Feedback & Reports

Plenty of snow on the ground making some swims a bit to risky to fish. Unfortunately a blank with no action to myself and my mates rod. Will try again in the next few weeks.

Beautiful winter's day. Had some amazing views of birds of prey up close, unfortunately no fish seen or caught.

20 x grayling 14-17 inches, trotting. These came from one shoal, tight packed, of very nice grayling, mostly 15-16 inches. These were pristine fish and not a cormorant scar to be seen for once, which was very encouraging. Also the temperature just about rose to freezing for an hour or two around midday, so rod ring icing was not so very bad a problem. The river is now low and clear, so the trotting gear used was quite light, and nymphing would probably have worked well also.
The main difficulty about today was to get the car to the beat at all. With all this snow about, the road into Cefnllysgwynne is definitely 4WD territory. Still, sitting indoors has been giving me cabin fever, so I threw a shovel in the back of the Landrover along with the fishing gear. I packed up around 3 as it looked like snowing again...and that's enough from one shoal.

17 Chub on bread and Cheese paste. River level low and clear. Fished several swims but couldn't find fish in the usual winter spots. Caught fish from fast shallow water.

First time out on this water. A spectacular winter wonderland after the snowfall. River slightly coloured. Fished the afternoon(4hrs), picking out only 2 grayling from the deeper pools with the best fish approx 12-13". Fishing was made difficult by a number of overhanging/fallen trees in some of the more likely grayling sections. Worth another visit with shorter rods next time :)

Five inches of snow made access difficult. All fished Boat/Ferry pool with deadbaits - no fish.

3 fished deadbaits from pumping station down to wood. 1 lost fish at end of day back at peg 1.

Walked the beat with the owner, very helpful but no fish.

5 x grayling 13 - 18 inches, on leaded wet flies fished in a team: Red Tag, Yellow Bumble, Grayling Steel Blue. The upper Wye looked to be in good condition (0.61 at Ddol), although I can't say anything very complimentary about the weather which was around 2 degrees all day with alternate showers of rain and sleet. And I found Craig Llyn a most attractive and interesting beat, with different types of water where you could practice almost any style of fishing you could wish: pocket water, runs, gutters, gravel flats, and some sumptuous deep salmon pools, all neatly labelled. Only the wading (with the exception of the bottom end) is not exactly dangerous, but hard work for us folks in our sixties - lumpy boulders rather than gravel for the most part.
This was in fact my first experience on Craig Llyn, which made such a good reputation for itself throughout 2012. I would have liked to try for its grayling during the cream of the season, September and October, when fish are rising, but other commitments and the floods kept me away until now. So I was starting from a position of ignorance and it's more or less a given that fishing a strange water for grayling in January is going to involve a lot of searching. So it proved, because I probably wasted time on unproductive water and I never came across a large shoal. However, I did eventually find a couple of small pods of grayling after lunch which included some lovely fish.
Some large fish have been reported from Craig Llyn and on this day mine were, in order, 18, 16, 17, 14 and 13 inches. Which is very nice of course, and I don't wish to seem to be looking a gift-horse in the mouth, but I would have been happier to have caught a few smaller ones as well. Where are they, those grayling we need for future years? They were certainly hiding on this day and 3 of those 5 nice grayling had the dreaded cormorant scars, which makes me a bit suspicious - like so many areas of the upper river, there isn't much cover at Craig Llyn. Anyway, a very nice day despite the weather.
One dead salmon kelt on the bank at the top of the beat - foxes or otters had most of it already.

Glorious winter day, river at normal level, fished mostly the bottom half of the beat and finding safe pegs to fish was tricky. One four pound Chub on maggots late in the afternoon saved the blank. Stunning sunset rounded off a fantastic day out.