River Test @ Wherwell

Our now annual trip to the River Test at Wherwell started as usual at Fleet Services where we indulged in Latte’s and bacon/sausage rolls all round. As well as myself there was Ray Marks, Paul Pavlou, Stephen Lew, Bob & Nick Ring.

We got to Wherwell at 9am and were alarmed to see another dozen cars there, last year we had the place to ourselves. I spoke to the riverkeeper later in the day who admitted that the office had overbooked, I pointed out that we had booked and paid for the day back in March. Having said that, there was still plenty of water for us to fish and I can’t say that it affected us that much.

In fact, I found that beats 3 & 4 proved to be a revelation with plenty of fish and some really good specimens. Catching them though proved to be a bit problematic, at this time in the season these fish have seen it all. I managed some nice browns (none targeted and all promptly released) and grayling to about ¾ lb, larger specimens treating my offerings with contempt.

At about 1pm we met for lunch, as you can see the weather was as good as we could have hoped for. Early afternoon proved quieter but picked up later on, coinciding with a hatch of size 18 olives.

Nick Ring then had some good sport and I will let him tell us;

“I tried first with a ginger tom for the grayling upstream with no success.There were rises under the trees on the opposite bank near the car park. I changed to a size 18 green aphid and cast up stream to let the fly float down under the trees. Bang, a nice size brown with the fly neatly hooked on the upper lip. Two more followed and then it went quiet. A lady just upstream from me had two nice grayling on a marsh brown (probably size 12/14).After lunch at the lodge, we walked downstream observing very few fish with no success.We returned to the spot near the car park and I changed to a grey Klinkhammer size 16 and landed a rainbow and two more browns. Again, trotting down under the trees.A great day with 7 browns and 1 rainbow.

Alas, no grayling.

Please see attached photos of flies which lasted the days fishing!

Roll on next year”

My most successful flies were pearly butt f flies, klinkhammers and CDC olives all in a size 18.

It was a shame that we had to leave at about 6.15pm, as the gates were being locked at 6.30pm. Mind you we had done a lot of walking and exploring so it was probably just as well.

I will be planning another trip next year, please let me know if you are interested.Regan