Feedback & Reports

Two trout on a dry fly and one trout, two grayling on nymph, beautiful stretch of water.

3 Trout, 2 Grayling

Had a great day with my son James and we were lucky to have assistance from Nathan whose knowledge and patience were much appreciated Lovely stretch of water but have to report nil return on this occasion. Hope for better luck next time.
Late afternoon slight spoilt by drifting weed which someone was cutting or clearing upstream

Llanstephen Guage 8". Fished 10 till 6.30 on a generally calm, warm, partly cloudy day. Perfect! Became even more perfect at about 11.30 with the "catch of the day" - an osprey above us, heading down river on its way home. But back the fishing - a few PWs, but not many, was about it apart from some sedges late afternoon. Some fish rising all day, but not many. 75% of the fish we caught were non-risers. Given that fish were looking up, we fished emergers pretty well all day and all of the fish caught were off the top. GW used small olive and brown parachutes, and latterly a brown bodied Duck's Dun. DC had just about every fish on a size 16 pale hare's fur Duck's Dun, with a few on a HE parachute as well. The best trout was 13" but every grayling, bar four, was 9-10" - that's 70 single year class grayling! We've never experienced anything like this before on the Wye where one year class is so prolific and so dominates catches. The other ladies were 11, 12 and 13", and more the sort of fish that in recent years have formed a significant part of catches on this beat. Where are the older fish? Whatever the reason for their absence, the 9-10" grayling spawning year was clearly very productive in the Wye catchment. What was so good about conditions that year? Let's hope that the FEBs don't feast on these fish. If they don't, a few years hence, the quality of grayling fishing should be something to behold? All round, not a bad day.

4 Trout, 74 Grayling

first time on this beat and enjoyed it . water lowish but ideal to suss out the river bed for the future. went in search of grayling and was not let down. ranging from 8-16 inches all bar three taking midge and olive emerger patterns on size 18 and 20 hook. the three others taking beads deep before they started rising. all trout between 8-12 inches. met the owner who was a very pleasant chap. also a few very small grayling but not added into the catch return.

3 Trout, 32 Grayling

2 Trout

Nil return

Apart from a large shoal of Chub and a few Barbel in the deeper glide below the second willow on the right bank there were not many fish around that I could find.
However the level was really low at sub 0.3 on the gauge at Ross so I suspect the Salmon were below me at the top of ‘The Creel’ beat which course anglers seem to ignore as it’s furthest from the car park; a shame as it holds the most Barbel!
Good to be on my favourite beat yet again and looking forward to a lift in water levels and the inevitable run of end of season fish.

3 Chub

It's difficult to know how to phrase a catch return after catching 70 fish. River level was 9" on the Llanstephan gauge, weather was mild with cloud. Good conditions in other words.
Starting at noon at the very top of the beat grayling were present in ones and twos in every pocket down to the start of the deeper pools level with the gate. At which point there were around in greater number to say the least. Five fish in about seven casts represented the busiest period.
I fished a three fly set up; two soft hackle spiders with something weighted on the point. Most fish took the droppers in the shallower water, less so in the deeper runs where a weighted GRHE was taken. A size 14 orange spider accounted for most of the fish but in all honesty a bare hook would have caught today. I was still catching at 7.30 when I called it a day (and a remarkable one at that).
Apart from two 12" inch fish all grayling were 6-8". Trout were 6 and10". 'Others' were salmon parr.

2 Trout, 65 Grayling, 3 Other

3 Chub

3 Chub