Feedback & Reports

A very pleasent beat, but I was plagued by fry body-slamming my presentations throughout the day. May try again in the winter. Memo to WUF suggest amendment to map making the upper weir to be the end of beat as the section above weir is inaccessable.

WUF NOTE - clearance work is planned for this autumn but please see subsequent catch return from OB at Pwll-y-Faedda on 10/8/11

River is very low and clear but with a stealthy approach and sensible tackle the sport was great this evening. Fished hemp and corn, 1oz closed end feeder straight through to 12 hook. It was fish a cast and even had barbel feeding in full view. Conditions are tough, but it's satisfying to adapt to them and still catch barbel as if it were a 3 foot warm flood in September. Finished with a dozen to 8lb ish. A few small chub were also caught, and salmon moving regularly.

A beautiful beat with a gravel and rocky bottom. Water levels were low but very clear, I could see all the fish I scared off with my clumsy wading. Once I had settled down, I fished the Duo, John Tyzack tungsten bead PTN,under a Bubble Sedge, for four hours to 7.30 pm. Caught and released 6 wbt to 7" had lots of takes missed. Plenty of small fry splashing at the sedge.

A pair of Kingfishers flew noisily up and down the river on several occasions. A great evening for my first visit to the Wye and Usk Foundation waters.

First time back here for a couple of years. Water low and clear. Rather windy all day with no emerging insects, just returning sedges from mid-afternoon. Not surprisingly, I only saw five rises all day, one a trout and the others grayling. Had nine ladies and one trout. All the girls bar one were 14-15" and the other a 16", one and three-quarter pound beauty. All taken on a HE emerger (nothing on nymphs) and in excellent nick but where were the youngsters? Also saw no parr rising nor caught any. Worrying? Maybe there is a FEB problem up here?

Nil return. None seen and none caught. Water v low.

13 x trout 6-10 inches, Grey Duster. Plenty of slightly peat-stained water coming down the Irfon, which is a much smaller river here than a few miles downstream - maximum 8 foot rod territory. On the minus side, a rather cold, autumnal day with a downstream wind. You can't expect everything to be right. I haven't fished this for a year and I was interested to see what was there, mainly due to all the work which has gone on to combat acidity in the upper Irfon. I appreciate the observations of a bloke walking upstream flicking a dry fly around and turning over the odd rock hardly have the scientific validity of an EA survey. There didn't seem to be a huge amount of invertebrate life, although certainly there were a few caddis. The trout seemed to be clustered in certain areas; not always plain to see why. The average size seems to have gone up by an inch or two since last year. Sadly, no sign of the heavy trout I spotted and failed to catch on two occasions last year, and a small fish was now on his station. Perhaps my old friend is now in (some-body else's) glass case. No grayling this time. There is a lot of water to cover here, a full 8 hours to get from the church to the top, even if you gallop through, and I didn't touch the section below the church. Finally, it's a most beautiful walk up this valley with its water falls. It was Mark Twain who complained that golf is nothing but a good walk spoiled (sorry Seth, but he did). I am sure he would never have said it about fishing."

13 x trout 6-10 inches, Grey Duster. Plenty of slightly peat-stained water coming down the Irfon, which is a much smaller river here than a few miles downstream - maximum 8 foot rod territory. On the minus side, a rather cold, autumnal day with a downstream wind. You can't expect everything to be right. I haven't fished this for a year and I was interested to see what was there, mainly due to all the work which has gone on to combat acidity in the upper Irfon. I appreciate the observations of a bloke walking upstream flicking a dry fly around and turning over the odd rock hardly have the scientific validity of an EA survey. There didn't seem to be a huge amount of invertebrate life, although certainly there were a few caddis. The trout seemed to be clustered in certain areas; not always plain to see why. The average size seems to have gone up by an inch or two since last year. Sadly, no sign of the heavy trout I spotted and failed to catch on two occasions last year, and a small fish was now on his station. Perhaps my old friend is now in (some-body else's) glass case. No grayling this time. There is a lot of water to cover here, a full 8 hours to get from the church to the top, even if you gallop through, and I didn't touch the section below the church. Finally, it's a most beautiful walk up this valley with its water falls. It was Mark Twain who complained that golf is nothing but a good walk spoiled (sorry Seth, but he did). I am sure he would never have said it about fishing.

I arrived at 08:30 and started fishing about 09:30 at the bottom of beat. The river was down about 8 inches from the last time I fished here at the end of June. The flow was still strong and the conditions looked excellent. I feeder fished pellet into the middle of the river into fast water and had bites straight away. My friend RH arrived about 10am and right on cue my rod tip hooped over and I was into the first barbel of the session which, at 6lb 6oz, was my biggest from the Wye. Keen to get started RH scurried off to his chosen swim just up the bank on the bottom crib and was into a chub within seconds of his first cast hitting the bottom. He used similar tactics to myself and had a total of around 10 smallish chub and barbel. We both suffered a blank period with no bites whatsoever from around 12:00 - 16:30. I switched to luncheon meat around 5pm and had an eel of about 1.5lbs. The action picked up later in the early evening when I had a new personal best barbel of 8lb 12.5oz followed immediately by another of 6lb 8oz, both to pellet. Another excellent day's fishing and I can't wait to come back and bring my dad here!!

Fished from 2pm with no luck - at about 8-30pm the action started and I ended with 2 barbel and 4 decent chub in the next hour. Conditions poor - very low with lots of weed coming down.

7 chub 2.5lb to 3.75lb, 1 barbel 4lb. A very enjoyable day bringing back fond memories of my youth. The chub were caught on luncheon meat and bread, and the barbel was taken on sweetcorn. A big thank you to Ian Boney for suggesting such a good swim. I shall be back!