Category Archives: The river Wye

Winter fly tying

With only a short number of hours in the day for Fishing the next best thing is tying flies!

I’ve done a fair bit over the a few months and posted quite a lot over Facebook and not here so making up for it. I’ve done a few smaller boxes of dries but mostly nymphs in all colours and sizes.

The nymph below has been the bomb for the grayling so far me and my good mates!

Hook, size 14 Hanak h450bl

Bead, 3.5m gold

Body, squirrel hybrid black pepper

Tag, glo bright 5

Rib, gold medium wire

Thorax, small amount of 17 spectra dubbing

To finish off add more squirrel in front of the 17 and brush over, it Gives a great affect when wet!

Winter bugging for grayling is something else. U love it or you hate it, and I love it! Everybody has there favourite pattern and for love no money you won’t get a look in but me I’m happy to show the world. Presentation and size and a splash of colour for good measure does me well 🙂

More flies to follow in the next posts I’ll be adding tying videos soon also. Hope you like the pattern and if you do tie it I’m sure your not going to be disappointed!

Grayling Fishing on the river Wye!

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Bit of a change for my good mate Ian Gillard over the weekend, we both fished the river Wye up in Builth wales, Gods country!

Popped into the local paper shop picked are day tickets up and off we set. My mate Ian never seen the river up there and how clear the waters are and I think it was a little bit of a eye opener. Condition were perfect, Low wind and clear sky’s, What more could a angler want on the hunt for graying.

Water levels were good after the washout a week before with record breaking river levels! Most rivers in wales broke there banks and were quite dangerous!

I thought it would be good to head down river and walk the beat just to show Ian about first and show where the grayling normally are in the shallow waters, Crystal clear water can be quite deceiving in depth and in these places you never know what could be in there!

Dry fly was a little out in the morning the wind picked up and started to cover the river with leaves but then I had the chance to show Ian grayling pulling leaves under looking for insects. Not often seen on the lower taff.

Most of the day was Fishing French leader with light tippets and small nymphs. I opted to use my Hanak 2wt super light in Fishing so fine. What a great rod for it to!

Throughout the day we managed some beautiful grayling and out of season trout that were released as quickly as possible.

Below a few images of the great day we had and a short video on how clear the water was and how beautiful the grayling are up there in the Wye!

Grayling candy

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Well the grayling are back in the crosshairs and the vice has been red hot getting ready for it!

Hopefully the weather will be kind this year, giving us many chances to fish for the stunning fish!

Been tying all sorts and in all manner of colours,Pinks,purples, Flo orange and Gold. Always great to have a wide selection of colours in the box but also don’t forget the drab flies, the more natural looking colours, brown, tan, black, and greens!

Below there are a few selections of my favourites ready to hit the water. I’ll put up the more natural patterns soon. Warning please wear dark glasses with these images 🙂 All materials are bought from Funkyfly tying, Great company and great products!

Pheasant Tail Emerger Pattern

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It’s great to have the dry-fly setup once again and my go to pattern early season is the pheasant tail emerger. Fishing is still slow but I enjoy just creeping around the river when the hatches start. At the moment the large dark olives are coming on around 11am to about 2pm and then they tend to peter off, but in this time you can have a little fun, they don’t turn their noses up to this pattern and It have accounted for many of my big fish that I’ve managed to catch over the years on my local waters!

I tie this fly in size16/14/12s

Hook. Kamasan B100.
Thread, Black UTC 170.
Body. 4 pheasant tail fibers
Rib. 2lb mono.
Hackle. Blue dun.

I like to tie this pattern on the kamasan due to the quality of the hooks and the strength. It’s Very important to have full confidence in the hooks when you hook into that fish of a lifetime! These have the thumbs up from me! Here is a link for the hooks so please check it out they won’t let you down! ..https://www.cliff-harvey-angling.co.uk/search_prod_list.asp?maingroup=HOOKS&thirdgroup=Kamasan&cha_product_category=8

The Wye

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I managed to get back up the Wye again this weekend with a good mate Sion Lewis. It was his first outing up there and I was hoping that is was going to be a good days fishing for him on the ladies.

We turned up to the river pretty early so just to kill some time, hoping the air temp would warm up and get a few flies in the air I described to Sion my fishing tackle, why what rods and line I use. Sion was most interested in my fly line choice. I was given a fly line by Kieron Jenkins which had a heavier taper towards the front few feet of the line. He described that the heavier tip would allow me to propel my flies, roll or overhead casting. I really like the fly line for klink and dink fishing, I can use a bigger dry fly and heavier nymphs as the taper of the line carries the extra weight easier at short and long range. Normal fishing line tapers are good for casting light dries and small nymphs but the Airflo Ridge Supple Tactical fly line excels in accuracy. Only recently I’ve got back into using the klink and dink, and im sure the line has helped me alot. Im impressed.

Here's the line - Click the pic to take a look

Anyway – back to the fishing. I wanted to fish the waters just below where me and Paul Jenkins fished first last week high up the Wye valley. I was hoping that it would be a little better than the day we had up there. It was Sion’s first trip on the upper Wye and he was well excited to fish new waters. The weather was looking great but there was a down river wind that was picking up by the hour and making it a little difficult but it didn’t bother us too much really, the thing was the wind was blowing all the leaves in the river and this was worse than anything. At some point you had to wait for a small clearing on the water surface to cast the fly. For the tight condition in amongst the cover and trees, the fishing was more at your feet in most places so I was using the klink and dink on my 8ft 4wt fishing rod. Sion was using a similar outfit also on the klink and dink.

It was quite early when we started fishing and it was very slow without any takes or even seeing fish moving or feeding, I knew from the weekend before it would probably pick up by the afternoon. As we worked our way up river keeping a sharp eye on the water we started to see a little fly life, Stone flies mostly and a few odd olives of some sort. This was just enough to kick off a few fish to rise, finally something to target. I covered one rise and with a quick splash I was into a fine wild brown trout. The colours were just beautiful and I would say it was on the 2 lb mark. Soon as I got him to the net and a quick look he was released without me even laying a hand on him. Sion stepped in where I was and after a few short casts beside a deep pocket on the far bank he was into a fine grayling on the nymph. The cheeky smile said it all, it was a new PB him. result! Nice one butty 🙂

A few photos of are great day we had below.

Wye oh Wye oh Wye

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I had the chance to fish the Wye with Paul Jenkins this weekend and I was really looking forward it, Paul picked me up bright and early and off we set.

The weather was not looking good at the start of the trip with it raining and we were both hoping that it would pass over so we could have a great day looking for the ladies on the upper Wye without getting wet and miserable. The wind was down and conditions were looking great as we drove alongside the river checking out the runs and pools up high in the Wye valley. The water was as clear as glass and the level was perfect and after having a good look around we decided to pull in alongside a lovely looking run and a pool above that. After chatting and deciding on taking one rod each and going fish for fish, I set up the french leader on my 10ft 3wt and Paul set up the klink and dink on his 9ft 4wt. As we got to the river’s edge Paul gave me the honors to fish first. For the clear water and level, I decided to use a 2m on the point and a 1,5 on the dropper, the distance between the flies were around 20″ or so. The run looked perfect for where I stepped in. There was a bush that stuck out in the river and it seemed to have a little drop off beside it. I pitched the nymphs below working my way up to the likely looking spot for a grayling on the drop off. I had a fast take but missed and then as I got to the drop off I pitched the nymphs way past it and tracked the indicator as it come down river. The indicator slipped away up river and I was into the first grayling of the day. Result.

After releasing the grayling Paul stepped in with the klink and dink and worked his way up the river and in no time he was into a lovely out of season trout. Lovely colours and in perfect condition and in seconds the fish was returned without any harm done. We both worked our way up some lovely pools and runs without catching even a trout. The water screamed fish but seemed to be void of anything. We moved on trying hard to get in contact with a grayling but with the odd trout falling to the nymph we decided to move back down river a few miles and leave the trout alone. Paul took me to a few places that he has had good success with over the past years with the grayling. It’s always a learning curve fishing with Paul with his vast knowledge of tactics and approach to the river, I truly believe this man could pull a fish out of a puddle if he wanted to 🙂 We made our way down river stepping in and fishing a few runs on the way that looked good and managing a few grayling to hand. It seemed that I was destined to catch the smaller grayling of the day but I was happy to catch anything so it didn’t bother me one bit. I already had a fair grayling at the start of the day and I was happy with that and anything after it was a bonus.

Below Paul is into a fine grayling using the klink and dink method, the grayling was taken on the nymph at the back-end of the pool. The grayling to hand is in the photo below this one.

The day was going really well with a good number of grayling to hand and the odd trout. As the day went on the fishing just got better and better, Grayling started to rise and in no time we were into the fish using a small stone fly pattern. Bushy being Bushy showed the way forward casting in the tight vegetation and flicking the fly under the over hanging limes that were touching the water surface and picking off the most difficult fish feeding. After taking a few more grayling the day was getting late and the fishing started to slow as usual. The temp started to drop so we decided to make a move on up river back to the car but before we left we gave one last run a few more casts and i’m glad we did. After a short time, I was hooked into another grayling on the nymph and then another on the dry. Paul stepped in behind me and in seconds was into another fine size grayling. It seemed that it was a good choice to fish the run before we set off home. A few more grayling fell to our flies and the decision was made to make a move home. It was a great days fishing on the Wye with paul and not a dull moment to say the least. Fishing was great, the company even more and if all goes to plan, I will be fishing the same area this weekend with another good mate. I really can’t wait!!

Ill leave you with a load of photos of are great days fishing.