Feedback & Reports

Having received your newsletters for quite a while I finally could no longer resist the temptation to try one of the locations for the first time - yesterday I went to Beat 13 on the Edw and had a wonderful day. I winkled out seven wild brownies, the biggest about 8 inches, which is not bad for August, and I lost others. The scenery and wildlife is fantastic and I shall certainly return and try some of the other beats. It is a great scheme. Incidentally, another angler turned up on the same beat later in the day and he too was singing its praises.

A total of fouteen trout were caught, the best just under a pound. All were safely returned. The day was very bright with the best fishing between 8-10pm. I lost a good fish just before dark and from its antics I think it was undoubtedly a sea trout. It is a lovely stretch of river with a good variety of water. I will certainly recommend it to friends and will certainly book it again myself.

Fished beat 12 on the Edw on the 15 July weather bright and hot.
I am a novice flyfisher, only started last July on Midlands resevoirs, so I was a bit daunted by the prospect of travelling 150 miles to try my hand at wild brownies. However I managed to catch two 9 - 10" fish on nymphs returned both.
Great day although tiring by the time I had waded up the stream and and back to the car.
Keep up the great work, hope to come back soon...

This was my first time on the Irfon and I must say this stretch of the river is utterly delightful – definitely in my top three! The river, with its rapids, islands, pools, and gutters, has plenty of visual appeal. But beware the river bed, which in parts is quite treacherous, indeed throughout the day I used my wading staff (almost) as often as I did my rod!
Due to the characteristics of this beat, I had to change my technique quite frequently. In places, a small beadhead was the perfect choice but less than a cast away a team of two was required in order to stand half a chance. It was all very challenging – but extremely rewarding. Despite the air being thick with fly life I saw only two rises all day.
Fished from 10:00 till 19:00. The river was up about two or three inches and falling. I managed nine trout: smallest eight inches, largest about fourteen inches.

9 Trout

I had a fantastic day with Kim who's a great instructor - among other skills, he's got all the necessary patience and sense of humor to bear with the slowest learners. My fishing skills and my confidence (in my abilities, but also in the river holding loads of nice fish) received a huge boost on Sunday and this guiding day was a great investment! I'm looking forward to my next guided trip with Kim now... My catch rate increased 10-fold in one day! So my expectation now is that i'll keep this rate of 25-30 fish a day, and next time i go with Kim i'll top 300 fish, right? I've seen lots of recommendations for Kim on your website and I can add my voice to this
chorus: he's just extremely good at his job of making people understand and practice fly fishing better!

Thanks for all the advice!

Just a quick, belated, note to thankyou for all of your help. We all had a great weekend fishing the various beats and I am happy to say that everyone caught fish. Most had not fished the Wye before. Personally I caught my biggest ever grayling.

The beats were simply stunning and the campsite was great as well. I think that it would be fair to say that I would have really struggled without your help. The trip for next year is already being talked about....perhaps the Usk.

Thanks again,

I had a gorgeous days fishing [on the Usk] last Thursday 21st June......We had 10 fish between us, all on dry fly, and most of them in the evening. All were small - about 1/2 pound, with a few larger fish lost. All were returned. There was a reasonable hatch of little sulphur coloured mayflies which they were taking well throughout the day. Also had masses of takes on a gold head nymph during the day but couldn't hook anything with this approach. It's a gorgeous beat with loads of wildlife, and I hope to return to it soon.

Just a quickie to say thanks for remembering the waders!!!! Robin had a fabulous day's fishing...despite nearly being swept away in pusuit of a frisky trout!! He survived, but sadly his mobile phone is no longer with us!!!

Llangoed Hall was also divine - all in all a fab weekend. Thank you for your able assistance to a fishing virgin!

Just a note to say that I have just returned from a weeks holiday fishing around Builth with my niece and some friends. We fished two of your waters. The first was the Edw on the Hundred House beat see photos attached where it was tough going as the trout there seem to have developed telepathy My niece caught her first small stream brownie though 11inches and she was very chuffed. The other water we went to was the Usk at Sennybridge. This was one of most beautiful stretches of river I have seen. We caught plenty of small trout and lost a couple of proper uns. Traditional spider patterns worked well in the quicker water. Later on though the fish were driving us daft as there was a fall of anglers curse and we could only get takes on tiny Griffiths gnats. But a good time was had by all. Keep up the good work!

Superb Friday and Saturday 14 Shad caught on Gromain beat with a more than a few lost , trout to the dry fly in the evening up to 1lb with a bonus grayling well over 2 lb best dry fly blue wing olive best shad fly gold head damsel.