Feedback & Reports

River v low but v good day weatherwise. V little fly life, with few fish rising. All trout were small with biggest only half pound. Grayling were 8-9" fish taken on small dries. An enjoyable - if not the most productive day, in fabulous surroundings.

25 Trout, 5 Grayling, 1 Chub

In common with everywhere else, the Irfon needs rain to give it a flush through. Some spots that were fishable a few weeks ago are now just inches deep. Still, managed to contact some grayling which made for a really satisfying day. The first four were taken using a two nymph rig on a French leader, the size 18 pink beaded PTN dropper being the fly they liked. A few fish began rising so switched to the dry fly and took fish on green sedge and tan klinkhammer patterns. Couldn’t see anything hatching so not sure what they were actually taking! Finally changed back to nymphing and caught on a waterhen bloa and baetis nymph. Several fish were 12 to 15 inches, a couple were 7 inches and the fish of the day a fat 16 inches. All returned.

10 Grayling

Extremely low water and river right down on its bones. The saving grace was colour in the water from what must have been an overnight downpour which brought fish to the surface all day. Rising to emerging up wings and small stoneflies. All caught on a size 19 barbless skinny CDC emerged. Best trout 1lb 8oz. No leviathans this time, but I will be back. Lots of kingfishers, dippers, wagtails and great to be on the water soaking in some fishing before the end of the season. Thank you WUF!

17 Trout

No fish, not even a bite. Fished for 6 hours near the dam wall. Didn't see one fish jump. Caught a cray fish and returned it...

Difficult conditions still, river very low. Fished various swims and methods, only one barbel from Boys Rock on halibut pellet.

1 Barbel

We only fished from 10 until 1.30 as we needed to get on the road. Another enjoyable trip to this lovely river, even though the catch return was poor. Better luck next time. Many thanks to the Wye & Usk.

1 Chub

Nil fish. Top pools are heavily overgrown. Much of the beat could do with some maintenance work generally.

River very low, only small dace and bleak caught on float tactics. Very disappointed with the beat considering the glowing reports we based our trip on.

Full cloud cover that vanished for a hour to show a muted white orb in the sky, but no rain! Water had the slightest colour, but was still very thin - visibility had dropped to maybe 3 feet of depth. Temperatures: 16-22. Fly hatches were mainly clouds of brown/purple mayflies on all sandy streches, some late browns and the ubiquitous dusters and other tinys. I tied some gold head GRHE's overnight and these were the fly of choice again... best trout a 7.5 inch perfect trout from a classic pocket water - as if the wbt had been reading fishing books. Fewer salmon parr than yesterday. Lots of fish nibbled at the size 18 and 16 flies. More rises than yesterday, but I didn't get any offers to a range of dries. Just the deep sunk gold bead GRHE nymph with an induced take.
Trees on the upper section's last 400 metres...Oh my! I managed to climb over most, but slipped climbing over one large trunk and went in head first - ungainly as a sealion at feeding time. Which is interesting and highly amusing! Then very next tree, I got hooked up and went in again, but not a diver that time... What with fighting my way through this jungle and emptying the old waders twice, I took almost 7 hours to do this single beat - started fishing at 10 and finished at the top (where I had optimistically parked my car for the Hundred House section) just before 5. Frankly, the last 100 metres was unfishable due to the tangle of fallen saplings - but did contain some fish. I know, because I spooked them.
Next time I'll go into training before venturing out on this river. Brilliant day.

6 Trout, 2 Other

Once again, I over-booked and didn't managed to cover this water... next time???