Feedback & Reports

Full cloud cover that reached down and touched the ground with some typical Welsh drizzle-in fact it rained hard for some of the time. Temperature ranged from 15 to 18. Water was thin and very clear; only in deep pools of upper beat did the bottom vanish. Large Browns (like March ones,except it is September), tiny grey dusters and very few brown/purple mayfly (?) were hatching. Fish ignoring the lot - perhaps 1 rise all day. Took fish on a gold bead GRHE and nothing else would do. WBT to 5" and salmon parr. Onto the upper beat: I missed the beat stop sign and found myself in a gorge with a couple of pools stuffed with fish - Having lost my 5th GRHE I had the chance to experiment - nothing else (honest). In higher water that section would be dangerous to wade... I went swimming twice.
Despite the rain and the spooky fish, I had a fantastic day (11.00-6:30) and didn't get to fish Hergest as planned. Great day out - if a little bruised!

4 Trout, 3 Other

Didn't have time to fish this stretch as was occupied on Aberedw. See my report on a great but wet day.

Booked the beat for 3 days from the 19th - 21st Sept.
River very low and clear. Fished from top to bottom during the 3 days but almost failed to find some feeding fish of any kind. Tried every trick in the book but could only produce 2 Barbel and a couple of Chub. They were simply not having any of it. Andy, the Keeper/Bailiff is a super chap and could not have been more helpful in our quest for a catch - but we still failed despite his valuable advice. But that's fishing.
The swims are on very steep banks and very slippery and dangerous when wet - not suitable (in our opinion) for anyone elderly or slightly infirm. Some work and maintenance by the Estate could remedy this and make fishing on this beat a lot safer.

2 Barbel, 3 Chub

Fishing two days Friday and a few hours Saturday. On Friday 26 barbel to 5lbs 16 chub. For numbers this was the best day of a fabulous week with a great bag of barbel again from the super productive bottom pool and lots of chub. On Saturday we had 11 barbel 3 chub during a short session with heavy canoe traffic so only fished a short while late morning. Very clear and in the shallower water the barbel are being spooked by swans and cormorants flying over. Nonetheless a good end to our best weeks fishing on the Wye ever. Thanks Don and WUF.

37 Barbel, 19 Chub

Little surface activity although some olives were about. Two small trout (both around 5" to 6" and safely returned)caught on size 16 GRH nymph below fast moving riffle near the top of the beat.

2 Trout

Came to Wales to avoid the referendum. River very low so didn't bother to fish and enjoyed a bank walk. Saw a bloated heron.
N.B N.B one patch of Himalayan Balsam and .... Japanese knotweed on second field down!!!!!!
Great little spot.

An very interesting day, albeit not as productive as expected for this time of year. Lovely weather - a light breeze at times, mainly overcast and warm at 18-19 degrees but the water very low at 0.28m on the Ddol Farm gauge. There wasn't too much fly life, just a few small olives, and the odd stonefly and sedge, but enough fallen leaf on the river to get terrestrials onto the surface (lots of little spiders and greenfly on the trees) and fish looking up......or so I thought! However, there were very few rises all day and the grayling were unusually reluctant to rise to standard go-to surface and emerger patterns for this time of year. Nymphs either fished duo or tandem were unsuccessful and just one grayling took a red tag spider. Three trout of 10-14" were taken on a hare's ear emerger as were four grayling of 10-16", the latter a fish of just over 1.5lb. As usual at Doldowlod, the 8-10" year class grayling that seem to predominate further down the river didn't put in an appearance. What was odd was that the water was quite cold at 13 degrees, which surprised me, given day and night air temperatures of late so, somewhat perplexed, I rang Severn Trent this morning who confirmed that, given lack of rainfall and low water, about four times the usual amounts of compensation water are being discharged from the Elan Valley reservoirs. I suspect that this may have been the problem given that Doldowlod is so close to the Elan confluence. Friends who fish the Dee and Severn catchments are always telling me how their fishing is affected at times like this. Bring on the rain please!!

3 Trout, 5 Grayling

Saw 4 salmon moving, 2 at the top end, one in the middle of the beat and one in the Cadora pool.
No takes for me, but still enjoyed the day.

You needed to be down a bit in the morning and graying and trout were caught bugging in the faster runs. In the afternoon a few fish were showing and we caught on small nymphs and spider patterns.
The river is very low but the fishing was fun and it was a great day to be out. None of the fish caught were large but all gave a good account of themselves on light tackle. Lots of par around which were difficult to avoid.

6 Trout, 7 Grayling

3 rainbows,all approx 2 lbs. 1 on spinner, 2 on worm and bubble.

3 Trout