Dear Fellow WMF Fishers.
At long last a newsletter from me and at long last we seem to have a sustained period of cold dry weather with the added bonus of wonderful winter sunshine. (As I write the forecast is suddenly about to change to high winds and yet more rain!!!)
Ever since our fly fishing season ended on the 31st of October the river has been in constant flood putting an stop to any hopes some of us may have had for a bit of winter Trotting or Pike fishing. However it now seems, with the welcome change in the weather pattern, we now have a river that is approaching a fishable level (lets hope it stays that way).
Coarse fishing is allowed on all of the beats until the close of the season on the 15th of March. So far there seems to be four or five us that like to do a bit of Trotting during the winter months, its a very enjoyable, traditional way to fish, using a float rod, a centre pin or fixed spool reel. With usually maggots or worms for bait. Last season we were catching some nice Chub, with one or two going over the 3lb mark!
If anyone is interested in especially the traditional technique of Trotting please let either Andy, or myself know, or just mention it on the WMF WhatsApp group and we can organise a few of us to meet up at Field Bridge and give it a go.
Grayling.
This winter it would be nice to come across one or two Grayling whilst Trotting which would be very gratifying and would show us that our 5 year Grayling stocking policy is at last bearing fruit. I know that one or two of our members this last season have caught Grayling on the fly, which is great news. ‘Our Grayling’ have also been caught on the beat upstream of us which is controlled by the Guash Fishing Club!! Shocking I know but it seems ‘Our Grayling’ know no boundaries!!
We are hoping that Hugh Bunker from the E A will be up for us continuing the Grayling fingerling stocking this year, fingers crossed.
AGM & Catch Returns and Subs.
Andy Howarth our ‘on it like a car bonnet’ club secretary will be sending you Catch return forms and request for annual Subs details very soon and also the date for our AGM, this should be sometime in late February or early March, the date will be decided at our committee meeting which we are having on the 1st of February.
Subs I’m sure will be staying the same at £90, this will be confirmed at the committee meeting.
Any member who would like add anything to the agenda please let Andy know: andymhowarth@btinternet.com
Working Parties.
We had some successful working parties last year, the first of which concentrated on clearing over hanging branches and trimming the access points to the river. This was followed by three working parties which were mainly focused on reed cutting using the new Makita cordless Hedge Trimmer that Gary researched and purchased for the club. Its a beast with a very long cutting blade and works amazingly well as a reed cutter. The 100yd stretch upstream of Field Bridge, which was choked up with reeds, was made into a very fishable bit of water in a couple of hours. Its not rocket science, with one person cutting and two or three members clearing the cut reeds onto the bank as they float downstream. Its very satisfying work with almost instant results, dare I say its almost as good as fishing!!!
Interestingly Ian went out a day after clearing this section and had a very good session, fishing and catching where it would have been impossible to fish two days before.
Working parties are very important for us as a fishing club, they give us lots of positives:
They allow us to meet and work together, always with good humour and banter, allowing us to get together with both new and old members.
If you’re a new member it is also probably the best way to get to know the easy access points and the really good productive fishing sections of our river.
Working parties keep the river fishable, by improving access points to the river, keeping aquatic weed under control, and making casting more possible by branch lopping and removal where overhanging trees are a problem. There is of course ‘Anna’s Famous Flapjack to be had!!!
Grant from the Angling Trust
Andy and I are currently working on putting an application into the Angling Trust for a grant, possibly of up to £5000 pounds. This application will be finalised at our up & coming committee meeting on the 1st February.
If we are successful, any money awarded to us would be put towards our on going Habitat improvement work.
(It was firmly rejected that it could possibly be used to pay for the committee to go on a Marbled Trout fishing trip to Slovenia, purely for the purposes of research of course!!!!!!)
Seriously though, hopefully there is a good chance of us getting some monies from this grant, our application is supported by match funding with the number working party man hours we put in last year, which Andy made a careful note of. These man hours form part of the application criteria and should be helpful in a successful outcome, fingers firmly crossed.
Web Site
Our Web Site : wellandmayfly.net is now live but our member Gordon Brown who is kindly constructing it for the club says there are pages that are still being ‘Tweaked’.
To get onto the members only part of the web site you need to know: Login is : Irene and the Password is : grayling
The Beat Map page has all of Ian’s, ( AKA ‘The Prof”), hand drawn maps on it and is a perfect guide to our stretch of the River. Its not every club that can boast that their maps were drawn by someone who went to the RCA.
Also there are some very tempting photos on ‘The Gallery page.
If any Members have photos of fish or other images that would be good to share, with any useful comments, please email them to Gordon Brown at, grsb@browng.co.uk
WhatsApp Group
The WMF WhatsApp group is a very useful communications tool between members. Its great for organising working parties and also good for getting us together to fish. Also for sharing pictures of fishing and what fly is working.
If you’re not on it and would like to be, please email Ian on, newsham737@gmail.com and he will invite you on.
Fishing
My time fishing the river this last season was very light mainly due to me having a very good time celebrating in various ways a rather big and memorable Birthday Year.
I actually did more working parties than I did fishing. This year I’ll have time to do quite a bit more of the latter.
The 2023 Mayfly hatch was again very good with great clouds of them dancing on some sultry evenings in May and early June.
It seemed to me that the best fly fishing was probably early on, from April to the end of June. The weather was very testing in July with unusual cool temperatures and lots of big windy wet days which I think would have stopped most of us. After that for those of us that went out, it was the usual late summer ‘Jungle Warfare’. September was also good for those who could get in with chest waders and staff and brave the more clearer fishable spots, Daddy Longlegs being the go to fly.
I look forward to seeing you all, date to be announced, at the AGM, (always a good night) at the Kings Arms Wing.
All the Best
Dick Clarke.