Feedback & Reports

Best of my 3 days here. River low and clear with good flow. Worked up from bottom of LA pool with small grayling taking emergers like DHE. Lovely to see fish rise in brief moment before taking. Upper pool fish unresponsive. Worked back down with 2 spiders and had more fish.

6 Grayling

Another enjoyable day. This time the river rose nearly a foot while we were fishing. Lots of debris in the water not so good for fishing. Going to Whitney court the next day, that might mean some salmon might move up the river

2 Trout, 2 Grayling

2 Trout, 9 Grayling

Llanstephen Guage 8". Fished 10 till 6.30 on a generally calm, warm, partly cloudy day. Perfect! Became even more perfect at about 11.30 with the "catch of the day" - an osprey above us, heading down river on its way home. But back the fishing - a few PWs, but not many, was about it apart from some sedges late afternoon. Some fish rising all day, but not many. 75% of the fish we caught were non-risers. Given that fish were looking up, we fished emergers pretty well all day and all of the fish caught were off the top. GW used small olive and brown parachutes, and latterly a brown bodied Duck's Dun. DC had just about every fish on a size 16 pale hare's fur Duck's Dun, with a few on a HE parachute as well. The best trout was 13" but every grayling, bar four, was 9-10" - that's 70 single year class grayling! We've never experienced anything like this before on the Wye where one year class is so prolific and so dominates catches. The other ladies were 11, 12 and 13", and more the sort of fish that in recent years have formed a significant part of catches on this beat. Where are the older fish? Whatever the reason for their absence, the 9-10" grayling spawning year was clearly very productive in the Wye catchment. What was so good about conditions that year? Let's hope that the FEBs don't feast on these fish. If they don't, a few years hence, the quality of grayling fishing should be something to behold? All round, not a bad day.

4 Trout, 74 Grayling

Please see report already submitted by DC. Wonderful trip and the number of small fish bodes well for the future.

33 Grayling

Day started 12 degrees and overcast/light rain. Forecast was to brighten up. Water was low, but pushing through with the faintest of peat stain to colour, so fish in depths were hidden. The only issue was a blustery downstream wind, which was cold. Weather turned bright and cloudless about 2pm. there were soome insects hatching and a very few rises.

Stuck to dry: para's and a mixture of grey, brown and even the odd black. Size 14 worked best. Tried to cover the whole beat, but the wading on the lowest part was a real ankle breaker and I gave that up. The best pool turned out to be the 'main' field pool, which is some 300 metres long and a great glide. Action in tail and head. Middle 100m almost dead.

I fished 2 sessions. The break (to stock up with flies and tippet: Thanks Sports Fish, but they do a good impression of a wounded rhino...) didn't improve my reaction times. I literally lost count the number of times my fly was taken and I managed to miss them. Maybe 40? The ones I got were 3 in am session and 2 in evening. Most were 7" to 11", but the prize of the day (week?), from the rough water at the head of the productive pool, was a stonking 21" grayling that was only just hooked in the lip on a HE dry of my own tying on a Moser barbless hook. which any will tell you are bloody useless as hooks... They are effectively bent pins and have a tendency to revert to type under any pressure... Lucky me!

The day ended cold. My car said it was 11 degrees (from a high at 4pm at 17) at 8:26 pm. That is why the rise was so pathetic I guess...

Another great day out. Thanks WUF!

1 Trout, 4 Grayling

Very warm day with fish rising all day. Most taken on a light coloured size 18 klink. Two very strong fish of over a pound & a half but the rest all around the half pound mark or less. River bank alive with families of long tailed tits peeping away which were a delight as I sat eating my 'docky' in the shade with the dogs (who had the crusts).We are so lucky to be able to just book such a beautiful chunk of the riverside at will. Thank you.

16 Grayling, 2 Other

A lot of water, 2 trout caught on PTN - returned

2 Trout

River at 10" on the Llanstephan gauge, which is higher than usual for mid August, with a touch of colour. DD mostly fishing dry fly, JD fishing a team of three wets (though swapping methods later). We didn't fish the beat hard, taking our time to enjoy the lovely scenery and occasional kingfisher, but caught regularly from about 2 til 6pm. All grayling in the 8-10" range (except for one tiddler) caught on olive nymph, Hancock's Pet, grey duster and red tag. Unusual absence of the larger grayling often caught on this beat.

11 Grayling

First time at this beat and there are some wonderful stretches of water. There were only a few parr rising in Lady Margarete's and no sign of salmon anywhere. Very few other fish seen.

I like the Edw pool very much. I wondered if the WUF Gardening Elves could pay a visit.... The very top of the beat is heavily laden with Himalayan Balsam and pretty much inaccessible... There are a couple of small trees on two jetties that could do with being removed. Any chances?!

4 Trout, 4 Grayling