After a good early winter on the river I decided to try my luck again and fished when possible despite the continual high water levels during early spring. I had success on most visits from late February to the end of the season.
It may not have the huge fish of the Great Ouse, or the charisma of the Royalty fishery on the Hampshire Avon, or even received as much publicity as its smaller Derbyshire cousin the River Dove, but there is no doubt that our stretch of the Lower Derwent is a superb fishery. Almost 6 miles of meandering river, most of it both banks, every swim different in character to its adjoining ones from shallow fast riffles to deep holes plunging to 12 or more feet. Many pegs hardly seeing a rod all season.
December last year (2006) was a brilliant month for me on the Derwent, I had put my barbel rods to one side and started pike fishing, but with the pike fishing being a bit slow, and the weather remaining mild I went back to the barbel fishing. In total during December I caught 22 barbel, up to four fish a session with one blank and although I did not weigh the smaller fish the average weight was over 8lbs with the largest at 10lb 8oz. Quite a few 4lb chub were caught along with the barbel the largest being a personal best of 5lb 11oz. I started the New Year with a fish of 10lb 2oz and towards the end of January my 100 th barbel of the season hit the net at exactly 10lbs, 73 of these from the Derwent.
Don't think you have to fish long sessions into the dark or in flood conditions to succeed, you will of course catch fish at these times but my own sessions tend to be of 3 – 5 hours in the afternoon, packing up at dusk. Water temperature was as high as 50 degrees F. early in the month, down to 44 F on Boxing Day.
Carp can be found throughout the stretch anywhere from Borrowash to below Wilne. The best caught this season was over 27lb, my own personal best being 19lb 4oz a few years ago. Bream to 6lb show occasionally and with pike to 22lb, perch to almost 4lb, tench to 6lb 8oz, chub to almost 6lbs or more and last year a brown trout of 9lb 8oz there are plenty of big fish to target.
For the float angler, during the summer and autumn good bags of silver fish can be caught in many swims.
I first fished the river in the late 50's along with my brother and fellow club member Mick Fletcher; we'd buy day tickets at a pub in Borrowash and fish down Nooning Lane . Roach were the dominant species then. The river still recovering from the heavily polluted lifeless ditch it was before the famous A.C.A verses the Electricity Board. Derby Corporation and British Celanese case 10 years earlier.
We must though, be forever vigilant, as situated below major industry and the city of Derby , pollution is always a threat. The river suffered serious pollution in 1989 and 1993 and many specimen fish were lost. On one of my last December sessions whilst the river was fining down after a flush of water, among the usual debris, which collects on your line in these conditions, was obviously toilet tissue. Chatting to an Earl of Harrington member the same day he told me of an incident last year when a competition on their water had to be abandoned after a storm because of an influx of tons of raw sewage.
