Feedback & Reports

First time on this beat and what a beat! The weather was looking good which in itself is unusual this year. The river was in perfect condition with a good flow and plenty of colour. I had a brief walk up from the lower end to the tree line and decided that I would have a roaming day. I picked my first swim and had a 6lbs 3oz Barbel within the first 10 minutes. I don't know what they have been feeding on but wow they can pull, took me over 10 minutes to get the fish into the net! This was followed shortly by another Barbel, and another and another. My roaming idea had gone out the window now and I settled into the swim. The fish kept coming, apart from a gap between 11am – 2pm when it went quite quiet, I am guessing the summer sun had a part to play here. I was kept entertained watching a group of 30+ swans moving up and down the river, they kept me company all day. From 2pm things picked up again until 7pm when the river was starting to rise quiet quickly. I finished the day with 16 Barbel and a very welcome Chub. I couldn’t believe the pulling power of the Barbel in the river, the fish in this stretch have to be some of the toughest fighting fish I’ve come across. They all fell to running ledger and pellet bait. Of course no report is complete without a "one that got away" story. My biggest fish today was a lovely 8lbs specimen, I did strike into what I can only guess as being one of the Wye monsters. It stripped a good 50 yards of line from the reel in its first slow powerful run. When I did manage to stop it I can only describe it as trying to pull a Thames barge! Annoyingly fish bounced the hook after about 5 minutes into the battle in which time I had made zero line on it. Shame as I would have liked to have seen what I had hooked, but it’s a dam good reason to go back! On the very last cast of the day I even connected with one of the famous large Wye Pike. Ok it hit my swimfeeder as I was reeling in so was only one for a couple of minutes but it managed a bit of tail-walking in that time before it released the swimfeeder.
All in all a fantastic day, the place is just amazing, quiet with lots of wildlife to watch when the fishing is slow. The only piece of advice is the car parking place on the road near the field parking is only any good if you have a 4WD type car as any normal car will bottom out. The bottom car park is a better bet and with some careful parking should be room for a couple of cars.
Excellent beat, I look forward to visiting again very soon!

First time for me on this beat therefore spent more time walking than fishing to begin with. First swim was running a bit too fast for comfort and I quickly moved to a swim just downstream of the tree line which offered the luxury of steps and a nice flat area to sit and huddle under a brolly when the rain set in. The bonus was that I had a 7lb Barbel on the bank within 15 minutes. The rain and wind duly arrived but despite this I finished with 7 barbel with two over 7lbs and a small chub, all on pellets.
The weather conditions did not encourage much moving between swims but from what I saw there were at least half a dozen good swims cut out with steps and posts and I look forward to returning to try some of them out in better conditions.
I was also grateful for the relatively snag free river bed in this swim which was a welcome change.

Nice section 1 chub & 8 barbel. On meat, bread & pellet.
Field only good for 4 x 4 but parking at bottom of section is fine. First swims fished best.

This is a great stretch of river and had a really enjoyable morning Session with all 4 of us catching 2 Barbel, one of which was close to double figures. Once we had walked down to the river we turned left at first but halfway down the track the nettles and undergrowth stopped us from getting to the end of the stretch. These were above head height in places I would strongly advise good heavy duty clothing is worn if you want to attempt to get past this. All in all another beautiful stretch of The River Wye. Would Fish the stretch again.

A lovely day out on a beautiful length of river. Middle section very overgrown but more than enough swims to choose from. Banks are very slippery so take care, managed quite a few fish to around 8lbs. Great day out.

24 Barbel on pellet. Caught fish from several swim.

Rising and cloured river with floating debris made fishing difficult but two rods caught 12 barbel to 8lbs on pellet baits.

6 Barbel all in evening session. Spent 2 hours in the morning trotting with the pin but should have known better as normal summer levels starting to rise and colour tinge getting in and no bites from anything. Adjourned for lunch and siesta.
I needed the recharge as the evening was eventful. A 7lbs 11oz barbel fought so long and hard (amazing power-to-weight ratio of 7lb'ers generally) with barbel rod bent full 180 degree arc under a bush right in the flow, it widened the gape on a strong size 8. I used a big bait. Another huge and overlong effort required with what I believed to be a VERY big fish on had me in bits as I had, unnoticed from the 7lbs 11oz battle, frayed line grinding in the rings. It was a sack-of-potatoes in fast flow and no wonder, 9lb7oz hooked in the belly. Barbless size 8 so no significant damage except to my nerves. Then an 8lbs 5oz bent off the landing net head though fortunatley I could get down to water level and use the net. Had a spare in the vehicle.
In between all this were 3 5-6lb'ers.
It was hard work!

Poured with rain from early morning until about 3pm. Almost didn't bother to make the journey. Arrived about 12.30pm and managed to climb down bank to swim to be greeted by the river pushing through and chocolate in colour for the first third of the way across.
Tried fishing beyond this to no avail then decided to fish close in, which produced barbel about 6lbs in the first 5 minutes in the pouring rain. Ten minutes later second bite and fish took off like a train eventually brought to the net about five minutes later. Opening the net looked like a double so unhooked it and took quick picture with my forceps beside the fish to give me some idea of scale of fish. As it was pouring with rain at the time I quickly weighed fish and was disappointed to see it go to 6lbs 12oz on scales, then returned fish. It was then when I was ready to start fishing again I noticed the scales were set on kgs, so it was 13lbs plus! Caught 3 more barbel to 7lb+ all on halibut pellets. Later scaling of photo showed fish to be at least 32" long.

6 barbel to 7lb 8oz and a 4lb+ chub. Nice warm evening promised more; what's to be dissappointed with in this lovely setting?
Should have got there earlier and had fun with trotting gear in an ideal swim in the middle of the beat.