Angler's profile:

Name
Gary Knowles

Hometown
Warrington, Cheshire

Personal Best
Pike 31.12, Zander 15.02, Perch 4.10, Bream 17lb 2oz, Tench 9.01. Barbel 13.06, Chub 6.14, Rudd 2.08, Roach 2.03, Carp 37.12, Grass Carp 35.08, Catfish 131

Favourite Venue
Large lakes and Troutwaters, Small rivers, Cheshire Meres

Favourite Specimen
Anything bigger than I’ve ever caught before!

Fishing Ambition
To keep catching big fish, but to more importantly to keep enjoying doing so for as long as I can…

Read More from Gary Knowles

Winter brace of 5lb chub

I’ve been spending a little time on the Ribble of late and have been catching good numbers of 4lb chub with the odd ‘5’ thrown in for good measure. But when I arrived on the bank last Saturday I thought I had made the wrong call.

 

The river was up and coloured and really pushing through quite hard, frankly awful conditions for chub, and much more suited for barbel. With only my chub gear with me I figured I may as well give it a go and walked upstream to a spot where I knew I could hold a rig on the inside line. Not one of the better swims, but a swim non-the less. Within seconds of casting in the tip dragged slowly round due to debris being carried downstream, so I wound my rig in, changed the cage feeder for a 1oz lead and recast after replacing the breadflake with a piece of cheesepaste.

After about 10 minutes the rod sprung violently back, signalling the lead had been dislodged and I struck into what felt like a decent fish. Due in part to the way it instantly took line against the clutch, but also because of the river conditions, I first thought ‘barbel’ but when a black fin swirled on the surface I knew I had a decent chub. And so it was, at 5lb 12oz it was my best Ribble fish of the winter and was later followed a little later with another 4lb+ fish and finally a second ‘five’ at 5lb 03oz just after dark. Given the conditions I was delighted to have taken a brace of ‘fives’ and made the long walk back to the car more than happy with the evenings events.

Successful tackle was a Preston Innovations 11’-6” ‘carbonactive’ feeder, Shimano ‘Stradic’ reel, loaded with 6lb Krystonite mono. For the end rig I alternated between a 30g Korum cage feeder and a straight lead, and a Kamasan B983 hook was attached to 5.9lb Grand Match Fluorocarbon hooklink.