Feedback & Reports

7 chub to about 4.5lbs on spam or corn.

Excellent day, thank you! Weather was pleasant and river up a little with a brown tinge but nothing dramatic. Tried lots of spots from the water pump to the top of the fishery. Found fish in several places and finished up with a fin-perfect barbel and some cracking chub including a 'dodgy' (exactly on the scales) 6lb beauty. Pellet probably accounted for most bites but rotating meat and corn livened things up when needed. Bites came on and off all day. The area where the bank has been marked with poles was the most productive. (Last Summer we were so grateful when the farmer strimmed sections of the tall balsam and nettles to make access easier and marked where he'd done it with the poles. Now the spate has wiped away all the bankside weed, the poles look redundant). Echoing a previous contributor, in wet weather the track from the farm-yard to the river can be slippery on the way down and tricky on the way up. Also, don't wear your best shoes for driving as to open the farm-yard gate you have to paddle through considerable M&S. You can park in the farm-yard if you don't fancy the track. Failing that, take the wife's car.

Very sunny day amidst all the rain and gloom. The barbel did not seem to make much of it and it was left to the chub. 8 fish to about 4lb from the middle of the river down to the Oaks. May have lost a barbel at last knockings from the viaduct. I think I can confirm that the last entry did see an Otter, as I saw a pair of them at point blank range popping up over the area I had baited earlier. Do they like the smell of halibut pellets; and can I blame their appeance on my lack of success with the barbel?

The weather was good, fished the whole of the beat with no grayling caught.

First time upstream of Hereford and, consequently, on this beat and it has a lot of potential. The water had very little extra colour and looked superb despite the overcast, drizzly weather.
Enticed half a dozen nice chub from a couple of spots between the orchard and the fence where the river is slower and deeper, having tried several along that part of the bank. Got a bit preoccupied with fishing meat having caught a 4lb fish on the first cast and should have switched to pellets for a more resillient answer to the constant pecking at the bait.
There are so many inviting areas in that section of the river that the top and bottom of the beat were only visited during a lunchtime stroll. It all looks good.

Thanks WUF.

A note on the instruction sheet/map. The reason there are two dotted-green footpaths so close together is the presence of a barbed wire fence separating the fields and going down to the water's edge. To get around this, you have to go back to the stile by the road and, 20 yards towards the house, re-enter the field via a 5-bar gate. This is no distance at all and worth the effort to get at the faster water passing the island.

Three chub to 4.2. Breadflake.

4 x grayling 9-15 inches, 1 x out of season trout 10 inches, trotting with centre pin. This beat fished marvellously well during the late summer and autumn, but has been slightly disappointing on my couple of winter visits. They must be in there somewhere!

Morning spent on the lovely Courtfield. River cold with snow melt, coloured and falling. 2 x 5lb Chub on meat and 7lb Pike on a spinner, not a bad mornings work!

A dour sort of day, with the sun failing to make an appearance and the air tempertature around 5-6 degrees. The river was dropping after last week's rain, although was still a bit too coloured for fly fishing. I spent most of the day fishing with Czech nymphs, although a sparse Large Dark Olive hatch after lunch brought a few fish up to the surface so I had a somewhat hopeful half-hour on klinkhamers and paraduns. Fish? None, but thankfully I didn't have any canoeists or cormorants to contend with.
I last fished this beat in October and found a large grayling shoal in the riffles immediately below the access point. I didn't find any fish there today, and fished from the top weir all the way down to the lower limit. If anybody knows where the grayling are currently shoaled up feel free to let us know!

Very many thanks for arranging my fishing at Upper Bigsweir. I throughly enjoyed my day. Water 46 degrees so just ok for barbel and I eventually caught one weighing just under 7lbs.