FINDING the Dorset Stour running bank-high and coloured after heavy rain, Ben Fairweather was confident that the river’s barbel would be feeding... and his hunch proved spot-on after he banked this 16lb cracker!
He used two rods, both sporting 14mm fishmeal boilie hookbaits, wrapped in paste and fished alongside mesh bags of crushed boilies and crumb. These were dropped on to a crease in the flow, with one bait downstream of the other.
After two hours, it was the upstream rod that burst into life, and Ben hooked a fish that doggedly hugged the riverbed in the main flow and then made several powerful bursts for freedom before it eventually tired and was netted.
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