The present cold patch has put spring into reverse gear for a while, and fishing hasn’t been easy. Most days a few midge feeders have been rising on the shallows, where the sun has warmed the silt beds just a little, but the rest of them have kept their heads down in the deep water. Combine sulky trout with clear water, bright weather and icy winds, and it can be hard to fish a fly so as to provoke a take. One notable exception, though, was the 41/2 pound brown taken by a visitor with Walker’s Mayfly Nymph which I saw entered in the record book. A bit early for that, you may think, but it worked, and it’s nice to hear about a classic pattern still in action.

My own session this week was on a bitterly cold day and I could do no good at all with the floating line. When I finally changed after some hours to a clear intermediate, the takes began to come from a shoal of rainbows out in the main lake, but I had to keep ringing the changes with flies to keep their interest and catch 4 of them over a long period – Greenwell’s Nymph, Dawson’s Olive and finally Black and Peacock Spider wore out their attraction by turns. The Dawson’s is a strange fly which I don’t fully understand, but with its sinuous combination of dark and light green marabou it is often very good in early spring at Beanhill. Looking back at my records, it has taken more than its share of larger fish, particularly browns.  Just tow one along on the leader so you can see it under the surface and you will understand how attractive and life-like it is. Popular with northern anglers, it was supposedly designed, though, to imitate large leeches found in Packington. Thank God we don’t have leeches like that in our water, but there are boot-lace eels and it might also simulate a newt, of which there are plenty at this time. I can’t imagine what the beard hackle of bright blue guinea fowl adds, unless it’s to brush weed away from the point of the hook, but I experimented with ordinary grey guinea fowl and it seemed to be less effective.

At the time of writing, the Wye has 5 salmon, to the best of my knowledge, with a similar number from the Usk. The best fish was a 28 pounder from Winforton. Holme Lacey had an 18 pounder; most of the middle river beats have at least seen fish. I had a day on Middle Hill Court, a classic beat of the lower river, where Robert Pashley took most of his ten thousand plus salmon during the first half of the last century (there is a photograph of him with a 45 pounder from the Wye in Hugh Falkus’ Salmon Fishing looking suitably competent and determined). I would have been happy with a spring salmon of any size, but had to content myself with the scenery. It is a beautiful if rather lonely beat at this time of year, under the walls of Goodrich Castle and overhung by buzzard-haunted stands of poplar on the far bank. The famous pools are the Vanstone, which is often fished by boat these days, Corner Tree and Maddox. The water was still a foot higher than ideal for the fly, but quite fishable at the upper end of the beat. The Marl Bed run at the bottom by the castle is probably wonderful in low water, but I came to the conclusion after trying it was too dangerous to get into at this height. Middle Hill Court, like the rest, is available from the Wye-Usk Foundation on 01 982 551 520                   

Oliver Burch