Feedback & Reports

I booked this from the car in Builth, testament to the ease of the online booking system. Although booked on Abernant originally, the Wye was still a little bit high so made a snap decision to head to Cefnllysgwynne to try and get a bend on the rod. To be fair the Irfon was till a little bit high too - the high water pushes the grayling off their usual lies and unsettles them, especially with a constant stream of leafy debris trundling along the river bed. I gave it a few hours with maggots in the usual "bankers", but didn't get a touch. Always a pleasure to visit Cefnllysgwynne, so much water to go at.

17 x grayling 8-18 inches, 4 x out of season trout 6-11 inches, 1 x out of season salmon 5-6 pounds, long trotting. Almost perfect river conditions today, although I had to use lighter float gear than usual with shy grayling in clear water. A nice healthy range of grayling sizes, including one at 18 and several at 17 inches, but also a few smaller ones included in the catch and there were some little grayling parr under 6 inches as well. The accidental salmon was a rather docile coloured grilse, which I thought was a big grayling for a while as I worked it upstream. To my surprise, it lay quite quietly while I plucked the hook out. All in all, a most beautiful Irfon day (though cold at 1-2 degrees) with snow on the hills and flaming colour in the trees over the river. It won't last much longer; the leaves are falling fast.

17 Grayling

A bitterly cold day with a sprinkling of snow on the high hills in the distance. However, the sun came out and we fished the Church Pool upwards with weighted upstream nymphs. NB caught and returned a nice WBT around 1lb. We called it a day at lunchtime.

1 Trout

It was a promising start with a small grayling and brown trout in the first 10 minutes from the pool next to the stile into the churchyard. Worked my way up to the top fields of the beat during the day but nothing was showing. Returned to the church at approx 4pm and was surprised to see fish rising in the large pool below the church. Switched to the dry fly and missed a couple of good takes before taking another couple of out of season brown trout.

3 Trout, 1 Grayling

Day trotting for Grayling. 10am to mid-day. Downstream of Church. 3 grayling, 12 to 15 inch and a very small oos brownn trout. Saw group of (migrating?) firecrests or goldcaps in trees next to church. Mid-day to dusk in field below 2 islands. No bites until 15.00 then found shoal immediately below islands caught 5 grayling, 10 to 15 inch. Moved 50yds downstream to top of long gravel run caught 1 large grayling of around 18 inch and at dusk 1 chub of around 2lb. Note: unusually all the Grayling were male fish and in excellent condition and colour. This is a beautiful peaceful place to spend an Autumn day and beat is an combination of excellent access and thoughtful bank maintenance. Thanks to WUF and owners.

9 Grayling, 1 Chub

Another mild day; air temperature up to 16+C. Cloudy. Water temperature 10C. River slightly coloured and a little higher after rain on 16th.
Fished a pair of bead-head nymphs through a number of likely looking pools in the middle and upper parts of the beat, to no avail. Spent a very interesting period watching a pair of otters. Soon after their departure, saw a solitary rise and covered it with a dry fly, catching a beautiful grayling of exactly 2lb. I would have thought that the otters would have 'spooked' any fish in their vicinity. Maybe the pools which hold grayling attract otters because of the ready food source?

1 Grayling

Weather: Dull, cloudy, rain in morning, air temp. 10-12C.
River: fairly low and clear.
Whilst fishing near church, an otter swam directly towards me. At the same moment my only grayling took hold and was landed (1lb 9oz), presumably the lesser of two evils from the grayling's point of view !!
Also caught approx 12 OOS trout.
Grayling took gold head pheasant tail nymph with red 'collar'.

12 Trout, 1 Grayling

I went back to this beat after fishing there on Sunday to try and find the end of my rod that I lost! Could not believe my luck when I found the olive tip section in the ferns along the bank.
The River was lower than Sunday and clear. Thought I would fish a couple of pools before returning to Sussex and again to my suprise caught a hen Salmon in the tail end of the flow on pool 5.
She was about 30" long, about 8lb and looking at the beautiful colours been in the river a few weeks. She was released and swam away. This is a great stretch of river to fish and will come back next year.
Thanks to the Wye and Usk staff who had mentioned my missing rod section to other anglers on the beat. Still can't believe it !

1 Salmon

3 of the guys tried for Salmon all day but no luck.
I had a Grayling of about 1lb from behind the Church. Great weather and the river looked perfect. The only down side of the day was that I lost a top section of my Hardy Angel fly rod in the bushes somewhere between pools 3 and 5.
I will come back next year and try again.

1 Grayling

Very hard fishing on my favourite beat of the irfon. Gin clear and no flow on several parts didn't help, but did manage to catch 4 trout, biggest 16 inch and 1 grayling 10 inch and lost another. French nymphing caught all the fish, never saw a rise all day! It seems to me the results of other anglers over the past year or so have gone down drastically, this is sure to be down to the otters! living in Norfolk as I do, I know only too well how they can destroy small rivers!

4 Trout, 1 Grayling