Oliver Burch's Game Fishing Monthly Report - July 2025

Early July found us still sweating it out at 30 degrees air temperature. It could have been worse: Huelva in Spain recorded 46 degrees, while friends in Mostar spoke of 48 degrees in the shade. The mountain railway line from Sarajevo through Mostar to Ploce on the Dalmatian coast closed due to heat-buckled rails. Back in the UK the water temperature of the Wye hovered around 20 degrees, sometimes up to 22 degrees and while many coarse anglers had big catches on the lower and middle river, the heat in the water ruled out responsible game fishing for much of the time. Turning to the western rivers, the Usk was just a little cooler, and the Towy cooler still. Even in summer the Towy always tends to be a cold river due to the feed at the top end running from the depths of Llyn Brianne.

Coarse anglers were doing well. At the end of June we had a remarkable report from MR of Liverpool and a friend who fished from 5.30 in the morning at Holme Lacy 3 and Lechmere’s Ley. Apparently the automated catch return system on the Passport would not allow them to fill in a combined catch of 300 chub! I wouldn’t know about this, never having had such a number to report! Meanwhile trout fisher Grant Edgerton from Broadway was very unhappy with the access to the Lugg at Eyton, after finding it impossible to reach the river almost anywhere in conditions of dense summer growth. I have a lot of sympathy with this complaint, particularly as the cattle fencing here has been done in a very unsympathetic way regarding access for anglers. Worst of all, the County has still failed to repair the footbridge crossing the river. This is on a public right of way, so a legal obligation is not being met.

Neil Withnell from Edge was more content with his day at How Caple Court where he caught 4 barbel to 7 pounds 10 ounces: “Thank you for strimming – very much appreciated for preventing nettle stings on bare legs.” SL from Aldershot had a good day at Fownhope No 5 with 2 barbel, 32 chub and an eel. Andrew Todd from Grimsby with a friend had 6 barbel and 30 chub from Middle Ballingham and Fownhope No 8.  The next day they were rewarded with 2 barbel and 42 chub from Fownhope 5. Tony Hobbs from Monmouth fished the evening at Wyastone Leys and caught a couple of chub and an eel over 4 feet long. Russell Dodson from Lower Boddington fished the upper Wye at Ty Newydd for 8 trout and 2 grayling. Jack Cook with 2 friends from Stanford Le Hope fished two days at Holme Lacy 3 and Lechmere’s Ley, catching 2 barbel and 60 chub on the first, and 2 barbel and 27 chub on the second day.  Michael Woodcock of Ross on Wye with a friend fished the same remarkable beat on 2nd July, catching 53 and 37 chub respectively on luncheon meat. Most of the 90 fish were reported over 4 pounds. Andrew Todd from Grimsby with a friend had 5 barbel and 21 chub between them at Middle Ballingham and Fownhope No 8.

Paul Lewis from Tredegar reported more trouble at the Usk Reservoir, again with a disturbing interethnic dimension, accusing other anglers of cheating on the rules, fishing extra rods and deceiving the Water Company bailiffs. It is important to know whether Mr Lewis reported the same problem to the bailiffs as they made their rounds that day. John Evans from Caerphilly with 2 friends had 4 trout from the Usk Reservoir, but warned that construction of a new pumping station is restricting bank access. MF from Coventry chose not to fish at Symonds Yat given the hot conditions, but was upset that the WUF turned him down for a refund. My understanding is that the WUF will switch the date, given payment of an administration charge and a minimum of 10 days advance warning. However, if a water temperature reading taken on the day shows a figure defined by the WUF as too high for safe catch and release, then without charge the booking date on the same beat can be switched or put in the bank for reallocation later in the year. Mark Andrews from Much Hadham with 2 friends caught 9 barbel, 2 of them over 8 pounds, and 60 chub to 5 pounds at Fownhope 5. SD from Oldham with a friend fished the Home Fishery, which they found very busy with canoes and swimmers, but caught 1 barbel and 20 chub: “Another beautiful day on the Wye…great day’s fishing on a lovely stretch of water – thank you, WUF.”  Stephen Harris from Treharris caught 6 trout from Llwyn On.

James Tutt from High Wycombe politely asked for an improved map and notes for the Usk Town water and the WUF have agreed to look into this. Experienced small stream angler Alastair Sayell from Newent had criticisms for the access to the Lugg at Litton, due to a huge number of fallen trees: “This beat is a jungle.” He did manage to catch 6 trout. DD from Abingdon with a friend caught 22 chub at Foy Bridge: “Well managed with good access and parking.” Will Samways with a friend from Leckford caught 10 barbel and 49 chub from Fownhope 5. Simon Fraser-Clarke acknowledged, as we all do, the difficult nature of the access at Monnow Valley, but also appreciated “…a beautiful part of the world and a lovely looking river.”

Laura Edwards from Scottow fished at Foy Bridge on the 5th for 1 barbel and 12 chub. PS from Stroud used feeder tactics on the same beat next day for 1 barbel and 19 chub. Simon Hamblin from Abingdon with his son were at Caradoc, where they caught 1 barbel and 19 chub. RL from Woodbridge tried an evening session in the fast currents of Wyebank and caught 10 barbel and 16 chub. Tom Harbinson, also from Woodbridge, caught 3 barbel and 12 chub at the Creel. Shaun Doughty from Spalding with a friend were down at Lower Symonds Yat, where using feeders they caught 7 barbel to 10 pounds 10 ounces plus 7 chub. RL from Woodbridge with a companion fished at Lower Carrots and Luggsmouth on the 7th and found themselves in a dispute with poachers – who apparently crossed the river to the far side but would not leave this double banked beat. Meanwhile they caught 13 barbel and 19 chub. AH from Swansea had 8 barbel and a single chub at Wyastone Leys. Alan Trevett from Basingstoke fished at Middle Hill Court and reported a barbel of 7 pounds 4 ounces and 20 chub to 5 pounds. Lucille Evans from Hengoed with a friend reported 8 trout from the Usk reservoir. Kai Jones from Swansea blanked at the same reservoir and was very unhappy about it. Jon Rice from Bristol caught 2 trout and 1 grayling from the Monnow at Skenfrith but had his day spoiled by 4 trespassers in canoes playing in the upper part of the beat. Was anything said or done at the time please? GM from Shrewsbury had a good evening on Clochfaen at the top of the Wye and caught 8 trout. Andrew from Hull enjoyed his day on the Strathmore Estate water of the upper Tees and caught 12 trout. He had 20 more on the following day. SG from London with 2 friends were pleased to catch 6 barbel and 70 chub from Holme lacy 3 and Lechmere’s Ley, but not so pleased to find a pile of human faeces lying out in the open by the End Island swim. Let’s be frank; this is a field sport and usually there are not sanitary facilities close at hand. But for heaven’s sake, pick your spot and if taken short please don’t leave it where anybody will find it.

The weather now started to build up towards another heat wave, conditions being particularly hot and muggy during the evenings. Tom Harbinson from Woodbridge managed another 10 barbel and 9 chub from the fast-running Wyebank beat. He had 11 more chub from Middle Hill Court on the next day, fishing morning and evening, 6-8 and 6-10, before heading for home: “…back in September to try again.” Laura Edwards from Scottow with a friend caught 14 barbel and 23 chub from Foy Bridge, followed by another 14 barbel and 8 chub from Lower Carrots and Luggsmouth. But generally, as the heat increased, catches were modest by Wye standards. There seemed to be a certain tendency to drift off to the pub as the evening went on, and there is of course no shortage of excellent pubs in the Wye valley.

By the afternoon of 11th July, the air temperature at Monmouth Bridge was showing 33 degrees, the river water temperature now up to 25 degrees, with 20 degrees plus for sea temperature out in the Bristol Channel, and still more hot days predicted. This was considered to be the third “heatwave” of the season. The Wye and Usk Foundation now declared a sort of “state of emergency” for the 2025 Wye salmon run, the main part of which was trapped between the tide and the Monmouth shallows. Despite odd sightings, very few fish seemed to have reached further upstream. The main action taken was to request a release of cold water from the Elan Valley dams, and in fact extra cooling water was on its way within 4 hours of the message to the Water Company. At the same time farmers along the valley were requested to abstain from abstraction and crop irrigation for three days, in the hope that that the released slug of cold water would reach the distressed fish at the bottom end to maximum effect. Meanwhile anglers of all types were asked to continue checking water temperatures and restrict their fishing if necessary.

The chalk streams, as you might expect, were holding up much better in the drought in comparison with our starved rain-fed rivers. The interval between rain falling and reaching the rivers after filtration through chalk downs is vastly greater than we experience in the rest of the country. I know that our friend Peter Major, keeper at Heale House on the Upper Avon, takes a good look at his beat in April and has an idea then from the volume of water coming from the aquifers how the levels will be for the rest of the season. At Heale they have pressed on with necessary weed cutting during the heat wave, although stands of weed in the lower part of the beat have been deliberately left in order to hold the water level up. Elsewhere in the UK, the water companies were introducing hose bans one by one.

Catches were meagre indeed during that heatwave weekend of 12th and 13th July, except for a few Llwyn On trout taken on the bottom with worm. Tony Labrum from Northhampton was upset to come across a poacher’s night line while fishing Llyn y Dywarchen in Snowdonia. Conditions were cooler in the North: Eric Hampel from Newcastle on Tyne took 6 trout and 12 grayling from the Tyne at Barnard’s Castle, while Paul Baker from Hull had 9 trout, all on dries from above Cronkley Bridge on the Raby Estate.

Finally, and to great relief all round, a day of rain arrived on the 15th. Some of the showers were heavy and some light; this was not enough to fill the rivers much, but water temperatures dropped by a couple of degrees. JP from Birmingham accounted for 15 chub using a waggler float at Middle Ballingham and Fownhope No 8. On the 16th Colin Mcsherry from Keynsham recorded 19.7 degrees of water temperature at Fownhope 5 and caught 2 barbel and 22 chub. His three companions fished at Holme Lacy 3 and Lechmere’s Ley and between them caught 46 chub to 4 pounds. Brian Lock from Derby caught 14 barbel from How Caple Court. A couple of game fishers also took an opportunity provided by slightly cooler conditions: Joe Alexander of Rhayader took 10 trout to 10 inches on dry fly from his favourite Llandewi with the thermometer showing 14 degrees, while Neil Stewart from Macclesfield had 5 trout and 2 grayling at Lyepole.

One interesting report came from veteran dry fly fisher Dave Collins of Moccas, who on the 16th headed well upstream to just below Llanwrthwl Bridge to fish during the day and then came down to the GPAIAC water at Builth Wells for the evening. He was aided and abetted in this strategy by the cool Elan dam releases, which by then allowed more moderate water temperatures of 14 degrees and 18 degrees to be measured at these locations. Very little was hatching and virtually nothing rising naturally, but by prospecting in likely locations with a Hare’s Fur Emerger size 16 or 18 he put together a catch of 10 trout to 12 inches and 12 grayling to 17 inches. Dave values the Hare’s Fur Emerger as one of those general purpose useful patterns which in small sizes often produce a response when fish are at all inclined to look up. Grayling Steel Blue and Duck’s Dun are also honourably mentioned in despatches by him and I would add to the list Grey Duster, at least during the late part of the season. See Dave’s tying details here.

Other game anglers further downstream where the “Elan effect” was less evident struggled to take one or two fish from a main river still warm and very much shrunken. In one sense only this was a wonderful time to learn the Wye pools as parts of the river bed rarely seen were now exposed. The coarse fishing was also now generally unproductive with a few exceptions. Stephen Pratt from Chertsey with a friend had 5 barbel and 19 chub from Foy Bridge. Gary Miller from Lutterworth fishing at Lower Carrots and Luggsmouth had a catch of 40 chub to 2.5 pounds, although most were small fish. Lee Hills from Cuckfield had praise for the maintenance and “ever helpful” keeper at How Caple Court.

By the 21st cloudy days with a few heavy showers had reduced water temperatures to some extent. Merthyr Tydfil Angling re-opened their fisheries on the Usk. Warm and cloudy nights are the right medicine for sewin anglers and a few good fish were reported from the upper Towy at Llangadog.

Here is something to think about while we wait and pray for a few salmon to run up river towards us. It might bring memories perhaps of those wonderful days past of summer floods and playing big salmon. What exactly do you do when you have just hooked a fish which makes its mind up to take charge and run down to the next pool or in some cases seems determined to head for the safety of the sea as quickly as possible? Trot down the bank after the fish while reeling up line until you get below and so on better terms with it? All right if you are able to do so, but sometimes the pair of you can travel a long way before you gain the upper hand. And what if you can’t follow along the bank because of trees or obstructions, a more than common situation on our rivers? If you can’t follow but decide to clamp down tight and yield no more line to a freshly hooked salmon swimming hard with the current, it’s all likely to end in tears, even if the fish is not a giant.

In the August edition of Trout and Salmon, Michel Evans describes something he calls the “rapid slack technique”. I call it throwing line down on a fish. Briefly, the idea is that if you find yourself in trouble with a salmon disappearing rapidly downstream towards somewhere you can’t reach, you slacken the drag at once to take off the strain and swing the rod rapidly straight upstream pulling more fly line off the rotating reel – about 5 yards in the case of a 15 foot double hander - before swinging the rod back towards the fish and (I would suggest) pulling even more line off the reel and dumping the whole lot downstream. When the line goes slack and the salmon no longer feels resistance from an upstream pull, it will almost certainly stop running and turn round to head into the current once more. When the current produces a sufficient belly of line below the fish tending to pull it downstream, it will begin to make its way slowly upstream towards the lie where it was originally hooked. When you have the fish opposite or above in a suitable position for playing and eventually netting, wind up the slack and get onto terms with it again. You may have to go through this procedure more than once, but it does work.

This trick often got us out of trouble when fishing the upper Wye at Pwll y Faedda near Erwood. This beat has good salmon lies on pool tails which narrow into dangerous gutters where all the current sucks powerfully and rapidly downstream. The tail of the House Pool with a gutter running down to Isaacson’s is one. Another is the tail of the Boat Pool which ends in a fast gutter running under the tall bridge at the bottom of the beat. I can also remember a difficult fish which decided to go down after being hooked in the Jackpot at the top end. There was another dramatic occasion in the Dog Hole at Goodrich Court. The slack line trick works and it may be your only chance. You can play a similar trick with the spinning rod if need be, playing tunes with the clutch adjustment knob. Even the drag on a bight of thin spinning line below the fish is likely to be enough to persuade it to start swimming up before you tighten and re-engage.

However, I need to add that the incidents described occurred before the barbless hook rule imposed for salmon fishing in recent years. To be quite honest, I have to admit to being slightly less confident about slackening on a fish with a plain hook in its jaw. In theory of course, if the pressure of the current plays its part, all should be well.

Short of game fishing during the heatwave, what to do during the day? Try for chub and barbel perhaps? Make a barbecue? Sit indoors in the shade with a cold beer some would advise, but the trouble is that at such times I find myself flicking through the news channels. The television was showing a BBC broadcast from Glastonbury where a member of a “punk duo” was encouraging a crowd of idiots to chant in unison: “Death, death, to the IDF,” “From the River to the Sea” and other similarly anti-Israeli slogans. I like to speak out for a broad interpretation of the freedom of speech principle, but my libertarianism only goes so far I suppose. Farage when asked for a comment remarked: “If you vote Reform you can have your country back from those lunatics.” Meanwhile over in Zagreb the right wing Croatian singer Marko Petrovic, whose fans all over the country and in the diaspora know him as “Thompson” (after the sub-machine gun), had sold a record 450,000 tickets for a concert in the Hippodrome. City centre roads were closed and according to Reuters 6,500 police were deployed. As he has done so many times before, Thompson made the fascist salute on stage and called out: “For the Fatherland…?” “Ready!” roared back the crowd in the time honoured manner. This was what they had come to see and hear. As usual with these Ustashe outpourings, a few isolated human rights voices on the liberal side of politics objected, but nothing was heard from the Croatian state, neither from ministers, nor the police nor the courts. At least one government minister was actually present at the concert. Nor indeed was anything heard from the EU, which has a remarkable talent for ignoring old-style fascist manifestations in its eastern member states.       

Otherwise the news channels were all reporting the shadow boxing taking place on the edge of a potential real war in the Middle East. President Trump claimed a great victory for the US with a determined night air raid against Iran’s nuclear programme. Curiously, Iran also somehow claimed a great victory from the same event, but I noted that Ayatollah Khamenei was still sitting in a bunker beneath his native city of Mashad.

The new Syria under its “reformed” Islamist government, an interim government from which promises of moderation are being taken on trust by the big players, is already boiling like yeast. In the South “rogue Islamists,” otherwise said to be local Bedouin gangs, after abducting a Druze merchant on the road to Damascus began to attack Druze and Christian communities around Suweida. Minority leaders appealed to neighbouring Israel and also to Saudi Arabia for help. Damascus was slow to intervene and inclined to blame the minority communities for making trouble, but eventually sent tanks. After a few hours of confusion, it became apparent that Bedouin factions combined with Government troops had now begun to attack the minority communities together. Southern Syria does not benefit from extensive international media coverage and initially it was assumed that these were relatively minor local or tribal quarrels. After a couple of days the grim truth emerged that a pogrom had taken place with more than 900 persons massacred in and around the southern city of Suweida. Houses and businesses were burned and looted while bodies lay out on the streets. Saudi was reluctant to be involved, but Israel carried out airstrikes killing the commanders of three advancing armoured columns and finally hit the Defence Ministry and Presidential Palace in Damascus – about the strongest message that could be sent – while warning the Syrian Government to withdraw its forces from Suweida and the south of the country. At the same time Israeli Druze (the world forgets how many Arabs live in Israel and serve in the IDF) were warned not to cross the border to join the fight. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and later the UN’s Volker Turk also engaged in pressurising Damascus to respect minority rights. The UN, admittedly not always the most reliable source, were now claiming that over 120,000 people had been displaced, implying the need for a major humanitarian operation in southern Syria. Apart from the stand-off with Iran, Israel is still actively engaged against Hamas in Gaza, Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Houthis of Yemen; it hardly wants another front across the border in Syria, an area which it would prefer to see de-militarised.

Back home, the Chancellor was for some reason in tears in the House of Commons, apparently provoking a run on the pound and thus I supposed reducing the value of our extremely modest savings. We then watched Thames Water Company giving evidence to a Select Committee, trotting out the whole sad story of mismanagement of the water supply in the South-East since privatisation. The Cunliffe review on the organisation of our national water industry and the failure of OFWAT as a regulatory body followed up with suggestions for a new regulatory body. You can understand why few people were impressed. “Ministers must explain how replacing one quango with another is going to clean up our rivers” somebody commented. I switched off the television rather than risk bursting into tears myself. As it was, despite the heat Nerma and I went target shooting a few times, trying to ignore how hot the gun barrels became. I’m getting better at driven birds off the high towers, by dint of trying very hard to keep both eyes open as the clay approaches. I decided I have definitely learned more about my eye sight from my shooting coach than from my optician.

I would like to note the passing last month of Harvard mathematician and satirist Tom Lehrer. Young people have rarely heard of him, but during the fifties and sixties he delighted us by composing and cheerfully carolling such songs as The Masochism Tango and that celebration of the nuclear age, We will All go Together when We Go. Sitting at his piano with a twinkle in his eye he assured his graduating students: “Soon you’ll be out amidst the cold world’s strife, soon you’ll be sliding down the razor blade of life.” I think I still know all the words to Poisoning Pigeons in the Park. He lived to be 97, which may indicate that a sardonic sense of humour contributes to a long life.

Let’s hope for kinder fishing conditions during August and above all for a sustained amount of rain.   

Oliver Burch

http://wyevalleyflyfishing.com