Feedback & Reports

8 x grayling 12-16 inches, 3 x out of season trout 9-10 inches, long trotting. The weather forecast let us down badly here. Two dry and cold weekend days should have been enough for the level of the Irfon to drop to a good fishing level. What we got was rain, snow on the hills, and so the river level stayed stubbornly up at 0.85 metres on the Cilmery gauge, which I would normally define as a flood. However, the water colour was not too thick. It was just about possible to fish under the bank and trot a couple of holes where the current was not too fast and grayling were sheltering. I would think that with a fly rod it would have been nigh on impossible, although two very nice gentlemen from Cheltenham were trying.

8 Grayling

"O" from Gloucestershire says it all ! The predicted forecast did not help when we booked and it was really a 'wash out' for us two from Cheltenham with our flies. Charlie was very friendly when we arrived and likewise 'O', who cheered us up by confirming that conditions were not in our favour! His advice on location gave us some hope and we battled on to dusk, catching one small and one 10" grayling (downstream from the chapel). Lovely beat and we very much enjoyed the day.

2 Grayling

River running fairly high but clear occasional rain / sleet showers. All fish were caught on nymphs. A few olives seen on the water but no fish rising.

17 Grayling

A great day, fine sunny day..lots of 10 to 12 inch ladies..2 biguns. Salmon louping in their tartan breeks as they back home. Ok

15 Grayling

River running clear for most of the day. All grayling caught fishing nymphs! czech nymphs style and on a french leader! also had a suprise salmon about 11lb on a size 16 pheasant tail nymph! river started to colour and rise around 3oclock along with a lot of leaves so called it a day!

1 Salmon, 3 Trout, 11 Grayling

Hectic sport up until 2pm when the river came up a foot and killed things off. Had 18 Grayling of all sizes up to 16 inches on trotted maggot. Found dead salmon estimated at 15 pound plus with a chunk out of it...picture attached.

1 Trout, 18 Grayling

15 x grayling 10-18 inches, 5 x out of season trout 8-14 inches, long trotting. An afternoon season until dusk. Mostly 10-11 inch grayling but several 15 and 16 inch fish and a specimen of 18 inches just before dark. The river was rising slightly at the end, presumably caused by light rain earlier.

15 Grayling

River dropping after heavy weekend rain. Still a bit higher than we would have liked, but fishable. Some really nice looking water oddly didn't produce, but myself and TH did manage to catch a good number of grayling on variety of nymphing methods, including czech, french leader and indicator. Good range of year class from small shots to nice 16 inch fish. Plenty of pound sized grayling about. Look out for a magazine feature in Total Fly Fisher in a few months time. Great beat!

23 Grayling

Washed - off for a second time... are we destined never to fish this river!!??

12 x grayling 10-17 inches, 5 x out of season trout 6-15 inches, trotting. This was an odd one. The first hour went well enough with half a dozen nice grayling spread over the pool. Then I became aware that the river, already on the high side, was now rising. Plenty of clouds overhead, but no rain here, so I figured it must be raining further up in the hills. Grayling promptly switched off, as they usually do in these circumstances, and all bites ceased. Salmon, however, were showing regularly as they got more excited. I pushed a marker into the margin and watched the situation. After a rising a few inches, the level stabilised and then began to fall again (confirmed afterwards by a little hump in NRW gauge graph). The grayling began to take again and I caught a few more before leaving. Nice average size of fish, including several at 15 and 16 inches).

12 Grayling