A new idea for the Web Site. With the input from you the members, every week or so a new member question and answer will be added to the site. The idea is to generate interest in site and for you to find out a bit more about others who fish our river. If you would be happy in taking part please send me an Email from the home page and i'll send you the questions. This will only work if you help! Howard your Chairman has "volunteered" to go first. Add your comments to the forum about this idea. Click on the links below to read the interviews.

1. Howard "Club Chairman"

1. Have a look at the Video links below, Some are very interesting.

2. New fishing Maps with locations are now on Club Info as requested.

3. Don't forget your Rod Licence runs out on the 31st March 08. Go to the links tab below to renew.

4 Local by-laws say we are not allowed to fish 22.9mts downstream or 27.4mts upstream of any weir on our river. This includes Rossett weir and Gresford weir. You have all been warned. The EA WILL prosecute!

Photos to go with the article are in Photo Albums.

River Fly Life Monitoring

All Fly fishers should be aware of what fish are potential eating, a basic statement, but do we?
As a club Rossett & Gresford Fly fishers joined a national scheme in June 2007 to monitor fly life in our river, take accurate reading, and spot improvements & more importantly any fall in the numbers of invertebrates. By monitoring bi monthly a picture of fly life & food source for the fish is built up. Patterns can be developed to suit the main items of food for trout / grayling. It also reminds the fly fisher that these food items do not always come in a standard size 10 !!!
Over a number of years I have run the “River Walk” on the Alyn & have always been amazed by people reaction to the insects shown on the day, with comments like “how do fish see those things” or “isn’t there a lot of shrimp, do trout eat them?” Very simple entomology is a great starting tool to better fly-fishing!!
To give an idea what is involved, please read on.
Classroom work
The classroom work was held at BASC Headquarters Marford Mill in Rossett. Some members needed a caffeine fix to get started!! An agenda for the day was laid out with work split between classroom & the river. 1st part was the talk & a view of the basic equipment. Samples were brought in from another river, just to give an idea how to separate, identify & record the species found. Syndicate exercises helped people to get used to the work
Once insects were separated, then detailed checks could be made! From a fly tying point of view, using a microscope shows up a lot of detail – that may or may not help. With a microscope it seems better, if only they would stop moving! Help “again” was always at hand. There was some confusion with young & adult invertebrates. On small size examples it may difficult to differentiate between baetidae & stoneflies, without the aid of a magnifying glass or microscope.
River work
Please note that a risk assessment was carried out & everyone who entered the river was asked to use a lifejacket!!  6x teams of two collected samples for training purposes. These were washed and bulk sorting in the river with the results passed over for identification. To help with identification & counting a sorting tray was used and a pipette!! – Very handy when identifying & counting smaller numbers of a particular species
All the relevant information was collated, & recorded A surprising fact was that of the 6 team’s samples the smallest number of shrimp collected was 500 to a maximum of 2,500!!! This was a shock to most involved & made them re think their fly patterns for the colder parts of the season or when there was no evidence of a rise (all teams were within 10m of each other).
Following on from the course
From the course our river was split into areas & teams allocated to sample on a regular basis, under a central club coordinator. This was so results could be fed back to the EA & put onto their database.
November dip
My team’s area, just below Gresford weir. This is above the sewage farm outfall, so will give a good indication of the state of the river. Historically the sewage farm has been our main source of pollution.
A 3-minute kick sample was taken across the width of the river, so a broad sample of insect life could be checked. See the results picture.
January dip
By January 2008 we were getting better with collecting & identifying – sample
Flat bodied up wings, in a range of sizes.
Cased caddis – non found before
Stonefly by it’s self
Caseless caddis
Shrimp (Gammarus) – no where near as many compared with November (1/6 of Novembers results)
As can be shown from the pictures, there are considerable differences between the November & January survey. There was a distinct lack of BWO (Ephemerellidae) & a reduction of Olives (Baetidae) (1/5) in January. It will be interesting to see what March shows in the survey. Based on my catch returns for 2007 I expect a marked increase in shrimp, Olives & BWO!!
Food sources while not in short supply, are markedly less than spring & summer, so fish will be more aware when feeding, what is available. Unlike the summer months when there is a multitude of food types. Therefore it will pay to match what is around in the early part of the season. Shrimp & Nymph patterns should pay off in March.
Eddie

Looking back at the notes I made this time last year I am struck by the similarity between them and the note I am about to send to members. Not only have we had high water most of the winter, but during our last fishing season we had floods that were comparable in their intensity to those we had during the winter. Water was over the banks in places and the Sunday bank work gang had no time to repair damage from the previous winter. It’s proving very hard to keep ahead of the work we need to do to keep the river in some sort of shape. The one conclusion I have drawn is that we are going to have to acquire sources of stone fill in order to construct groynes which will be less subject to flood damage than the timber groynes we install at present.

On a more positive note we did manage to get some reasonable fishing last season and were surprised by the numbers of grayling that were caught. We have caught occasional grayling in past seasons but last year they appeared throughout the length of our water. We believe they have been washed down rather than travelling over Rossett weir. It will be interesting to see what happens this year.

In October last, the EA instigated a scheme to provide large rocks and fish shelters from the sewage works down to the Llay Road Bridge and these obstacles were placed under a contract let by the EA. It is hoped that both the rocks and the shelters will provide extra cover for fry, smaller fish and migratory fish. There were a number of salmon and sea trout seen to negotiate Rossett weir during December last. I would remind members however, to take extra care when wading, as holes may have been scoured out in places where there were none the previous seasons. Likewise members should also keep their eyes open for these obstructions so as not to trip and take a cold bath!

We were unable to transplant any weed last year but the committee have decided this year to carry out weed planting and hope that the rocks may provide a more stable river bed which may allow the weed to get a firm hold. I am also reliably informed that the rocks may loosen the gravel and increase the chances of an improvement in the habitat for flies and other invertebrates.
As reported last year the Club have instigated a scheme to monitor the fly life of our river. This involves taking regular ‘kick’ samples and counting the insects captured. The high water of the winter has prevented sampling since November but it will resume in early March. The results to date have been interesting but further sampling is essential before any firm conclusions can be drawn. Any members who would like to volunteer with this work would be made most welcome. Besides just recording what insects exist in our river, I have asked the experts in the EA to suggest methods which may improve the population of upwing flies and sedge. This monitoring scheme is being run nationally and is meant to be able to identify problems of pollution and chronic habitat deterioration before it affects the overall health of the river and has been proved to be very successful in those areas it has already been used.

Considerable effort has been made by the Club’s coaches to encourage junior members to take up angling and we have had some success. Only time will tell if the initial rush to join will provide a sustained number of potential younger members but the signs are very encouraging.

Simon Hayes has expressed his disappointment with the use being made of the web site which was regarded by outside viewers as a first class site. He is currently working on a new format which I hope will encourage people to use it more this season.

For those of you who follow the saga of the Wormswood section of our river, I have to report that Wrexham, the owners, are proving very slow in their response to clarify what will happen with the water. You will recall, we acquired the water when we amalgamated with the Griffin Club and they had fished the water for many years. We understood that Wrexham had been approached by a group of anglers from the Bradley Club who wanted to rent the stretch. We objected strongly and showed that we had held the water since the 1960s. Wrexham had no records whilst we had letters and notes which proved we were the tenants. Members are free to fish here next season and indeed should be encouraged to do so provided they notify the web site so that we can demonstrate our interest in the water. I hope members will fish this length as much as possible even though we are not able to spend much time on its upkeep. I look forward to comments on this water throughout next season.

In March a tree surgeon is being employed by the EA to carry out work downstream of the ‘straight cut’ in order to pollard some of the outsize crack willows. This work is being done prior to the EA erecting a fence to prevent the ingress of cattle. This is part of a scheme to encourage a margin to develop of plants between the river and the farm land.

You will notice a number of new styles have been erected over the winter which is the handiwork of Billy Hough. They are master pieces of flat pack engineering and although he has not quite finished, the overall improvement in access is considerable.