A relative newcomer to coarse angling and keen to unlock any secrets that the River Barrow might hold, I was happy to accompany Gary for a days fishing on a favoured section of his between Carlow and Athy. The Barrow is navigable from New Ross in Co. Wexford to Monasterevin in Co. Kildare, shallow areas bye passed by a system of canals which in the past served a number of milling operations. Today many are derelict although some have been restored for private use. Waterways Ireland maintain the canals and manage the lock gates enabling private pleasure craft and narrow boat hire companies to avail of this wonderful resource.
Overnight rain had rendered the main channel unfishable so Gary and I turned our attention to a canal section. Fish seek shelter in these waters during times of flood, and with water fairly pushing through Gary decided to try out his new Adcock Stanton centrepin reel. I on the other hand stuck to the game plan of feeder fishing with red maggot. Employing a light coloured groundbait mix of crumb, sweetcorn, and various particles we set to work. Bites were fairly immediate mainly from quicksilver dace and small roach.
Missing a lot of bites, those dace are quick, Gary advised me to step down from using four maggots on the hook to just one or two, the result was three roach on the bounce and a couple of small hybrids. My efforts would have put a match fisherman to shame, but hey I was having fun. The Adcock Stanton reel was performing well, Gary trotting a quill float down his swim winkling out small dace supplemented with a few silver bream, roach, and hybrids.
The day had been cold throughout, sunny interspersed with a number of heavy showers. A constant breeze from the south west hinting at worse to come. By 16.00pm with bites becoming less frequent we decided to call it a day. Gary had a mixed bag of 10.lb+, the less said about mine the better although I was happy to have caught all four species mentioned above. A feature was their good condition and how cold they were to touch. We did not connect with any perch or notice evidence of pike although they are definitely present. The day though was positive, a steady stream of fish to christen Gary’s new reel and one or two of the Barrow’s fishy secrets revealed.
