Effectively Fishing Off The Barrow

In winter (and for much of the year to be honest) I fish only days, and with the usual amount of kit we all take, I find a barrow is the best way to be on the move as quickly as possible. However, I like to try and optimise everything, and whilst ‘fishing off the barrow’ is not new, it is not overly realistic due to the stuff you need to hand and the nature of the luggage we all use. The second challenge to overcome is ‘handle’ weight: the amount of gear I stored in front of the wheel and as such the effort required to lift and push. So I embarked on a little test…

The Weight Test
I placed a bungy around the handles and with a set of scales, weighed the effort to lift the back feet off the ground. It was 31lb, and the kit included a day chair, unhooking mat, plus the under-barrow bag full of the tackle, bait, hookbaits, torches, PVA, food etc., etc.

Basic (and obvious) principles
The more weight you can put in front of the wheel, or directly over the wheel, the better, which means the under-barrow bag is a no-no for anything weighty. Given I leave the barrow ‘ready to go’, it also means that using the under-barrow bag for food and bait is difficult as you would have to empty and reload between sessions, and as such remove all items on the barrow. Yes, I know some barrows have side access, but aside from emergencies, these aren’t really neat, friendly or easy to use.

So the challenges:

- Only very light items to be stored in the under-barrow bag that are not often needed, especially prior to setting up.
- Food and bait needs to be easily accessible and easy to replenish between sessions.
- Tea making kit needs to be instantly accessible, along with water.
- All ‘take-every-session’ tackle to be placed over the wheel, but with access to PVA and bait up tools without a complete unload.

The answers:

- The unhooking mat fits inside the under-barrow bag, along with a collapsible refresh bucket, sling, retainer, scales, tripod and Rhino lights. All of those items weigh next to nothing and wouldn’t need access until I was all sorted and fishing.
- Food and bait. Well, I had a couple of the hook-on Carp Porter bags that fitted nearly on the front bar. These could easily be removed and stored/cleaned between sessions.
- One side of the wheel bag fits a 5lt water butt, and the other side takes a stove, gas cannister, kettle, towel, mug and everything else required for a quick cuppa.
- On top I placed the barrow bag, back-facing (to keep stable), which also still gives me  access to the under-barrow bag. This has the not-often-used stuff in the main compartment, with hookbaits, tackle box and rig board in the top.
- Lastly, the side pockets have PVA, scissors and a few often-used liquids etc.—stuff that I would need to be able to set-up and get fishing. This means I can get rigged up, tie a bag and make a cuppa tea without removing anything from the barrow.

Refining

- I use a ‘Singlez’ type of rod support set-up that sits on top of the chair.
- The chair is the Fox one and the lightest I have ever known and okay for 40 winks at a pinch.
- The rod bag is a Korum Quiver which takes an umbrella, net and is not only super light but the access is brilliant and it can stay on the barrow whilst you connect up all three rods, or whack the Fox Day Umbrella spike into the ground.

Other neat tricks and tips… 

- A tube mounted (cable ties) on the front bar houses my distance sticks, so again I can access them without removing anything from the barrow.
- The Carp Porter bags were treated with utterly pointless patches (i.e. the ‘Food’ and ‘Bait’ on each of them), but you know…
- My forceps and carp care are on a spring key ring attached to the barrow.
- A small pouch goes on the barrow handles to take my receiver. 

So the results… 

- The ‘handle weight’ was reduced from 31lb to just over 14lb, so 50% in ‘handle lift’.
- I had all 3 rods fishing without removing anything from inside the barrow bags.
- I keep the food bag in our larder so I can fill up on the day of the trip, and the bait bag is by the freezer with a couple of tubs of shelf-life hookbaits in.
- I can get ready to move with only the rods left out until the last minute.

Couple of bits of advice

- Keep the tyre properly inflated; it makes such a difference. Replace the crap dust cap which comes with most wheels supplied on carp fishing barrows with a decent one. Oh, and keep a bicycle pump in the car.
- Handle grips matter—ensure they are comfortable.
- If you’ve got a van, a ramp is a godsend. I purchased a cheap motorbike one, but a length of trunking or board will do the job.
- Don’t put all your effort into ‘light’ kit if this compromises your angling; focus instead on the weight distribution, and tweaking the contents can be done to refine.