Feedback & Reports

Slow day with only an eel in first few hours. Moved swim early afternoon and had a Barbel of 7 lb which is a PB for me so very pleased.
Good day only spoilt by the dozens of canoes pretty much constantly all day which prevented fishing in a couple of swims.

1 Barbel, 1 Other

Booked BOTH available rods on this beat only for a salmon angler to turn up bold as brass and start fishing !!!!! THIS IS THE SECOND TIME I HAVE HAD THIS HAPPEN ON THIS BEAT . Last time the WUF said that I should have ring their offices and they would have despatched the ghillies. Well this time I did that but not surprisingly being Sunday there was no answer, not even a facility to leave a message! Why don't the Foundation just supply the ghillies details with the booking ???????
Booking coarse fishing through the WUF is not cheap, in fact it is extremely expensive but I am prepared to pay as it does offer the "exclusive access".
Not happy and won't be making any further bookings through the WUF given the amount of other cheaper options available on the river.
WUF Note : As advertised in the website beat description, a small salmon syndicate fish this beat so please be aware absolute exclusivity cannot always be guaranteed.

4 Barbel, 8 Chub

Only able to fish mid-morning to early afternoon, hard going due to warm and bright conditions, 4 brown trout 8-9".

4 Trout

First time fishing the Wye. Arrived around 6.30am and walked the entire stretch. River was slightly coloured with visibility down to around 4/5 feet. I understand it was marginally higher than usual. Weather was clear and sunny (very hot). A number of fish could be seen moving in the shallower stretches of the river, particularly on the woodland stretch.
Free lining bread brought a number of early chub on the woodland stretch before moving up to the top end of the beat. A friendly local pointed out the better swims and the majority of the day was spent fishing the middle stretch of named pools.
Feeder with double pellet hook bait (hinders barbel blitz) brought consistent action through the morning. Action died down on the open parts of the river once the sun got up. Moving back down to the woodland stretch chub could still be had in the shaded areas (taking cherries from the trees overhead!). The fishing picked up again as the sun dropped with the biggest barbel of the day coming at this time (around 8lb). Packed up tired and happy at 8.00pm.

5 Barbel, 12 Chub

A low water level. Nymphs, dry and wet flies were not effective.

Great day being tutored by the Welsh International Rivers lads - great info and great value - thanks to John & Alun for organising this. Very highly recommended for anyone who (like me) has struggled to read the river.
Took a lovely pound-ish brownie after the workshop in fast water - within a metre of where I was standing (hardish wading) and in water I'd already been covering for 10minutes+. Really hammered home the tips from the day!

1 Trout

A Curate's Egg of a day. The good? 4 of the Trout I caught were 1lb plus; with the best two going all of 3lbs a piece. So surprised was I to catch fish of this stature that I contacted Oliver Burch to check if anyone was stocking the river - and was gratified to be assured that they were almost certainly wild fish.
The bad? Having to turn two teenage girls, armed with spinning rods, off the water. The girls came down from the Caravan Park, within 30 minutes of my arrival, and proceeded to chuck spinners into the Lower Craig Lyn Pool. I must admit, I felt a bit like Scrooge telling them that they could not fish. However, having dragged myself out of a warm bed at 5:00am, and driven the best part of 100 miles to be there, I was not going to allow my day to be spoiled by anyone going down river in front of me with spinning rods. Their father (at least I assume it was their father) came down shortly afterwards. He opened with the standard "I did not know it was private" gambit and then said that he had been told that he could fish by "the bloke who is always fishing here". He then went on to tell me about the nice trout (plural) that he had caught from the Lower Craig Lyn the night before. Neither upstream nymphing nor catch and release featured in his repertoire (ditto, I suspect, reference "the bloke who is always here"). As if that was bad enough, there were two other fly fishermen on the beat. I did not get close enough to either of them to establish their bona fides (or otherwise).
Other than that, not a bad day. Unless you fish rivers like the Test (when you will almost certainly be catching stocked fish), it is not every day that you catch a brace of 3lb browns. That said, I cannot help thinking I would have caught more were it not for the antics of the worm/spinning brigade and the other two anglers on the beat.

5 Trout, 2 Grayling

Today no fish! I lost one and had a few very little attacks on the spiders but there was nothing rising.

Ben Woods (age 11 years) caught a 7lb salmon and a very small 3lb grilse!? On a rapala. Another very small grilse was lost on fly, all happened late afternoon yesterday.

2 Salmon

2 trout caught on silver fox spinner. Conditions really windy and choppy but still got 2.

2 Trout