Feedback & Reports

Almost no fish rising during the day and nothing happened until about 6pm when good hatches started and fish started to rise. We then caught 10 and missed another 5 or 6, all of good size (30cms +). A great day in the end but difficult during the afternoon.

10 Trout

Cloudy in the morning giving way to sunshine around lunch time. A few olives coming off throughout the day and even a few late mayfly but I only saw 2 fish rising. The river was running with a hint of colour. I caught on a size 16 black parachute dry fly by fishing likely looking spots. I hooked and lost 1 fish on a gold head hares ear. A lovely beat and an extremely enjoyable day. A word of warning. After entering the field a walk of around 400 yards will bring you to a clump of trees. One of the trees has a 3-4 inch diameter hole in it. This is a bee's nest so take care.

3 Trout

Brown trout (9") on mayfly CDC emerger. River still significantly coloured (as predicted in earlier telephone conversation). Sporadic mayfly and other upwings in evidence but not much in the way of an evening rise.

1 Trout

Water higher than usual. A little muddy. 2 brown trout on dry fly but little activity.

2 Trout

This turned out to be a very expensive day of casting practice. The river was high, though not in flood and very coloured. You couldn't see the bottom in water deeper than 18". Despite a continual trickle of mayfly coming off, we saw only 3 fish rises the whole day. Not a single rise to any of our mayfly patterns or other dry flies. Nymphs and spiders were equally ignored whether fished up or downstream. We had possible 3 bites on nymph between us in the day. It was hard to know what was up with the trout but they were not in the mood to feed. Shame because the stretch of river is lovely.

The river was quite fast and brown-at least it seemed to us on our first wild fly trip. I got one small trout on a nymph who swam away happily after being admired for a little bit.. My 12 year old son spent a good 20 mins trying to tempt a jumper onto a dry fly before a family of swans intervened. It's a beautiful stretch of river and the low return is a reflection of our inexperience rather than the place.

1 Trout

Unfortunately this was a pointless exercise, the river looked more like a carp pond due to recent flooding, very swollen and absolutely no visibility. There was plenty of fly life, some mays, etc in so many respects it could have been perfect on what is a really lovely beat. I tackled up all the same just for the hell of it. Still, had a very comfortable night at the Bell Inn but it was very disappointing to get these conditions on what is generally only an annual trip to this area.

Sunny and only light breeze. Plenty of flies about but very few rises. Caught 7 trout max 15in all on dry fly.

7 Trout

All on dry fly. 8 Trout max 13in. One Grayling. Sunny and warm at first with a few flies and some rising fish. Strong wind after 2pm stopped activity.

8 Trout, 1 Grayling

Our second annual visit to this enchanting beat. It was a very warm sunny day and the fishing took a few hours to come alive – very little action on NZ setups all morning.
Mid-afternoon, after a good lunch at The Bell, the Mayfly hatch began and we caught three trout of 7-9 inches in fairly quick succession from one of the upper pools, on French Partridge and Wulff patterns.
We returned at about 7pm to fish the spinner fall and after a few bodged strikes to rises from wily fish in the slick glides, finally managed to connect with one last fish as the light faded.
Glorious!

4 Trout