Feedback & Reports

Fisrt time on the wonderful River Wye. Fished just below the bridge mid river using pellet on feeder rig. Managed 12 barbel to 9lb 12oz and 8 chub to 5lb 8oz in 5 hours! Would have stayed longer but it poured with rain making the bank very dangerous. Very impressed with the whole experence. Thank you very much.

2nd visit, River running low and clear. 15 Barbel to 6lb 11oz and 5 chub. The bigger ones didn't show but still a great days fishing. Thanks again WUF.

Arrived to find the river low and with only a slight tinge of colour, the bottom being visible mid river in some places. It proved hard going. We fished several swims all day including a couple of particularly hairy ones, but the fish were hard to come by with only the odd fish showing.
Ended up on the bottom section & stayed until it got dark.
Not a great deal to show for our efforts. DS had 2 barbel to 8.5lb, CW had one barbel of around 7.5lb & lost 2 others from hook pulls (most unusual). We both also had a few chub each but nothing above 2.5lb. Nevertheless, a beautiful place to be on a week-day and a wonderful sunset. On our previous visit when the water was high we weren't impressed with the number of fishable swims, and to be honest there weren't that many safely fishable swims with the water low either.

Arrived to find river dropping steadily but still coloured. Caught 30 Barbel and 1 Chub, all on Pellet. Best fish 9lb, with plenty of sevens & eights. Will be back!

River dropping but still heavily coloured. 2 rods caught 23 Barbel averaging 5 to 6lb, all on Pellet. Excellent fishing!

Mild weather but drizzle all morning meant I stayed put after walking most of the beat. River coloured but walking pace. Quite a open wide section of river with the fish holding features seeming to be more about the depth than bank side vegetation.

Some serious numbers of chub present, Fished below Carey brook area baiting with seed,corn and hemp fished pellet and meat over the top. 1-2 rod lengths, 4 barbel 7-8lb
Plenty of chub to 4lb. Hard to fight through the chub to find barbel and altered the rig to deter the chub. Plus one pike 5lb ish. Then fished an hour 200 meters up stream and blanked fishing above some bushes. Finally spent a few hours in the lower bridge pool fishing the obvious crease. Fish responded the same and took another barbel and several chub.

Summary:

Whatever you put in here seems to get whoofed down quickly by the chub. Next time the stick float and a chub session will be worth a go. A few snags as expected but nothing that lost me a fish. Lost end tackle on rocks etc 7 or 8 times but was able to avoid the snaggy spots once I found them. I am used to small rivers and this is completely different, fishing the deeper pools on the map seemed to work as in places the river was a foot or so deep. I would imagine it is possible to pull in a big number of fish.
Daunting amount of river for two anglers. I could spend a season on this beat!

Beautiful area and I look forward to trying other sections.

1 rod: 33 barbel to around 9lb and 14 chub to 4lb+ - spectacular!!

Eleven barbel to 7lb plus. Lost a couple of good chub which were brainier than the barbel and went straight into the near bank snag.
Another thoroughly enjoyable day's fishing on the Wye.

Yesterday's rain had dramatically increased levels. River high and very coloured & logs, branches & other rubbish were flying downstream. At least it wasn't raining, but still very windy.
We had a recce first and only found 3 viable spots to fish in safety, all near bank slower runs & slight eddies. We caught 16 barbel between us, mainly fish between 5-7 lbs with two slightly larger at 8lb, plus a couple of small chub - all on pellet & pellet/boilie combos. Had to hold the fish hard so they wouldn't get into the main flow. Brilliant fun & not expected when we arrived and saw the state of the river. We will be back.

First visit to this beat and filled with anticipation having read that it's a prolific beat for barbel and with plenty of swims to fish from.

The first part turned out to be spot on - the second part less so. I didn't walk the whole beat, but in the half mile or so I covered, I found 5 fishable places. As much of the beat is classic barbel water, would it be possible to create a few more safe perches in likely places? With the 2-rod limit, there's no problem finding a swim with fish, but a bit more variety of swims would be nice.

Anyway - I started off in the obvious swim below Carey Brook and had a 8lb barbel first cast. "Here we go", I thought - which is nearly always a mistake! One small chub next cast then nothing - not even bites. The 60 or so swans which were feeding, fighting and generally getting in the way didn't help. Wandered around a bit and chatted to the other angler, who gave me some helpful info on this and other stretches. Moved further downstream to a tricky spot which was shouting "FISH" at me. Barbel first cast. Managed to not say "here we go" and caught regularly for the rest of the day, finishing with 14 barbel and the chub.

Another splendid day's fishing in great surroundings. Thanks again WUF for friendly and efficient service, not to mention great fishing.