Hi All
After the hustle and bustle of the Welsh Game Fair it was nice to get back to guiding and I was on the Usk and Wye foundation Water at Ty Newydd below Builth Wells with Alan. This stretch is beautiful and produced great fishing even in the low water we have at the present. Best flies were gold head hares ear. Wednesday saw me down at our lake Fishpembrokeshire- 2 acre lake with a group learning how to cast. Its great to see how quick people take to fly casting and some of the group mastered the double haul by the end of the day.
Friday saw me back at the Wye with Mark and we had a great day plenty of fish and wonderful weather. He did take a quick dip early on but was fine after that. On my way home I stopped to catch some of the Commonwealth championships which were being fished just above us on the river. It was a privileged to watch John McCallum from Scotland fish his beat where he had 19 fish in 3 hours. Great angling by a great fisherman.
Saturday I was on Llandeg guiding Bill and his partner Linda - we had a casting lesson first on the grass and all went well. We then ventured out on the boat and boy it was hard. The Celtic league were fishing at the same time and due to the heat not many fish were caught.
Sunday I had the pleasure of teaching Alan from London and we had a great day not many fish but hey its not all about catching.

Welsh Game Fair

Gellu Aur was a great a weekend very sunny and well attended. The Morgan family were all demonstrating with Yasmin and Tanya stealing the show. Both of them cast very well and Tanya my 5 year old tried to cast with a salmon rod for the first time.
The most interesting part for me was on Sunday when I was roped in to help the coracle display as they were short of people to go on the river. Having not been in one for over 15 years it was a bit scary and the one I used had a hole in- He told me that the hole was there to let the water out !!!!
I am sure that people watched to see if I would fall in!!!
A big thank you to everybody who came to watch the demo's even those who were laughing at me in the Coracle.

Ladies International

I had a great week at Llandegfedd reservoir coaching the Welsh Ladies Team. The conditions were horrendous strong wind and sunshine for the whole week of practice. On match day the conditions were far better but unfortunately the fish did not play ball. It was a very close match with England catching 33 fish Scotland 28fish and Wales 27 fish. The top rod went to Cheryl Jones of Wales with 5 fish and she caught the best fish of the match as well. It was a great match and the Welsh girls worked very hard and I was very proud of the effort put in by all.

Great Weekend

Well it’s been a hectic few days, first it was an early start and down to Avon Springs for a day’s teaching.

There were 12 in the group ranging from beginners to some who had been fishing for a few years. We had a great day and the most productive lake was the top one where we caught fish up to 7lb. All of the fish caught were spotted and fished for- really heart stopping moments and everybody were surprised on how quick they had to strike to set the hook. The fish were not taking the fly aggressively but were just cursing around just feeding as they swam around. What we were watching for was the tell tale sign of the white flash when the fish opened and closed their mouth to take the fly. If we did not strike at this point the fly would be rejected very quickly- I am sure that I saw a few fish swim away laughing to themselves as the angler struck far too late. All in all a great day was had by all.

After this it was a 5 hour drive up to Stock’s reservoir to practise for the Anglian water comp. On Thursday it was a heat of the Stocks pairs and as I was not fishing this I just went out for a few hours to relax and catch a few fish on dries.

On Friday the whole Osprey team were out practising and after a hard day there were 2 obvious methods for us to go out and fish the following day. First was dries and secondly was pulling on a wet 2. I know two very different tactics but both seemed to work. On match day we were greeted with a sunny windy day- why cant Metcheck ever get the forecast correct!!!!!!.

It was a tough day for some but congratulations to the winning team “Stocks” and to their top rod Paul Bebb who caught 9 fish on dries. Second individually was our own Star Steve Smallie who caught 8 fish pulling on a DI3 sweep.

A special mention must go to England Youth who qualified in 3rd and it was the first time in a few years for them to go to the English finals” Well done Lads”.

The Ospreys sneaked in in 4th. The average bag was 3 fish with some catching far more than that. You will notice that I have not mentioned how many I caught well as John Marshall announced the statistics he said if you did not catch 3 fish you were below average, well I was well below average with one fish!!!!

A relaxed day for me. Roll on Rutland in July

Frantic few Day's

Friday saw me down at Garnffrwd teaching Wayne and we had a good morning but the fishing was tough very tough!!!! Best method was fishing an egg fly under a bung- NOT us I may add. After a morning's tuition it was back home to Guide Andre and his mate Gaz on the Upper reaches of the Teifi. This was a set up for Gaz as he had no idea that this had been arranged and the look on his face was priceless. I live only a stones throw from the river but have not fished it for years due to it being polluted a few times, but had heard a few rumors that the old girl had started to produce fish again. Well they were correct we had a great evening with great sport on Dry fly. Now you can see its not the biggest fish in the world but to us it was a beauty. Gaz fished the run you can see behind and caught this one but the one that he spooked was far bigger. I will be back down there soon to try and catch the one that got away.
After a late finish it was a 4am start on Saturday to drive to Barnsley for thw Wentworth Castle Game & Country Fair. Saturday was a bit quiet and Sunday it rained most of the day but the people did come out even in the bad weather and there was not a white trainer in sight.
Monday I was on the Dee in North Wales guiding Peter and Phill now both of them are on a 6 week trip fishing around the UK. They had been down to Devon - South Wales and after our day on the Dee were off to Ireland then Scotland. Two nicer people you would not meet and it was a pleasure to share their company on the beautiful Dee. I only wish that the fishing was better but we did land a grayling of over 2lb and some nice trout. The water authority have been releasing water from Celyn and it is dirty and has spoiled the fishing for the last few weeks. Why oh why do they do it and why don't they tell the fishing clubs.
Got to go now and pack- off to Avon Springs in the morning and then Stocks for the Anglian Water comp cant wait

Yorkeshire Game Fair

Yasmin and I had an early start on Sunday morning leaving home at 3.30am to travel to Harewood house for the Game Fair.
The first day was very windy but at least the rain kept away and there were good crowds for all the demo's. We enjoyed a great BBQ thanks to Rob and Michelle from Carrilon on Sunday night and bedded down on site in our tent.
Monday the weather gods were kind to us and the Sun came out to play, there were more people and everybody had a good day.
Thankfully all the traffic on the way home was going in the opposite direction and we were home in a little over 4 hours.
To everybody who came down to watch the demo's Yasmin and I would like to say thank you and we hope to see you next year.

Open Day Fish Pembrokeshire

Saturday saw the whole Morgan clan down for the open day at our new trout fishery in Pembrokeshire.
Unfortunately when we got up in the morning we were faced with heavy rain and strong wind. I can say that everybody who attended and fished enjoyed the Fishery and had some great sport with the best fish landed weighing over 3lb.
Highlight of the day for me was watching my youngest daughter Tanya catching her first trout of around 2lb- the look on her face was brilliant.

To all who attended thank you and I look forward to seeing you on 2 Acre lake soon.

For more info please visit http://www.fishpembrokeshire.com/

Llangollen on Friday
Today was a guiding and casting day at thank god one of them went well. I was teaching Steve from Hartfordshire who was really looking forward to fishing the Dee. We started the day concentrating on casting and boy what a quick learned he picked up every cast I taught very quickly as well as mastering the double haul- well done mate.

Its a pity that I cant say the same about the fishing- for some reason the water authority had been releasing water from Trewerin and it had introduced all this sediment into the river which put off all the fish. Why oh why dont they inform people so that we can re arrange and go fishing elsewhere, it took Ken Bathers who is the chairman of the club 3 days to get an answer from the Environment Agency boy they need to buck up there ideas.

Well at the end we did get some fish and it was an enjoyable day.