Three times this winter I have walked the towpaths of the River Barrow from Goresbridge to Clashganny, and now upstream of Carlow casting various pike and perch lures to no effect. Plugs of various sizes and descriptions, bulldogs, storm lures, leadhead jigs, mepps, have all tried their luck but still no takers. Bright days, dull days, noon, last light, I haven’t tried first light could that be the reason? Were there no fish in the stretches that I tried, hardly? Was I just doing something wrong, working the lures incorrectly? Anyone out there got any clues?
Perseverance is the key and the need to tap into more information. Large pike are caught on the Barrow every year as the specimen reports prove. Video clips of perch and pike being caught on the river are posted on you tube, friends have scored with both species. I met three fellow anglers yesterday who recently landed a ten pound pike on a lure from the stretch that I fished. The words “just be there” come to mind. If your not fishing you ain’t going to catch fish, so keep fishing it will happen sometime, the door will open, a chink of light, after that you never look back.
It’s not just the fishing though but getting out in the air that is important. Participating, meeting people, visiting new places, sights, sounds, and smells, what surrounds the fishing that is what is important. Yes catching fish is the ideal end result but not the be all. Lies!! No, but if the drought persists? It won’t. A mottled green leviathan is out there its eyes piercing the murk every sense acute to the electrical impulses emitted from that struggling roach, she focuses, she targets, like a zeppelin she floats adjusting her position to strike. Three sweeps of her paddle like tail, eyes intent, mouth agape, BANG, fish on……
Tags: Angling, County Carlow, Fishing, Ireland, Leadhead jigs, Lure Fishing, Mepps, Pike, Pike Fishing, River Barrow, River fishing, Roach, Storm lures
