At the beginning of the week I had a day after barbel on one of my local rivers. With the rivers being low and clear and the fish becoming more than a bit cagey I decided to use maggots for the first time this season. Maggots have the affect of getting even the wariest of barbel feeding, the downside is that used too early in the year small fish can be a real pain.
 Having found a shoal of barbel underneath a near bank snag I quietly lowered in 6 dropper full's and watched events. Almost instantly the barbel were on the feed and small fish were quickly pushed out of the way. As I only fish short morning sessions I decided to get my hook bait in and hopefully get an early fish, the bait was lowered into position and within a few minutes I saw a barbel turn on it's side while at the same time the rod tip hammered round, I just love visual fishing. After a spirited fight the fish was in the net, at around 8lb it was no monster but still great fun. I lowered in a couple more droppers and the fish came back on the feed. Placing my hook bait in position again it wasn't long before I had another fish in the net about the same size, a great end to the mornings fishing.
 Below are a couple of shots I took a couple of years ago for an Angling Times feature showing the rig used, the only difference being I was using the new Drennan specimen hooks in a size 16 that I found worked really well.