No more news of fish I'm afraid and still no confirmation of those reported Wyesham fish.
However hope springs eternal for those on the lower river at least..


                                                   HIT FOR SIX.

Never met anyone really famous during my years on the Wye.  Some important business people I was told and I did once meet Max Boyce on the downstream boundary
However the most famous visitor  was I suppose Ian Botham .  Not sure how it came about but he visited us one afternoon accompanied by his England team mate Alan Lamb     .   While chatting and looking at the river we noticed some fish showing in a slack deep area we called The Hole.  It always seemed to hold fish which never took for some reason. Theory was they were out of sorts , possible returned or pre hooked fish -who knows..  However Alan Lamb was determined to have a go and waded across and despite advice he was wasting his time he spent most of the afternoon there with fish showing in front of him but with the predicted result.

I went off downstream with Ian and tried all the usual spots and eventually he connected with a fish in a pool called the Whitmore Rock, not usually a  over productive spot.  He was a competent caster and fisherman and eventually I netted the fish, which took a size 8 Wye Thunder double.
I was a fish of around 12/14 pounds as I recall and starting to colour up and we returned it.
Good friendly guy to talk too , good company and we all had a pretty enjoyable afternoon all round.   That was the only time he did fish with me which was a pity.

With reference to The Hole, that unproductive spot I did try it myself one afternoon with a mepps and connected with a fish.   Good many people were at the lodge at the time and they all came out to see the salmon landed .  Well the fish put up a really good account of itself and couldn't explain why I  seemed unable to control it effectively  .  Eventually it became clear as when netted by one of the guests it turned out to be a 9lb barbel foul hooked in the dorsal fin, which explained a lot.  This was the first off the beat and I set it up and its still in the lodge I understand.  Bit of an anticlimax but there were not many about on the upper river then and still don't seem to be that many about even now