Gunthorpe weir pool, River Trent

Weir pool · Fresh water · in The River Trent

A navigation weir and lock on the middle Trent, with a scoured pool beneath the sill, a fast broken tongue of water, hard gravel and stone in the pool and a slower tail below it.

Safety: moving water and currents — can cause serious injury or death. 3 more points apply here.

What each one does, and what reduces it ↓

FishingHQ describes what this place is. It does not say whether you may fish it: access rights, permits, licences, byelaws, closures and protected areas all apply, all differ and all change. Who to ask is below.

What you can catch here

Documented at this place, grouped by how you would be fishing, with how strongly the sources support each one. This is what has been written down, not a forecast, and being listed is never permission to fish.

From the shore · 4

What these strengths mean

Established quarry: Fishing sources describe this as a normal local target here, not merely as caught.
Seasonal: Well supported, and concentrated in part of the year rather than spread through it.
Repeatedly reported: Several independent public accounts. Enough to say it happens more than once; not enough to call it a fishery.
Places, accounts and sources are counted separately: A fish documented once at each of six marks is still documented once at each of six marks. Breadth is reported as a place count and never raises the strength, and sources are deduplicated across places so one publisher covering a whole coast counts as one. A fishery account is a source describing the fishing; a recorded catch is a report of a specific catch. They are counted apart because they are not the same evidence.

Also associated with this ground

Recorded as present here without a documented method or strength behind them.

Common bream

Recorded here, but not a species to target

These are recorded here and are not quarry. Each is either assessed as Critically Endangered or protected by statute in this jurisdiction, and taking one may be prohibited outright — elsewhere every rod-caught fish must be returned. Read the species page and check the current rules with the authority before fishing.

European eel

How people fish it

Practised here: Coarse fishing.

Methods the sources name for this ground. Each one is explained in full on its own page.

Ledgering
Fishing a bait on the bottom held by a weight, with no float — the simplest way to fish at distance, in depth, or in wind.
Feeder fishing
Legering with a weight that also carries bait, so that free offerings arrive in exactly the same place as the hookbait, cast after cast.
Float fishing
Suspending a bait at a controlled depth beneath a buoyant indicator — the most visual, most controllable and most widely applicable method in angling.

The ground and the water

The ground: A navigation weir and lock on the middle Trent, with a scoured pool beneath the sill, a fast broken tongue of water, hard gravel and stone in the pool and a slower tail below it.
Exposure: Partially sheltered by bankside trees and the weir structure itself.
Depth: Deeply scoured immediately below the sill — weir pools are the deepest water on most navigable rivers — shallowing through the tail.
Tide and flow: Flow is governed by the weir and by upstream rainfall. The pool changes character completely between summer low flow and winter high flow.

Through the year

Barbel and chub in the oxygenated water through summer, predators in the tail through autumn and winter, and a year-round concentration of fish that the weir creates by holding food and oxygen in one place.

Safety

Moving water and currents — Can cause serious injury or death

The water immediately below a weir sill recirculates: it flows downstream on the surface and back upstream underneath, forming a hydraulic that holds a floating object — or a person — against the face and will not release them. It is the single most dangerous feature on an inland navigation and it looks like white water rather than like a trap.

What reduces it: Do not enter the water below a weir under any circumstances, do not wade the sill, keep well back from the edge on a wet structure, and treat a weir in high flow as a place to be away from rather than a place to fish carefully.

Worse when:

In high flow, when the hydraulic is strongest and extends furthest downstream.

Drowning and immersion — Can cause serious injury or death

A soft, undercut or steep bank gives way, or a wader steps off a shelf, and an angler enters water that is deeper and colder than the surface suggests, in clothing and boots that fill.

What reduces it: Test the bank before committing weight, wade only where you can see or have felt the bottom, wear a buoyancy aid on any water you would not want to swim in clothes, and do not fish alone at night on a steep or undercut bank.

Cold water shock — Can cause serious injury or death

UK coastal and inland water is cold enough for most of the year to trigger the involuntary gasp and the loss of swimming ability that decides most immersion deaths, and it does so within the first minute, long before hypothermia is relevant.

What reduces it: Wear a buoyancy aid rather than carry one, carry a means of calling for help on the person rather than in a bag, and plan on the assumption that an unplanned entry into the water is survivable only if somebody knows immediately.

Tides and being cut off — Can cause serious injury or death

Below Cromwell Weir the river is tidal. Soft silt banks that carry weight on the way down will not on the way back, the rising tide covers the ground walked in on, and on the largest springs the Aegir arrives upstream as a wave faster than a person can move off a soft bank.

What reduces it: Know the state of the tide and the timing of any bore before going down the bank, know where the exit is, do not fish the tideway alone, wear a buoyancy aid, and keep well back from the tideline when a bore is due.

Worse when:

On the largest spring tides, when the bore forms and is biggest.
In the dark, when the state of the bank and the rising water cannot be judged.

Rules and access

Licence

A rod licence is required for freshwater rod fishing in England, issued by the Environment Agency.

Permission to fish

Separate. Almost all fishing rights are held by a club, association, riparian owner or navigation authority, and the licence does not grant access to any of them.

FishingHQ does not know the current access position here. Freshwater rod fishing in England requires a current rod licence AND separate permission from whoever controls the fishing, which is frequently a club, riparian owner or navigation authority rather than a public body. Close seasons, byelaws and local rules apply and change. Check with the Environment Agency and with the controlling club or owner before going.

Who holds the answer:

The Environment Agency, for rod licensing, close seasons and fisheries byelaws in England.
The club, association, riparian owner or navigation authority that controls the fishing.
The Environment Agency, for rod licences, byelaws, the statutory close season and fisheries enforcement in England.
The club, syndicate, landowner or day-ticket fishery that holds the fishing rights on a given stretch, which is a separate permission from the licence.
The Canal & River Trust, where fishing is on connected navigations and canals.
The GB Non-Native Species Secretariat, for biosecurity guidance on moving between waters in a catchment holding invasive species.
The Canal and River Trust as navigation authority for the weir and lock structures.

Nearby fishing

Other publicly documented places within about 40 km, by distance. Positions are approximate public geography and are never exact marks.

The Trent at Burton Joyce — 2–5 km · River reach
The Trent at Newark Dyke — 10–25 km · River reach
The Trent at Collingham — 10–25 km · River reach
The tidal Trent at Dunham — 25–40 km · River reach
The Witham at Lincoln — 25–40 km · River reach

Gunthorpe weir pool, River Trent and the publicly documented places around it. Approximate positions, not marks. Positions are approximate by design — they are capped at about a hundred metres and describe where a named public place is, not where fish are and not a mark. Everything plotted here is also listed below.

Sources for this place

Angling Times — Bauer Media (Specialist angling publication)Relied on for: Long-running published description of British coarse and match angling practice by water and by named reach.FishingHQ's interpretation of what it saysCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
General angling website restatements of established technique — Various (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: Widely restated public descriptions of which waters are conventionally fished and how, recorded as practitioner consensus rather than as scholarship, and not relied on for access, permission or any current rule.Background and mechanism onlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
Environment Agency fisheries management, byelaws and rod licensing information — Environment Agency (Government fisheries body)Relied on for: Freshwater and transitional-water fisheries management in England, the structure of rod licensing, close seasons and byelaws, and the monitoring of rivers and stillwaters.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
RNLI water safety guidance: cold water shock and Float to Live — Royal National Lifeboat Institution (Water-safety or diver-training authority)Relied on for: Cold water shock and the immersion response, tidal cut-off, and water-safety guidance for shore anglers and small-craft users.States this directlyPassage read and verified

How FishingHQ labels evidence is explained in the evidence policy. Last reviewed 2026-08-16.

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