Feedback & Reports

River low, walked the top section and only found one swim and had to do some clearing to fish it. It is a shame that there is a long stretch like this without a few swims prepared. Two of the others started on the float, one from the concrete path and one on the beach, only chub came out apart from bits on the float. Won't be booking this beat again.

3 Chub

Three very inexperienced anglers from Northern Ireland. We had never fished for barbel or chub before and this was our first day of three on the foundation stretches of the Wye. First of all we were all taken by the beauty of the river and the surrounding countryside along with the abundance of wild life. Regardless of catches we found the Wye a great place to fish.
On arriving we found that water appeared to us to be very low. There were a number of really nice looking swims but most of them appeared to be left high and dry above the water with little access to either land or return fish safely. We found this to be a feature throughout our trip. The fishing was, as we expected, very difficult although I did manage to catch two barbel of six pounds and five and a half pounds from just below boys rock. This was a really nice and picturesque swim. Attempted to trot with maggots but this only brought bleak and minnows. An enjoyable day which allowed me to tick off a totally new species.

2 Barbel

Lovely autumn day, river low, clear and warm. Spent the day trotting sweetcorn on the centrepin, under a chubber float in the main current. 6 chub up to 5lb and one immaculate barbel of about 4 1/2lb. Great way to spend the day.

1 Grayling, 1 Barbel, 6 Chub

Tough day on a low river which was clear. 1 barbell, a lovely fish of approx. 8lb. 3 chub from 2lb to 4lb. A nice beat. It's a bit of a walk and the banks are a bit wild.

1 Barbel, 3 Chub

Hard and difficult days fishing river low and clear very little stream. Plenty of Canoes.

1 Barbel

Largest about 8lb and all caught around dusk. Very low and clear.

3 Barbel

Maggot and hemp, feeder, 4' fluorocarbon, small hook. River low, mist first thing, hot, cloudy spells. JB silvers on the mag feeder. Barbel last thing 6lbs bracket.

1 Barbel, 8 Chub

Low river, misty first thing, bright and sunny. Mag, feeder. Small chub up to 1.3/4lbs. 6lbs bracket barbel, last thing. JB silvers and small chub.

1 Barbel, 8 Chub

One of the driest Septembers on record I understand and this was reflected in the river conditions. Water very low with hardly any flow, tried pellet feeder in the middle of the beat and trotting meat in the faster water by the island with a negative result.

Even though this is not WUF water, I thought that the post might be of interest to folk trying to tempt Usk trout rising in the low water at the moment. Just went down for a couple of hours in the sunshine, before and after midday today, to find fish sipping. Seine netting the surface netted small (about 3mm maximum) midge pupae. Put on a small (Varivas 2300 size 22 Ultra Midge hook)bi-vis CDC shuttlecock, olive midge pupa and caught trout from 8-14". Abdomen tied just with olive Ultra thread with a small black thread thorax (the whole thing only about 2.5mm long). Once the rise stopped, I checked the net again and found no midge pupae, just empty pupal shucks! If anglers see small dimpling rises and fish smutting in the next week, try some of these - you just need good eyes to see them and here, the bi-vis shuttlecock helped.....a bit!

6 Trout