Drennan’s Stewart Moss was delighted to land this specimen barbel from a
midlands river recently, which weighed in at 16lb 5oz, narrowly setting a new
personal best for the species by ounces.

The plump fish was tripped up by a simple legered CC Moores Meteor Boilie presented to a Kamasan Barbel Maxx hook with a small mesh bag of bait. Stew fished whilst the river was heavily coloured and almost bursting it’s banks – a time when even pressured barbel can lose their caution and feed really hard. It was hooked during the classic “just got properly dark time” and put up a terrific battle, with driving rain into the head torch making visibility difficult.

“This big old girl is an interesting fish as it’s been a fairly regular visitor to the bank over the years and is capable of big weight fluctuations – fortunately I caught it when it had plainly been on a big feeding binge, as it was as fat as a pig ready for market!” explained Stewart.

The barbel was landed on one of the fabulous 12ft Drennan Martin Bowler Specialist Barbel 1.75lb rods and 15lb ESP Syncro line.