Feedback & Reports

13 x grayling 9-16 inches, 5 x out of season trout 9-18 inches, long trotting.
The river still high, coming down oh so slowly, but clear enough. Trotting was possible from just a couple of stances, but extensive wading out of the question. The weather took a sudden colder turn and all day we had a thick fog lying in the upper Wye valley and temperature of only 2/3 degrees.
One decent grayling of 16 inches and in nice condition; the rest were shoats of 9-12 inches, also looking healthy. I am afraid the 18 inch trout was a rather horrible sight: big head and long kyped jaw, eel-like body and two livid wounds from recent cormorant attacks. Between the floods, spawning and the predatory birds, our trout have had a battering lately.

Arrived at beat after a sharp overnight frost. Fog gradually subsided with the afternoon sunny and cold. Water conditions very good. Unfortunately, I was unable to locate any grayling despite trying nymphs at various depths. The beat looked excellent with plenty of likely looking water so I was somewhat dismayed to (almost) blank, the only relief being a nice pound and a half out of season trout in excellent condition, which was returned.

River about as good as you would expect in winter. 2 rods after Pike using deads and lures. Not a touch all day.
One rod per person severely hampers the ability to explore a stretch of this length and becomes overly expensive for one rod over time. I appreciate the desire not to over pressurise pike but with four anglers only on the entire beat at any one time (and from catch reports the overwhelming majority of those in search of Barbel and Chub) that is hardly likely to happen. Won't be back here for Pike and it might be an idea for Wye/Usk to review their policy.

A very pleasant beat. Unfortunately, the grayling eluded me! I fished through the entire beat with Czech nymphs suspended from a bite indicator to no avail. Caught a 3lb out of season trout which was returned.

6 x grayling to just under 2lbs. 4 x chub to 4lbs. 12 x brown trout topped by a stonking fish of 3lbs+. River in perfect condition. Rain set in so left around 2pm. Apart from chub caught on bread flake the rest were on bronze maggot. Contrary to another return for the area the trout were in fin perfect condition. Great day out.

Water level at good height and running clear. Fish were lying very deep and hard to find. 4 good Grayling all around 15" and a very hard fighting OOS cock Trout what must have been about 18" to 20". Believe I could've done better with heavier flies. Back to the tying bench.

The river had dropped back from flood levels but the banks were still very wet and mucky. A mild, enjoyable morning saw 5 barbel to 8lb banked along with the usual chub to start the new year well. Unfortunately, fishing stopped after lunch when my companion speared his finger with a quickstop (it goes in the pellet, not your digit K)and he needed to get to A&E for a protracted spell of surgery to remove the offending item. Ouch! Happy New Year to all at WUF.

River fining down and looked good for piking. Walked the whole length of the South bank, trying all the pikey looking slacks, some of which I have caught from before, but it was dead and I didn't get a single run all day.

Although river looked in good nick and despite trying a plethora of baits only action came in last hour whilst using small feeder down the edge with sweetcorn on the hook. Several missed bites but ended with one barbel.

11 x grayling 8-17 inches, 7 x out of season trout 8-15 inches, long trotting.
A very warm, rather dark, cloudy day. The upper Wye was running clear but still quite high. I'm not really sure how high, because when the Llanstephan gauge emerged from the flood waters after all these weeks, it turned out to be gone, just the iron mounting pole left. Can we have it back WUF, because we are a bit lost without that when planning our fishing? My guess was that the level was around 2 feet, OK for fishing at Abernant. The EA gauge for Erwood showed 1.32 metres.
In fact the fishing was quite difficult. Searching during the morning only produced two small grayling and a number of unwanted trout, one of them cormorant-injured, all occupying prime spots where grayling should be expected. Another rod out fly fishing helped me search the river (thank you C) but it was only late afternoon near the bottom of the beat that we located some feeding grayling. The swim was developed a bit by dark and a few good ones showed up, including a very nice fish just under 18 inches. Nevertheless, grayling were "picky" and wanted the bait literally dragging the bottom, single maggot on a small hook.
For all that, it was good to be out on the river again after all these inactive weeks.