Rudi’s had a good year for fishing, here are a selection of his fish from the year.
Rudi lives locally and is perfectly placed to keep an eye on the Wyebank and Courtfield fisheries and he helps me enormously by looking after fishermen and watching for poachers. He fishes both beats regularly and is very well acquainted with the best places to catch fish. As the feedback pages for both Wyebank and Courtfield show he has had some superb fishing this year, with quality chub, barbel and pike. These pike pictures, in particular, are stunning and show the wonderful colouration of healthy Wye pike.
Beautiful Chub caught on the Courtfield water
Another good sized Chub for Rudi
Barbel caught on the Leggs Meadow beat in September
9lb 12oz Barbel from Courtfield
Typical Courtfield beat pike
Beautiful Pike caught on Courtfield
Big Pike caught from Courtfield
Here’s a couple more beautiful fish caught by Roger Knife and friend on the Courtfield water.
10lb 5oz Barbel from Leggs Meadow
9lb and 14oz Barbel
12 and a half Pound Barbel
It got to be worth starting with the best! This is Kraig’s 12 and a half pound whooper caught from The Legg Meadow! I think the smile on his face says it all.
10lb Barbel
Kraig said “that day i had 5 chub, 4 caught before i had any barbel. then i had 7 barbel two 10s one smack on 10lb, one 10.4lb. two 7+. two 5/6+. the big one was 12.8lb. i only weighed the doubles but Ive had plenty of 7s before. we checked the weights against my friends scales to make sure the scales were correct, he also had similar amounts of fish, fishing right next to me including doubles. I’m sure i beat the 12.8lb the night i met you but my brother had taken my scales but it looked BiG!!! HUGE mouth. the night i met you i had 8 or 9 barbel mainly between 4pm and 11.30pm 5 chub i left to go home at around 12/ 12.30.”
Another Barbel
Just landed Barbel
Chubb
Shining in the flashlight - night time Barbel
Here is a selection of the Barbel caught by Roger Knife and Oli Dormer throughout the summer and autumn on Courtfield. They ranged in size from 6lb 2oz through to 10lbs 3oz, including eight 8 pounders and six 9 pounders. His season’s catch illustrates the steady growth of the 8lb class of fish in June through to 9lbs in August, which have shown up in September/October’s catches as 10lb Barbel which have been caught in significant numbers.
8lb 2oz Barbel
8lb 11oz Barbel from the Wood Stretch
8lb 13oz Barbel
8lb 15oz Barbel from Legg Meadow
9lb 4oz Barbel from the Wood Stretch
9lb 6oz Barbel
9lb 12oz Barbel
10lb 3oz Barbel
Thanks to Roger Knife for the use of his great photos.
Tuesday the 18th October was one of the last days for memorable catches, with Wyebank producing a good bag for Adriano Mercato and friend, including barbel to 8lb plus and chub to 6.25 lbs and Courtfield producing a good bag of barbel and a great get together for Dean Macey, Les Westbeach, Nigel Botherway and Shaun Hodges.
Shaun, the manager of tackle shop Hinders of Swindon took the day with three consecutive ten pound barbel at 10lbs, 10lb 4oz and 10lb 8oz. These were caught on Hinders Blitz boilies wrapped in Blitz paste with Hinders Barbel Bomb in the feeder, proving in Nigel Botherway’s words that Hinders of Swindon “sell the best barbel bait known to man.”
10lb 8oz Barbel
Another beautiful 10lb plus fish
The third of the 10lb plus Barbels
After a fantastic run of doubles over the past few weeks it looks like the barbel fishing is winding down now.
Posted in Barbel, Catch reports, Coarse Fishing, Coarse fish Gallery, Uncategorized (Tags: barbel, coarse fish, Coarse Fishing, courtfield, Dean Macey, Hinders of Swindon, Les Westbeach, Nigel Botherway, Shaun Hodges) | No Comments
Dean Macey, Ali Hamidi and Richard Stewart had a day on both Wyebank and Courtfield as part of a feature for TV for Improve your Coarse Fishing Magazine. In Dean’s own words “it was by far the most productive days barbel fishing that Ive ever had“!
Below are some of the pictures taken by Richard for the magazine article
Ali hooked into a fish
Dean hooked into another!
Bringing a Barbel in
Ali with a lovely fish
Dean with a large chub
Another chub for Dean
Ali with another Barbel!
Dean in amongst the Water Buttercup with a Barbel
In late September Peter Foster and his friend Richard fished Courtfield, the photo is of Peter’s largest Barbel at 10lb 3oz. Other fish caught that day were, as Peter describes; “I had just the five barbel – three sevens, a 9-11 and the 10-3 – a very good average for the Wye, I would say. Richard had even more success later in the day at Courtfield”
He added in an email “Just a brief note to show my appreciation for your lovely stretch of river. I thoroughly enjoyed my day’s fishing, and I was pleased to have the opportunity to meet you, too.”- Thanks Peter it’s always good to know that people enjoy their fishing on the stretches.
Peter's barbel resting in his net
It is great to have pictures of fish so that they can be seen fully but it is nicer to see the fish back in the water too!
This was Phil Brumhills amazing fish from Courtfield, caught mid October 2011
10lb 12 oz Barbel from Courtfield
Jonathon Avery, his Dad and his boss Dan from Cadbury Angling came and enjoyed the Courtfield water. Here are some of their catches.
8lb 12oz Barbel
10lb 6oz Barbel
5lb 4oz Chub
Barbel caught on one of the Legg Meadow swims
Another great Barbel
Pike caught on Legg Meadow swim
Mike and Alan Holcombe had a good day on Wyebank beat in late July 2011. He said in an email to us:
“Thanks to you we thoroughly enjoyed two superb evening fishing sessions on your water. Our total catch for the two short sessions was 14 Barbel to 7lb.4oz., and 6 Chub to 4lb.1oz. “
Below are a few photos of their catches.
Mike's first Barbel from Wyebank
A second barbel for Mike
Evening Barbel
Alan with his Wyebank Barbel
Alan with his second fish
Hooked into a Barbel on the first cast of the evening!
Thanks to Mike and Alan for letting us use their photos.