After a couple of lean days on Courtfield and Wyebank and difficult conditions with floating weed at the weekend, which gave even the likes of Ali Hamidi a hard time, today has seen a return to some fantastic fishing. First of all though I must mention Stephen Murdoch’s record for a small barbel, which I am sure he will take in the good vein in which it is meant. Fishing yesterday on his 50th birthday in the hope of “just one barbel” he caught his fish, but it was a mere 5″ long making it the smallest barbel of the year!
Today four rods on Courtfield landed more than 20 barbel between them, two only fishing part of the day. These included three 10 pounders and two at 9lbs 15oz. also a 5lb 4oz chub. Fishing today was Jonathan Avery of monster catfish fame, who landed the record 8ft 3″ 245lb catfish in Spain on the 29th September. Jonathan has fished Courtfield several times this season and has had great success on every occasion.
River levels going up and down by around 1.5 to 2ft early in the month helped the flow conditions and allowed for some interesting fishing, as the previous posts have shown. By the end of the month it was starting to heat up again towards the exceptional short heatwave. This heated the water back up a bit with the warm nights keeping temperatures ideal for the barbel to get well back on the feed.
Some superb barbel have been caught on the Courtfield beat with 8 ten pounders and possibly others. Plenty of 9s and other fish spread throughout the range from a few pounds up. The chub fishing was wonderful early in the month and half a dozen 5s, a couple of 6s and one 7 pounder have been reported.
It is quite evident that the barbel in the 8 lb class back in late June, became the 9s in August and are now the 10s, suggesting around 2lbs of growth through the summer. Much depends on the coming winter flood situation. If it is similar to the last two winters I feel we can hope for a spectacular season next year with an excellent stock of fish which could be pushing 12 to 13 lbs by this time next year.
Health is everything and strong lean river barbel are the mark we are looking for. The excesses of ground baiting, leading to overweight fish with compromised fitness, are now behind us. The WUF letting system with minimum pressure is the perfect formula allowing for stocks of barbel to thrive.
The great barbel nursery of the Wye hereabouts is undoubtedly the shallows below Lydbrook as evidenced by the continuing results from Wyebank. These have continued to be spectacular throughout September, with good catches of barbel from 1.5lbs to 9lbs. On the 29th a notable catch was made by Simon Eeles’ 2 rods who apart from catching 5 barbel in the 5 to 8 lb range had 30 in the 1.5 to 3lb range. As well as excellent barbel fishing several chub over 5lbs and a couple over 6lbs have been caught. The potential of Wyebank’s short stretch was highlighted on Monday the 3rd October by Rudi’s 10lb 14oz barbel
All in all a very satisfactory result. There will be some fine pictures coming soon.
Friday the 9th September, proved to be the Red Letter day for three fishermen. In the morning the river had dropped back from the 2ft 6″ of Wednesday evening to a perfect 4″ at 9.30am. I had gone down to Wyebank and saw several small grilse slashing the surface. I raced back and got my fly rod and by 11 o’clock had landed two grilse of about 6lbs and 4.5 lbs and lost another tiny fish maybe 2-3lbs. The fish rose to a cascade fished across the Wyebank run and must have been running fish. The resident cormorant turned up followed by canoes and all went quiet. It was the first time I have ever had two fish in one short session from the beat and it could have been three!
The river then started to rise again midday and was at a foot and coloured by the evening when Colin Tyler fishing number 2 swim in Legg Meadow finished up with 9 barbel to 9.5 and 4 chub to 5lb3oz and Rudi, fishing the evening finished with 6 barbel to 9.75 lbs and a huge bag of chub every cast, the best two weighing 5.75lbs and 5.25lbs. In total 100lbs or more of fish. Truly a Red Letter day for salmon, barbel and chub.
The river was low and clear throughout August . Despite the low water of August there were some excellent catches of barbel and chub. Feedback for the month on the WUF site showed the fishing held up well with barbel to 9.5lbs recorded on Wyebank, lots of chub and also good dace. The Courtfield fished consistently with a mix of difficult and good days, Huw James recording 14 barbel to 9lb 14oz on the 20th August and there were many sightings of salmon, which were settled throughout the fishery.
Improve your Coarse Fishing September – October issue carries a fabulously illustrated feature article on Dean Macey fishing Wyebank for barbel in early July. ” Dean declares this had been his best day’s barbelling ever”, an outstanding testimonial for this lovely stretch of water. A double page picture of Dean fishing, with the stunning backdrop of the river downstream, the woods and the romantic tower and spire of Welsh Bicknor in the distance, illustrates this great location for some of the finest barbel fishing anywhere.
Canoeing was intense throughout the holiday season and although it does’nt generally effect the fishing it certainly affects the fishermen, when the behaviour sinks to the standard of drunken tomfoolery. It is unacceptable that the quiet enjoyment of the fishermen is so rudely disrupted and I believe it is upto us all, fishery owners, keepers. gillies and fishermen, to make our views heard by the EA. They are the statutory Navigation Authority responsible for ensuring that the bylaws are upheld, whereby “masters of the vessels” do not cause damage to private property. It is vital in this regard to recognise and understand that fishing rights are deemed in law as private property. It is vital to report incidents to the EA. Lynn Bulbeck at the Navigation Authority has stated that they can respond to reports where the master of a vessel is failing to observe the bylaws.
After years of scarcity we are now seeing salmon all over the place on the Wye. July has seen Courtfield absolutely full of fish. I estimate there was between 60 and 100 fish spread through the beat with good sightings of many grilse as well. I caught a 9lb small summer fish in Legg meadow on the 16th before the river rose and a fish of 10lbs was caught by a salmon rod on the 25th. A good fish leaped clear of the water above the Wyebank crib yesterday while a likely small grilse was lost the day before and very small grilse have been showing along the bottom end of the Wyebank stretch. Our catch of salmon has now risen to a respectable 7 and 1 kelt for Courtfield and Wyebank.
Its early days but I for one feel confident that we are on the cusp of a major turn around, particularly with the evidence of the super small grilse which hopefully will be followed now by grilse of increasing size more typical of the late summer Wye fish.
What a month it has been for the Wyebank barbel! While the upper lower Wye and middle river was difficult for salmon and sometimes slow for coarse fishing, the Wyebank stretch was absolutely magnificent. Around 230 barbel were caught by 22 fishermen, with weights ranging from less than a pound up to almost 10lbs with several fish breaking tackle and suspected of being in double figures. The quality of the fish has been superb and every year class is being represented in the catches demonstrating a very healthy population.
That staple of the Wye, the humble chub, has become less desirable for the fishermen. However along with the barbel the Wyebank stretch has produced at least half the above number of chub to magnificent 5 pounders and plenty of 4 pounders. All in all a truly memorable month of fishing with smiles all round.
The Courtfield beat has also seen some stunning catches this month with Kraig Mcleod’s bag including 5 and 6lb chub and two 12lb and an 11lb barbel, Rudi’s 10 and 11lb barbel, while others have had chub pbs of over 6llbs and lots of good barbel. Alan Andrews bag on Wednesday 27th of 10 barbel all around 8lbs and a huge bag of chub to 4lbs plus and Tom Woollerton’s party of which two had 20 barbel, just shows the sort of coarse fishing Courtfield is famous for.
Its official from the WUF that Wyebank and Courtfield have been the best producing coarse fisheries on the river.
Thursday morning 14th July saw Dean Macey doing a feature for TV and Improve Your Coarse Fishing monthly magazine, on the Wyebank stretch at Lower Lydbrook. Fishing the lower pool from the riffle, where he was wading, with Richard Stewart the photographer on hand beside him, Dean hooked into his first barbel second cast after missing one on the first cast as the pellet sank. From then on Dean had a barbel and the occasional chub on every cast.
Dean said “it was by far the most productive days barbel fishing that Ive ever had”
Meanwhile Ali Hamidi the film producer for Korda fishing the top end, likewise hooked into a succession of barbel in the 6 to 8lb range to take a total catch in excess of 20 fish.
With a magnificent combined catch of some 50 barbel to 9lbs and significant numbers of fine chub, including a 5 pounder by Richard trotting the Wyebank pool off the crib, the day ended with Dean and Ali agreeing this was their best barbel day ever in the most fantastic and exhilarating swift waters of the Wyebank fishery of the river Wye.
Dean said “it was by far the most productive days barbel fishing that Ive ever had”
Look out for Dean’s feature in Improve Your Coarse Fishing.
The coarse season kicked off with low and cool water, with 2 to 4 inches on the gauge through to the end of the first weekend followed by a rise and colour to 1ft 6 inches after summer solstice, which fell away by Saturday evening the 25th June to 4 inches and came up again fast Saturday night to 3ft plus and rose to 3ft 6 inches by lunchtime today, the biggest rise since last winter.
All of this made for some interesting fishing. The Courtfield has been fished lightly compared with the past four seasons and rod catches reflect this with some good bags of chub and some barbel being caught. Mark and John Evan had the following to say.
“My son booked this beat for us so that I could try and catch my first Barbel, mission accomplished the weight 6lbs, I was over the moon. It didn’t last long as my son caught one that went 8lbs 4oz. Sod’s law that your son catches one bigger than you.
The day was really good because on top of the Barbel, between us we had 24 Chub up to 4lb 12oz. Caught on pellet with feeder and straight lead and also on the waggler fishing pellet. I would say this fishery is well worth a visit considering it was our first and will be looking to come again.”
It was Wyebank however which took the cup for the best report and the catches by Mark Lane and Tim Smith were probably amongst the best from the river.
“Our second visit to Don’s beautifully presented and sensitively managed traditional mixed fishery. We knew that early season barbel can be slow on the river. Very pleased to report 26 barbel to 9lb, 16 chub 2 over 5lb over 3 days. The canoe menace reached its peak on Sunday, whilst most were polite and having a good time some were drunken yobs who did not understand the meaning of private property and it quikly became tiresome asking them to pack up there picnics and depart so we could fish. Fortunately this menace is short lived and by 4pm the river returns to normality. The fishery is absolutely stunning and it is a joy to catch scale perfect fish in such quantity using traditional methods. Thank you Don for a truely memorable few days.”
Rudi’s report from Friday also demonstrates just how well Wyebank has fished this first week. Special note should be taken of Rudi’s observations of salmon. If only the water had stayed down after Saturday we might have benefited from some salmon catches comparable with years gone by but as it stands now all fish are probably ‘flying’ upriver somewhere. Incidentally salmon were seen surfacing like dolphins today, apparently below Hay bridge.
“River up perhaps 1 foot but clear. Fished middle croy 10am to mid-day, 1 9lb plus barbel and 2 around 7/8lb on large halibut pellet.
Fished pool behind submerged bottom croy until 16.00hrs and caught 4 more barbel all over 7lbs and lost large one that went downstream to end of spool line when hook snapped at bend, (a size 8 carp hook by reputable manufacturer) All on large halibut pellet with loose fed small pellets.
An 11lb plus barbel was taken by a W&U angler from this swim on Wednesday.
Salmon seen frequently surfacing between croys, tried heavy flying c with no result.
For those who have fished here recently and been entertained by the loneley duckling, its still alone but alive and growing fast.”
After Anthony Sheehan’s grilse this morning (previous post) on Wyebank I have just this evening lost a fish of about 8 lbs on the fly and had a magnificent shad of about 4lbs which I thought was a grilse to start with. Anthony also had a shad between 3lb plus. Lots of beautifully conditioned shad around this year which need letting off if possible as they throw the hook pretty easily and are a protected species. It is unlawful to fish for them but impossible not to get into them whilst salmon fishing.
The water bulged about 10 – 15yds downstream of me and the next thing I knew a fish was running up past me with a loop in the line and took me down to near the backing before I got organised. When the line tightened the fish went airborne and came off.
All great fun on an old 10ft Hardy Wye.
Don Maacer-Wright
Anthony Sheehan landed a sea liced grilse around 3.5 to 4lbs this morning, Sunday 5th June, and had two 10 yard pulls which failed to hook, fishing a shrimp fly derivative on a small treble and dropper, fished on a super fast sink tip line through the Wyebank run above the crib.
This is great news because it is fantastic that grilse have arrived so early and may herald a return to the days when Wyebank at Lydbrook held significant quantities of these wonderful little salmon. This fish clearly belongs to the fish reported at Cadora as coming in on the tide yesterday morning between 10 and 2pm and shows how well they run.
Wyebank is back at summer level after its rise of a foot the other day and is looking great.
Canoes on Saturdays are a real problem.