Feedback & Reports

My first visit to the Irfon having recently bought a house in Talybont on Usk. I parked not far from the tiny church near the lower limit of the beat and made my way across the field and walked upstream.

The setup was my old faithful 35 year old, 13 foot, Normark Titan coupled with a free spinning centre pin, 3lb mainline down to a Drake wire stemmed 6x no 4 stick, a 2lb hooklink connected a size 18 fine wire, just enough for 2 maggots. I wanted the bait to get down in what looked a strong flow but to keep the presentation as fine and as balanced as I could. I walked up through the woods and across open sheep fields to the Grandstand pool and looked at the river upstream. It was very turbulent and given that I had limited time I decided I had gone far enough upstream to start my way fishing any near side slack that I could find on my way back down to the church. In the first field as I watched the float intently, it bobbing amongst the ripples, a loud splot, followed by a flash of blue and green rising out of a far bank eddy back to his perch was the sign I was not the only fisher on the beat.

I fished each slack I came to for a few minutes before moving on downstream, feeding a dozen or so maggots with every trot down. 6 small but beautiful brown trout and 5 grayling came to the net before the failing light meant I could see the float no more and I had to make my way up the track, past the church to the car. A couple of slurps of hot tea from the flask was the end to a wonderful day, on one of the most beautiful stretches of river I’ve ever fished.

6 Trout, 5 Grayling

Had a fantastic day’s fishing catching a 12.07oz pike with some wonderful scenery around me.

1 Pike

River rising and temperature dropping throughout the day. Caught 1 cracking Barbel about 7.5lbs around 10.30am.

1 Barbel

Another very poor day, as with Holme Fishery 4 X 4 essential for access. Should be more effort by the Foundation to create swims. There are plenty on the far bank. Very disappointed with the lack of effort by the Foundation. The road opposite is noisy and annoying

1 Trout, 2 Chub

A short, dark, winter day with water levels very high - 2ft 3 inches on the Llanstephan gauge, so restricted to trotting and Tenkara. 20 x grayling 6-15 inches, 1 x chub 3.5 pounds, 2 x out of season trout 10 and 12 inches. There were some good grayling in that catch, but also a lot of small ones. There seem to have been many grayling parr in all our rivers this year - bodes well for the future. Some salmon kelts also present on the beat.

20 Grayling, 1 Chub

Very few swims to choose from. This could be a good length but requires considerable effort by the Foundation to cut out places. I wouldn't recommend anything but a 4 X 4 to gain access

1 Trout

Caught on a link shrimp. Lovely stretch but very cold conditions

1 Grayling

1 Grayling, 8 Chub

A couple of hours nymphing lower part of beat. Fair clarity and height but no takers.