Feedback & Reports

Fished for a very pleasant couple of hours, mid afternoon. As expected river was low and clear, weather bright sunshine and very warm for April, Just the one trout, about 10", on small dry fly, returned. No hatches noticed.

1 Trout

A really niggling bloody annoying Easterly wind this morning, before the quick journey from Rhayader to the Edw @ Hundred House beat ......
Set off half eleven .... reading 13 in my wagon that... looked promising !!! The wind picked up .... just a pain and made dry fly presentation tough going ...
I fished the top hundred yards of Cregrina..Strewth I've got some work here when the trout season finishes !! Needs a serious haircut!! The bottom of the beat , going just hundred yards up from the bridge, I completed winter time ..... Now, the rivers looking like it could do with a week of rain, and a dam good flush through !!!!
I waded up slowly from just after twelve... A few bugs on the go, but nothing like three days ago ...No wind would have made it the perfect dry fly day !!!
Managed six little chaps ... two were risers, the remainder, speculative trouty locations. In the fast stuff . A few large brook duns and olives on the go from about quarter to one....
Again, on the lower hundred house beat, skinned frogs present .... Tarka has been absolutely nailing the Edw frog population ....
A fun session on an old favourite beat .... A good drop of rain and a flush through needed here ...In fact all rivers will be nearly on their bones !!!
The Leominster / Hereford contingent I'd be having a crack on the Upper Lugg and Arrow at Kington about now ...Worth a couple of hours mid afternoon??? Have Arrow Kington and the Lugg at Litton gone out of trend or something??? Great dry fly sport on both those .... I'll certainly get over on one of them into next week after some local bunny bashing with the .22 ....
Anyway , back to The Ponderosa, and a well earned pint of Thatchers cider on The Crown, after anothef cracking stream sortie ............. cheers !!!!

6 Trout

Well, a niggling easterly with a bit of poke today, we’ve had it for a few days now, getting a bit annoying to say the least !!!! I opted for the Hundred House beat today, see how she goes ….. I bowled up at the bridge, at quarter to twelve….. Jeeeeeeeeeez, she looked lower than the Hergest beat, from the bridge view point !!!! We need some serious rain. The Edw, and probably the Wye and all her tribs, need a dam good flush through ……
I did start a hundred yards below the bridge, strictly speaking in the Cregrina beat, looked fishy, one of the pool heads from the bridge, and in fact she was, first one of the day, on my dry offering ….. yaaaaaaaay, a nice start !!!! Large brook duns and olives were on the go from about quarter to one … so not bad timing today….. at least even with the horrid east wind, there were some bugs showing . As I tackled up, it was reading 14 degrees in my truck at ten to twelve …. Not tooooooo bad !!!
It certainly wasn’t as lively as three days ago …. Had it not been for that wind, dry fly sport would have been excellent ….. wading is a slow affair now, with these being so low….
The Hereford / Leominster contingent, I’d be giving the Arrow at Kington or the Lugg at Litton a good bash on an afternoon stint … I’ll be on one of them, if not both next week, it’s all about giving them a go …..see if the trout are looking up on those beats !!! A couple of hours midday till two tells you a lot about the state of play !!!!
So, a difficult, but rewarding session, six wee chaps , nothing big, in fact all between six and eight inches… but, two were risers, and the others speculative casts into trouty territory …. Produced the desired splashy rise to my dry !!! Always fun on this beat, lots of new pools, masses of woody obstructions for trout refuge, and some nice dry fly areas too !!! Wild streams always do their own thing … You can trim them back, but they’ll never be tamed !!!! Hoping for this east wind to alter to at least the north or better still south west !!! Here’s hoping, and looks like no rain for quite a while too …. It’ll be the River Elan and the big reservoirs soon then …. Right, off to The Crown in Rhayader for a well earned pint of the good stuff ……. Cheers folks !!!!!

6 Trout

First time for a while that a bad back that had precluded fishing for the last month or so had eased up AND a reasonaby stable few days (weather wise), so I toook the opportunity to visit my local wild stream beat this afternoon.

Whilst I didnt hook up, I had 5 rises to small dry flies in a couple of hours. Good to be out and mobile again.

The stream itself was reasonably clear and a nice hight compared to the last few days when fairly heavy rain had rendered it muddy

Well I did intend to fish the little Clywedog, but the farmer was penning sheep and busy in the only parking area down that narrow lane, so I reversed up, onwards to Hundred House, only another twenty mins onto the journey !!!
Actually I did three hours here and finished off with two at Cregrina, I'll submit that report also......
Ohhhhhhhh dear , really overgrown and what a cracking beat this used time be ..... one of my favs ... Tis a pity no investment is put into these streams..... still I persevered .... I don't mind over grown but jeeeeeeeeeezzz this is like primary jungle!!!
Fish taking surface insects by one, manged five on the dries ..... one was particularly fussy , three fly .... he took a size twenty f fly !!!!
I was actually pretty pleased with five, considering the dense foliage , stuff in.river etc etc etc ....Sizes of fish, between eight and eleven inches .... Happy days ... Still plenty to go at ,just a bit sparse now!!! And thr fish are there, just frustratingly not doable with dry fly tactics ..... loved it though as always...A quick pastie at my truck, and a can of diet coke ...then a mooch to Cregrina at half three, see if the parking spot is free ....ahhhhh yes ... might as well give it a go, happy days !!! The Edw extravaganza continues........

5 Trout

1 Trout

Bowled up at an old favourite of mine at eleven this morning, warm and getting warmer!!!.... reading 18 in my truck when I parked up..... always have a mooch over the bridge while setting up. Some sedge and a few olives on the go .... so I opted for an eighteen para Pheasant tail .... a good suggestive all-rounder!!
Real jungle stuff here now ..... perhaps i can see why it's hardly been fished this season, shame really, six seven ,even ten years ago , total fun .... now a lot of the decent pools are long since hindered by fallen debris or over hanging trees !!! I'm sure it's why Arrow Kington hasn't bern fished at all too !!! There's that Commando assault course half way, in the form of a fallfen huge Ash tree .... no way around it really !!! Is it still there WUF????? ...can the habitat team cut some steps into it as a minimum ...... just so that anglers can get over it !!! I digress ..... big time !!!! .......lol !!!
Anyway where you can get a cast away on the Upper Edw, great smash takes to my dry Para PT. Lovely stuff !!! Stayed on the same dry all morning ....Three were a respectable size too, maybe eleven inches or so, in a tally of nine .... that said,the smallest today was probably an eight inch brownie.... lovely to catch on the six foot , two weight rod ....just fun !!!!!
A lot of the top beat iisn't worth the effort now, it's so taken over by nature, think the map needs to be adjusted to dictate this !!!! It's certainly not fishable past that one huge field .... really needs the top rung of barbed wire crimped as the full length is done with taught stock fencing and barbed wire ...Farmers must dream of barbed wire, its literally everywhere , damn stuff !!! .... its alright for agile people, but I guess you need to be agile to fish here from the word go, so disco dancing over a barbed wire fence is easy compared to some of the tree clambering you need to do !!!
Still an enjoyable four hours, I cut out into that big field at three bells, hot by then !!! 25 degrees !!! Strewth was I ready for a diet coke when I got to my wagon .... like a wilde beast at a watering hole !!! Lol ..... A good hair cut with four chaps would soon sort the lower " decent " beat !!! Here's a thing WUF .... I KNOW we're in a world of volunteering now, but six sessions done by each member of a" staunch work party" has gotta be worth a free wild streams season permit !!! You reap what you sow !!! And hopefully the gaffer is reading this !!! Let's tidy up all these lovely streams back to what they used to be like !!! A fun few hours today ....... home , a freshen up, and a couple of scoops in The Crown in Rhayader .... sorted!!!

9 Trout

What started off as a dull dreary day at 11 degrees proved to be warmer than expected. A few small trout were taking flies but non took our patterns - albeit we caught 3, 2 on a dry and 1 on a nymph, lost another on a dry with a barbless hook. All fitted nicely in one hand. This is a small stream. The bottom part of the beat is deeper pools and slightly more accessible and less overgrown than the top part. The landowner has added a number of gates and styles but the banks still require some alpine skills in parts.

Pleasant day but probably won't come back. Feel I have had enough of wild streams this season.

3 Trout

My first visit to this river. Was hard going. Most stretches heavily overgrown. Water still rather coloured after heavy rainfall in the previous week. Had 3 small 15cm trout on sedge emergers size 14. And 3 24 cm trout on a Partridge and Orange spider size 14. Trout looked well fed and healthy. Missed a heavy atack on a Tup’s nymph size 12. Didn’t see traces from other fishermen. Really enjoyed the jungle tour.

6 Trout

No fish seen, two rises in evidence however.
Beat was coppiced in 2007 but is still overgrown, I couldn't wade through the deeper pools and the bank was too eroded in places where it wasn't overgrown.
Only managed to fish around 70 yards of the lower beat due to the above. Barbed wire fencing prevents re-entry to river from the field. A disappointing day.