Hanak rods | TaffDiaries

Over the weekend Me and and my good butty Sam Weston traveled up to the river Severn for a day of grayling Fishing.

The river Severn is a wonderful river and very beautiful with wide open valley with a meandering river running through it, You never know what’s around the next bend and every pools clear and fine gravel under foot! It’s such a beautiful place.

Was quite fresh starting off and quite cold with frost on the ground so first we started off with nymphs in the slower deep pools.

My setup, Hanak 10ft 3wt superlight using a french leader with a 2 nymph setup with a yellow indicator around 12″ long. From there 4ft of tippet with a dropper around 20″ up from the point. Simple setup to start with. For Nymphs, I went for a little colour due to being so cold and no sight of any movement or fly life, It’s a start! Later on I went for more natural colours and still nothing really. Just one of those days!

I found it quite difficult to pin down the grayling using all sorts of nymphs, after a spell of catching trout, I dredged the bottom and fished just under the surface to no avail, They just didn’t seam to be anywhere or feeding, It happens on times. Your always learning and thinking in these situations. Me and Sam did manage to pin a few down later on in the day but was very quiet. Trout were very active so we moved around a lot trying to avoid them!

For the last hour a small hatch of olives kicked off and there was a little window of dry fly action, smaller grayling but action none the less!

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!