Feedback & Reports

Crystal clear water, beautiful surroundings but the fishing was hard this time. Found it hard to locate the grayling and was much harder going than our previous visits. But that's fishing for you. Still enjoyed it though, lovely beat. Thank you.

5 Trout, 1 Grayling

Walked the length of the beat but found it hard to locate the grayling.

4 Trout

River high after much rain, so arrived more in hope than expectation! Long trotting on maggot. Grayling 1lb 11oz.

4 Trout, 1 Grayling

One Grayling of around 14" hooked (red tag) but lost. One decent, 16", OOS Brown trout taken on a 'Holy Grail Hare's Ear Olive' which went ballistic when hooked!

1 Trout

River had dropped to 0.6m overnight and looked perfect. However, 2 of us trotted our hearts out all day for a nil return. Not sure if we failed to locate fish or did not hit upon the correct presentation, but we tried running through, holding back, heavy and light floats, different shotting patterns etc. to no avail. Did not try the fly rods and maybe should have. Just one of those days perhaps, but after a previous more successful trip we will be back to this stunning beat.

River in flood, 0.9m on Cilmery gauge.

Bitterly cold start at -5 and the river low and clear but the big Irfon Grayling were up for it. Light trotting gear and double maggot on a size 16 hook to 2.5lb line under a wire-stemmed stick float on the centre-pin accounted for 6 stunning fish, 4 over 2lb with the best at 2.5lb. All hooked at close range and fought deep and hard in front of me with one fish getting airborne - fantastic sight in the winter sunshine and crystal clear water. Glorious stretch of water this and all to myself - must have died and gone to heaven!

1 Trout, 6 Grayling

A tough day, took the fly rods and trotting rod but the normal banker pools seemed devoid of life. Fishing up at Glaslyn an otter popped its head up for a look and swiftly disappeared, as did we further down the beat. It was after 3.30pm before we saved the blank. 4 fine grayling in a very short spell ended a cracking day and a finale to our grayling season.

4 Grayling

29 x grayling 6-18 inches, mostly with single maggot whipped on a Tenkara rod. This was a dark day, warmer than of late, with what proved to be an annoying downstream wind at times. Showers the previous day had provoked one of those classic “quickly up and down” Irfon mini-spates, rising up to 0.75 metres. However, now the level was back down to 0.55 and the water was almost painfully clear, every stone on the bottom showing. The grayling seemed to be extremely spooky and before long I put the conventional trotting gear on one side and went after them with more success using the Tenkara rod and a tiny float. Most were hen shoats of 10-14 inches, but some of the big boys showed up around lunchtime. A few large dark olives hatched during the afternoon, which finished with light drizzle. Just one rise was seen.
There is a story attached to the largest fish, an 18 inch male. Using the Tenkara outfit I hooked into what was obviously a pretty solid grayling, which then caught me unawares with a sudden downstream lunge and broke the tippet at the hook knot. I was using 6X, which admittedly is fine enough, but the very flexible Tenkara rod usually protects it. Nevertheless, I was rather annoyed with myself; it is a shameful thing to break off in a fish. I remade the tackle and 10 minutes later, in the same place, I hooked a grayling which again was obviously a good one. However, this fish seemed unaccountably tired, without quite the usual mixture of fire and doggedness. Before I netted it, I had half-guessed what I was going to find. Once it was secure in the net, I proceeded to remove my hook, and then went on to remove a second, identical, hook from the upper lip. It seemed rather unlikely that somebody else had lost this fish using a Varivas 2100 size 16, so I concluded this was my adversary from 10 minutes before, happy to take once again. He was a handsome fellow, too, this “Tim Nice But Dim” of the grayling world. This is not the first time I have caught the same grayling in the same session; I suspect it happens more often than we realise. In Spain, my son once did the same with a wild river carp, a fish recognisable by a very distinctive scar, which fell for a floating crust twice during one afternoon.

29 Grayling

Cilmery Gauge 0.85 dropping to 0.75m by evening and ice in the rod rings so tough going, but managed some small grayling on trotted maggots. River running clear. My first visit so spent much of the day looking around, truly a stunning piece of water.

1 Trout, 3 Grayling