THE BARBEL 



BARBUS VULGARIS 



German, Die Barbe; French, Le Barbeau 



By R. B. MARSTON 



I KNOW no river fish which is so capricious in its feeding — at any 

 rate on the angler's bait — as the barbel, and it is a good thing, for 

 otherwise this fine fighter would have become extinct long ago. When 

 they do *' come on " in a good barbel swim in the Thames or Trent 

 there are scores of big and little fish, say from two to ten pounds, 

 spread over the bottom of the swim and racing with each other in 

 competition for your worm or bit of " scratchings." 



Up to fifteen or twenty years ago it was not an uncommon thing for 

 Thames anglers who had baited a barbel swim with lob worms to take 

 between one and two hundredweight of barbel, including fish up to ten 

 pounds or so, and occasionally much heavier — ^up to about twenty pounds 

 have been recorded in this country; but neither in Thames nor Trent or 

 Lea are there now so many barbel as formerly. 



This fish gets its name from the four beards or barbules, of which two 

 hang down from near the pointed end of the upper lip and two near the 

 angle of the mouth. 



The barbel lives in the strongest streams, and loves a clean, gravelly 

 bottom, and although, as I have said before, there are times when he feeds 

 madly, there are often months, and sometimes whole seasons, when no 

 bait will tempt him; this is especially the case in the Kennet, lower Golne, 

 near Wraysbury, and the River Lea — all Thames tributaries. An old 

 angling friend, Mr Tom Hoole — dead long ago, like so many of my old 

 angling friends — ^used to invite me down to Wraysbury to show him how 

 to catch the big barbel in the pool near Wraysbury Station, where he was 

 station master; he told me he had tried them day and night, often in every 

 kind of way, but could never get them really on, but I knew if Tommy 

 Hoole could not succeed with them I had no chance — ^for he was a past- 

 master at Thames angling, and in the Thames itself had many a heavy 

 take of barbel. Then, on the Kennet and Lea, any angler who knows those 

 rivers well will tell you of the droves of great barbel which are often seen 

 in the weir pools, but rarely caught. 

 240 



