Feedback & Reports

9 x grayling 10-17 inches, 2 x out of season trout 6 inches, mostly on dry fly but a couple on traditional grayling wets (Grayling Steel Blue and Treacle Parkin). We switched plans to fish the Irfon as main Wye was still rather coloured this morning. A very cold frosty start, but grayling eventually started to rise, although in a rather finicky way. Not easy fishing, but the bag included quite a number of nice 15 inch grayling and one very solid 17 inch male fish.

After a very cold start to the day, the sun managed to punch through the valley mist and provide us with beautiful sunshine for the rest of the day. 4 beautiful grayling to @40cm with several missed. All fish were taken throughout the mid section of the beat, and all fell to weighted bugs. This was a great day out, on a great beat provided by a great organisation. I will be back as soon as I can. Many thanks to the Foundation and Charles Picton.

Wyebank Section. 16.00 to 18.30, overcast but mild. Evening walk to use maggots left from trip to Glanwye. Met 2 W&U anglers leaving after blank day for Barbel. River falling and clearing but water very cold the probable cause of the lack of barbel. Trotting, centre-pin, chubber float lightly over shot to size 14 hook on 4lb line set at 3 to 4ft and held back on edge of flow. Loose feed maggots with 2 on hook. 1 x 3lb plus chub followed by dace to 12oz every other cast until very dark. During this summer only caught occasional individual dace when using sweetcorn for barbel/chub and thought the heavy presence of a cormorant family and immature goosanders had cleared most of dace so good to find a large quality shoal present again.

Wyebank Section. 16.00 to 18.30, overcast but mild. Evening walk to use maggots left from trip to Glanwye. Met 2 W&U anglers leaving after blank day for Barbel. River falling and clearing but water very cold the probable cause of the lack of barbel. Trotting, centre-pin, chubber float lightly over shot to size 14 hook on 4lb line set at 3 to 4ft and held back on edge of flow. Loose feed maggots with 2 on hook. 1 x 3lb plus chub followed by dace to 12oz every other cast until very dark. During this summer only caught occasional individual dace when using sweetcorn for barbel/chub and thought the heavy presence of a cormorant family and immature goosanders had cleared most of dace so good to find a large quality shoal present again.

Wyebank Section. 16.00 to 18.30, overcast but mild. Evening walk to use maggots left from trip to Glanwye. Met 2 W&U anglers leaving after blank day for Barbel. River falling and clearing but water very cold the probable cause of the lack of barbel. Trotting, centre-pin, chubber float lightly over shot to size 14 hook on 4lb line set at 3 to 4ft and held back on edge of flow. Loose feed maggots with 2 on hook. 1 x 3lb plus chub followed by dace to 12oz every other cast until very dark. During this summer only caught occasional individual dace when using sweetcorn for barbel/chub and thought the heavy presence of a cormorant family and immature goosanders had cleared most of dace so good to find a large quality shoal present again.

A glorious autumn day following a sharpish overnight frost. Cold throughout - especially in the freshening wind. Our first time on the water. Got our cards marked by the farmer on arival. The river had been carrying a bit of colour on Saturday but, come Sunday morning was running clear - but still pushing through a bit. Took a while to work out where the fish were. Picked up the odd fish downstream in the morning before dropping onto a run of quality Grayling mid afternoon in one of the glides below the top weir. Around a dozen fish in total to a mixture of PTNs, Copper Johns and Klinkhammers.

4 x Barbel and 2 x Chub. River rising.

Twenty fish caught (14 grayling and six trout), most of which were around 10". All caught on Czezh nymphs fished in the riffles (the induced take method worked really here). Didn't see any fish rising and there was only a very sparse hatch of what looked like pale wateries in the early afternoon. The river is narrow at the lower end of the beat and is too deep/silty to wade. You can fish from the bank but the pace is slow (feels more like a coarse fishing section). The few gravel glides riffles in the mid section offer easier wading. Didn't try above the weir or the wooded section so not sure how the top end of the beat fishes. A nice new acquistion for the WUF.

Early frosty start, fish were active from first thing.
Good numbers of grayling up to 40cm on various nymphs, sizes 14 and 16 mainly, nice buggy looking hares ears, and pheasant tails etc. A few olives hatched during the day but nothing rose to them. Great little beat with tight accurate casting in places to target every little hole that holds a fish. The day before the fishing had been spoilt on the Lugg being quite coloured from the rain on Friday night. By the Sunday however the worst of the colour had subsided and fishing was once again much better

A couple of things to be wary of:

1) For a fly only stretch there’s a lot of spinners (mepps) in the trees

2) Be very careful of the cattle! I was chased by them twice during the day, the second time down the river channel which wasn’t that amusing. Finding what I thought was sanctuary on the opposite side of the barbed wire fence in the field, I was more than a little alarmed as they displayed show jumping style skills and quite happily hopped over in my pursuit.

A bright sunny day and the river a lot lower and clearer than I thought it would be. A struggle to get bites all day, ended up with just 1 medium sized chub at dusk.