Feedback & Reports

The river was low and clear, there was a good mix of fly coming off by no real specific hatch or rise, Black knat was probably the most prolific fly. Picked up 3 fish, not easy fishing but a very rewarding day in a beautiful part of the world.

3 Trout

Very nice location but very low water levels made finding fish difficult. We managed 5 trout during the day, each 10-12 inch in size. No visible rise at all but one fish fell to a small dry and the other 3 to small nymphs fished as deep as we could get them.

5 Trout

With the Trallong guage at only 0.23m, the river is right down to its bones, running languidly through the drops into a descending series of very shallow, slow-moving glides. Fish are VERY spooky, sitting and feeding in shallow margins, and with tail-gunners and non-rising fish off upstream if inadvertently disturbed. The morning was cool and cloudy with a pesky cold upstream wind impairing presentation and little fly until about 11 a.m. but with just a few fish sipping, mainly in the margins, probably on midge. Then mainly OUs, LBDs, midge and gnats appeared, not in huge numbers, but enough to get more fish moving. There is also a lot of green aphid on the sycamores, as well as some monster stonefly on the water – the Little and (very) Large Show! In the afternoon, as if it wasn't tough enough already, it was wall to wall sunshine with fish even spookier, but some still nebbing, seemingly on black gnat, especially where there was some shade. The trout were all plump well-fed Penpont fish, with fish ranging from 10, 12, 14 and 16 inches, the latter fat at a surprising two pounds. Fish were taken on Baby Sunfly, an OU Duck’s Dun variant, a small HE emerger, and a black F fly for the gnats. I had to leave at 5 p.m. but there were lots of spinners in the air so I shall stay later on my next trip (after / if we get some more water – lots of rain please, and soon!). An exceedingly hard but rewarding day.

11 Trout

No fish caught or hooked though fish were rising to various flies.
Bright sunny day but water very low. I was disappointed not to hook a fish after a marvelous previous day with excellent guiding of Chris Price on same beat when he caught a lovely brown trout of at least 3 lbs and I had hooked one of about 1 lb.

Struggled to get any interest on or below the surface in very low water conditions. Nonetheless, this is a very nice stretch of water made all the better by lovely weather. Will return.

3 Trout

Truelly great beat, but no luck.

Very few trout rising to very few flies - some LDOs and few more LBDs. Fish moving around to search for food. Very flighty in low clear water. A bright sunny summer's day in April dictated very tricky fishing - the "dog days of April"?!
This is however a fantastic beat and, given a few more inches of water and a decent hatch of fly, would likely provide superb fishing.

12 Trout

River very low and gin clear. My walking, wading and clambering efforts were eventually rewarded with a WBT. The fish was taking advantage of a very brief hatch of pale watery duns and happily mistook my Adams dry fly for a real one.
Penpont isn't what it used to be as a beat in the day of the "Penpont Porkers" - which I hope referred to the fish and not the regular anglers! However, it's still a varied beat and as long as you don't pick school holidays you may be untroubled by the fast-growing holiday campsite at the farm that owns the beat.

1 Trout

Cold day had some nice fish on nymphs

8 Trout