It is November 14th and complete autumn in Holland. After 2 days of stormy weather the wind has finally dropped but it still rains on and off.

The water level in the rivers is very high and I leave quite early in the morning heading for the river Ijssel.

Arriving at the waterside I see that the breakwaters are completely submerged. This is not favourable because if I am lucky enough to catch a fish it will be very difficult to successfully play and land. The fish could swim himself fast between the basalt blocks of the submerged breakwater or the line could break on the sharp edges of the rocks. The bait is made up of 2 kg Sonubaits hemp& hali crush and 1 kg 4mm halibut pellets and the whole of it saturated with Sonubaits barbel & carp liquid enhancer in a hemp & spicy sausage flavour and the necessary amount of water.
You can ask yourself how much bait do I need in this colder period of the year but this has (up to now) delivered many fish. I don’t think that overfeeding in a fast running river such as today will be to my disadvantage. The time is right, the fish are beginning to gorge themselves for the coming winter. You can expect barbel in the summer but in the colder months the fish confines itself to periodic feeding. The better catches are usually made in the late afternoon or early morning but up to now I have also made catches in the mornings.

Because the water is so high and murky I decide to spend the first hour laying down a lot of  feeder baskets to build a bait trail and to try and lure the barbel to my fishing spot.The current is quite strong and I am using 120 gms(large korum mesh feeder) they take a little more bait than the standard feeders. The hair is mounted with a red coloured 11 mm hemp & spicy sausage pellet which has a powerful sharp odour that should attract barbel. After an hour of regularly adding new bait on the spot I decide to let the bait lay a bit longer.

An hour and a half later my KXI free spin reel begins to hum. This sounds like music to my ears. I grab my rod to make my strike and the barbel takes some meters of line. I have set the drag not too stiff to prevent losing the fish on the strike. The most larger examples usually take an enormous run when you make the strike and if you have not set the drag correctly there is a big chance that through his brute force you can damage the fish because the hook or the line can cut into his flesh or in the worst case even tear his lip. There is also a chance of breaking the line with a wrongly set drag. This depends of course on what diameter line you are using, in my experience 0.28 nylon is the absolute minimum.

In the beginning of the play I have difficulty getting this heavy fish to the bank because he stays firstly on the bottom and then swims full into the current. About 5 minutes later I can get him a little closer and then it begins to get exciting. I am wondering if I can keep this fish high enough in the water to prevent him from swimming fast in the stone blocks. The adrenaline is working and saving me a trip to the sport school this evening, what a powerful fish!
The rod is bent nearly double and I think I can hear the line creaking from the strain. This whisker bearer is a violent beast.

After a while I glimpse the babel for the fist time and he makes an immediate dive for the bottom again but I don’t give him any slack. Its now death or glory and there is still a chance of losing him at the bank. It is eventually glory because I can slip my landing net under him and we can both take a rest. And get our wind back. I let the barbell recover from the intensive play and decide to weigh and measure him shortly. On the measuring board he turns out to be my third at 85 cm.
My Dutch barbel record dates back to 2007 and was a length of 85 cm with a weight of 6.4 kg and in 2009 I bettered that with once again a length of 85 cm and a weight of 6.9 kg. This record has been broken in 2009 by Ade Kiddell on the river ‘De Waal’ the length of that barbel was 87 cm I am very curious about the weight of this one and grab the scales, The  screen with the digital readout tells me 7.2 kg or 15.9 lbs, a new personal record by weight is a fact.( by the way the official Dutch record by weight is 7.1 kg)
In the last couple of months I have had the good fortune to catch and land various heavyweights(12.8-13.1-13.6-13.7-14.1 and 14.6 lbs)all over 80 cm but this beats all of them.

These impressive catches I have to thank to intensive and long pre-baiting campaigns, although today was without the pre-baiting. This barbel is ready for the winter and has gorged himself which goes to show that autumn can be a good time for heavy barbel looking for even more food.
 
Honestly said this catch is a bit un-Dutch because you only expect these heavy barbel in English waters(where even heavier examples are to be found) but this is on its way.
The coming years will surely produce bigger and heavier examples here in the Netherlands, so be prepared.

Preston innovations are prepared because they have developed a barbel rod specially for the big dutch rivers. They will be available in the lengths 12’8”, 13’8”& 14’2”.The last will be my personal choice and the name of the rod will be how else Dutch Master River.

Because of the length it will be easier in high water so as today to keep the fish high further from the bank and so minimise the chance of a lost fish. With normal water levels it is even easier. I lost 2 heavyweights today because I couldn’t  keep the fish high enough and tore my line on the rocks. Nothing more frustrating than to lose a fish after a long play at the last moment.