed the depth in an area we liked the look of. It came to 11ft. Mixing up a good bucket of groundbait and adding sweet corn, maggots and chopped worm to the mix we began to bait up the chosen area. While the bait settled we had our breakfast, it always tastes nicer while on the bank of a river.

Roach
Roach

Better fish

So now was the time for the first cast, placing the float some meters above the groundbait area it travelled beautifully down the current. The shadows on the water of the trees highlighted the orange tip of my waggler. Just as it passed over the groundbait the orange tip gently dipped under. I lifted into the bite it and the fish held its own and turned away from me slowly. Under the water I couldn’t see any flashing. There was no head banging. Could it be on my first cast that I had a hybrid? Eventually the fish came to the surface and turned on it’s side. A beautiful roach in pristine condition was my first catch. After that we had in excess of 30 roach all good sized fish. 2 small hybrids showed up also and the odd few dace.

Changing tactics to running ledger rig now using sweet corn as a hookbait threw  a cast just beyond the groundbait. After a few more casts the rod tip wrapped right around I lifted into it and was fairly certain this was what I was waiting for. The fish swam around, gave me a good fight and finally he came to the net, a beautiful hybrid was my prize and in pristine condition. A few more hybrids came to the net after that then Mr Pike gave us a visit. We used a wobbled dead bait and had him take it. A small jack pike again the culprit. We had some more fish after this then decided to pack up after a great day yet again on the Barrow.