Feedback & Reports

Finished the season with yet another blank. This is without doubt the worse season in 30 years of having a boat permit up the Usk and next season will be worse again as no boat fishing is allowed next year due to essential work being carried out on the boat launching area.

River was at 2.2m all day and bombing through. The pegs at the top end were not fishable but the first 2 fields still had plenty of pegs. We rotated the pegs and caught decent chub throughout the day, not sure why we didn’t get any barbel as it looked good for them.

14 Chub

26 Trout, 1 Grayling

Beat looking perfect…coloured , falling and warm….not a sniff from the barbel…only 4 small chub caught between 2 of us.
Disappointing but hopefully better tomorrow.

4 Chub

The river was still really high and powering through. it was the first time I have fished the Wye in these conditions.

I set up in one of the few swims where there was slack water and caught a chub a rod length out within four minutes of starting to fish. However, after that, it all went downhill fast. I ended up in a snag every cast. Sometimes I got away with just the loss of a hook, sometimes it was a feeder or lead. I can't wait till the summer levels so I can see what was devouring all my tackle.

I decided to cast a 5oz feeder downstream and much further out. I found I could hold bottom and caught two more chub and two barbel, one of which got away. (Hinders Barbel Bomb did the trick.) A very enjoyable day overall but the ground became increasingly slippery as the day wore on.

1 Barbel, 3 Chub

8 Barbel, 4 Chub

3 Trout

With the river fining down nicely at 2.2m, we bravely drove down the hill, something I would not recommend in wet weather if you haven’t got a 4x4. The video showing access should come with a warning that access is very difficult in wet conditions. The second field at the bottom was too tricky even for a 4x4. The fishing was good and we caught fish from different areas with the biggest barbel going 9lb 14oz which was arm aching with the extra flow.

12 Barbel

River dropped a bit had a lot of chub 2barbel

2 Barbel, 9 Chub

4 Barbel, 2 Chub