Feedback & Reports

A day of light cloud and a little early morning drizzle. Arrived at midday had a walk along the beat and pre baited a couple of swims. Had the place to myself and the first Barbel of 7 1/2lb arrived after about an hour. Caught the second Barbel about hour and a half later weighing in at 5 1/2lb. Had a quiet spell then had a Chub of 3lb 5oz. Started to rain at about 5pm when I had the final Barbel of 7lb 5oz. It then lashed down so I packed in and headed back to the holiday cottage. Great day thanks WUF.

3 Barbel, 1 Chub

Fished top section between the gate and fishing hut, 2 chub early on, but besides numerous salmon leaping in the pools, nothing else doing.

2 Chub

10-12lbs cock salmon home made fly, silver and yellow size 12 hook at 1.30 pm Fish returned safely.

1 Salmon

Sorry to say this is the last time I will be visiting this venue. Too expensive to share your swim with half the population of Birmingham. They descend from the Black Country and line the far bank like an ivading Army. This is not what I come to the Wye for. Not a single bite.

As other posts have stated the far bank is lined with angers from Birmingham AA and while we understand WUF cannot guarantee exclusivity it does get frustrating having paid double the going rate to find a large proportion of the opposite bank full, even midweek.
A man walking his dog told us that the landowner of the opposite bank was not too happy with the opposite bank being very busy with some anglers fishing into darkness.
Moan over.
Similar weather to the previous 2 days did not help the fishing and the 3 of us struggled aside from the 4 fish in total we caught. Picturesque the venue maybe but the change of use of the far bank will ensure we will not be booking this length again.

1 Barbel, 3 Chub

Due to the bright sunny weather, cold nights and falling water temperature, I started fishing at 2pm. Between 3pm and 6-30pm caught 4 barbel up to 6lb on pellets. Sadly, 2 of these fish had badly broken dorsal fin spines, and also missing upper parts of the tail fin. I have not seen serious damage like this in the 4 previous years of fishing this stretch. It looks like the result of fish being retained in keepnets, or use of crude, inadequate landing nets. Top of the list of suspects are the club fishing the opposite bank, which has resulted in a big increase in fishing pressure this year.

4 Barbel

Whilst this is undoubtedly a very beautiful stretch of the river Wye, with easy vehicle access and accessible swims throughout, there are well established swims along the entire far bank losing the feeling of solitude and unspoilt atmosphere you get on other stretches in the WUF portfolio. Despite the river being in perfect condition fishing was very poor with the various swims we tried above the suspension bridge offering just two chub to two very experienced rods. Only after relocating to the very lower end of the stretch did we finally catch five chub and four barbel to about 7lb in the last hours of daylight. Overall we were very disapointed with our visit given the high cost of fishing Caradoc. We would not have booked, had we known of the angling pressure from the far bank so perhaps this should be mentioned on the venue description.
WUF Note: Any single bank fishery runs the risk of anglers on the far bank and we have no control on how many may be fishing there. For anyone wanting to ensure exclusivity, there are plenty of double bank fisheries to book. Please contact us on 01874 712 074 and we would be happy to advise.

4 Barbel, 7 Chub

We arrived at Caradoc and were surprised how easy it was to access the venue and the beauty of the surroundings. Due to the poor weather conditions we decided to concentrate our efforts around the fishing hut which was probably just as well because 2 other anglers were fishing at the other end of the beat. We caught numerous Dace, Bleak and a welcome Roach but only managed 2 good chub and a very lively Trout.
The evidence of swims on the opposite bank is certainly going to put more pressure on this lovely fishery and it will be interesting to see how this situation develops.

1 Trout, 2 Chub, 60 Other

Another early start and we headed down to the beach below the bridge in an attempt to fish undisturbed via the opposite bank. I caught a nice chub early on with pellet and feeder, then nothing. We then decided to trot with a float and caught vast amounts of Dace, Chub, a couple of really nice Roach and a small trout.
A beautiful day on a lovely stretch but this beat is fast becoming too expensive to share with the opposite bank.

1 Trout, 15 Chub, 22 Other

See catch report from previous day - same applies.