Dave Roberts - Epic River Wye Roach Fishing

[Zerkalo]

Always enjoy Dave Roberts videos but this one is pretty good I think. Does not surprise me how close in he catches Roach as that matches my experience on rivers I fish that Roach can be Bank Huggers at times.

 

[Silverfisher]

That was interesting. Agree roach are often quite close in, most those I catch locally are within an easy under arm cast distance. I generally have short, medium and long lines in mind and I’d say on average catch as many short as medium and rarely have to resort to long. I find depth is the most important thing as long as you’ve got at least 4 foot (ideally 5 to 6 foot) there can be big shoals of roach well within a couple rod lengths out.

Never caught a roach from the wye though, either they are localised or I just haven’t been able to get through the dace, bleak and trout!

 

[robert d]

Always enjoy Dave Roberts videos but this one is pretty good I think. Does not surprise me how close in he catches Roach as that matches my experience on rivers I fish that Roach can be Bank Huggers at times.

Excellent fisherman is Dave ,love to watch him from rivers to commercials

 

[NoCarpPlease]

Robbo is a very good angler and also a real gentleman.
Last season he won the Wye Charity match, the riverfest qualifier and the Wye Champs ... quite some feat!
he is also a fishing guide if you fancy a day on the Wye.

Roach on the Wye at Hereford are definitely a winter affair ... they shoal up in the stretch above the town bridge.
there Is a pronounced ledge that is about a rod length wide ... you tend to catch the roach on top of the ledge and the dace at the bottom of it.
a few years ago, when I fished it more regularly ... the roach would often come on very late as the light levels dropped .... and you’d catch on maggot.
these days it seems that feeding caster works better and you catch early in match.
if there is some water on you can have 7-8ft of depth right against the bank.

the only other river that I’ve built a weight of roach that close to the bank is the Severn at Shrewsbury ... where there is some real depth close in on some pegs.

 

[Silverfisher]

Robbo is a very good angler and also a real gentleman.
Last season he won the Wye Charity match, the riverfest qualifier and the Wye Champs ... quite some feat!
he is also a fishing guide if you fancy a day on the Wye.

Roach on the Wye at Hereford are definitely a winter affair ... they shoal up in the stretch above the town bridge.
there Is a pronounced ledge that is about a rod length wide ... you tend to catch the roach on top of the ledge and the dace at the bottom of it.
a

I wonder where they go the rest of the year? I suspect there isn't that many of them compared to other rivers as a lot of the river doesnt look that roachy so guess you just have to get on the roachy looking spots. One place I've fished on the Wye is distinctly unroachy being fast, shallow and barren looking (although I have caught a few roach from similar bits of the Severn although think there's just more of them in that river) but another place on it I've fished is much slower and deeper and does like quite roach friendly.

 

[NoCarpPlease]

Just been reflecting on my own post above .... I think the common factor is flow and depth/cover.
if you have both flow and depth then you can catch roach really close to the near bank.

 

[squimp]

Years ago there were lots of roach at Ross as well as Hereford.

we used to fish the stretch just above the old bridge in winter when it had a bit of water on and catch 40lb bags close in with centrepins. Really great fishing. At that time they tended to be bigger fish than the Hereford stamp.

These days I think the Ross fishery is now more chub, dace and barbel.

 

[Zerkalo]

I haven't had any 'great' hauls of Roach from rivers myself yet. But the ones I have had have felt 'fluked' when the float has travelled a bit closer to the bank than I have wanted and buried only for a decent Roach to be on the end. That's from the Middle Severn and my local weir.

An exception was one near 2lb Roach I had on Barbel tackle mid river, but the other near 2lb Roach I had on Barbel tackle came close in. I imagine a lot will depend on river and conditions for where they are.

 

[Silverfisher]

I haven't had any 'great' hauls of Roach from rivers myself yet. But the ones I have had have felt 'fluked' when the float has travelled a bit closer to the bank than I have wanted and buried only for a decent Roach to be on the end. That's from the Middle Severn and my local weir.

An exception was one near 2lb Roach I had on Barbel tackle mid river, but the other near 2lb Roach I had on Barbel tackle came close in. I imagine a lot will depend on river and conditions for where they are.

Got to try the hemp in the likely spots mate. I think there’s so many dace in parts of the severn that getting through to the roach on other baits is challenge. The dace have certainly well outnumbered roach when I’ve fished the Severn which is pretty much the opposite to slower rivers locally. Did see a fairly recent video of Matt Hayes getting a load of roach on hemp and pellets at Bridgnorth.

Alternatively there seems to be a bit more of an even roach/dace distribution on the Avon up this way so lower down closer to you may well be similar.

 

[Zerkalo]

Got to try the hemp in the likely spots mate. I think there’s so many dace in parts of the severn that getting through to the roach on other baits is challenge. The dace have certainly well outnumbered roach when I’ve fished the Severn which is pretty much the opposite to slower rivers locally. Did see a fairly recent video of Matt Hayes getting a load of roach on hemp and pellets at Bridgnorth.

Alternatively there seems to be a bit more of an even roach/dace distribution on the Avon up this way so lower down closer to you may well be similar.

If you have a link to the Matt Hayes video I'd love to watch, was only in Bridgnorth today and have previously seen people fishing in a few likely spots as well as being told there's a free stretch in the town with platforms there.

Hemp is a bait that I need to build up confidence using, I feed it, but rarely try it on the hook as much as I should. I've noticed a lot of Dace on a few stretches but also have a few pegs in mind for next season. What I usually do is if I fluke a few fish, be it Chub or Roach when Barbel fishing, make a mental note of it as somewhere to be good to try on the float.

 

[Silverfisher]

If you have a link to the Matt Hayes video I'd love to watch, was only in Bridgnorth today and have previously seen people fishing in a few likely spots as well as being told there's a free stretch in the town with platforms there.

Hemp is a bait that I need to build up confidence using, I feed it, but rarely try it on the hook as much as I should. I've noticed a lot of Dace on a few stretches but also have a few pegs in mind for next season. What I usually do is if I fluke a few fish, be it Chub or Roach when Barbel fishing, make a mental note of it as somewhere to be good to try on the float.

Yeah I’ll see if I can find it

It definitely is a confidence bait. If there’s enough roach there any time in summer and autumn provided the rivers not too coloured it almost always works to some degree and usually works well.

 

[dave brittain 1]

The Wye is without a doubt the best river in the UK. There aren't any rivers that I can think of where you have a realistic chance of catching 50lbs pounds of roach, 40lbs plus of dace, 40lbs plus of Perch, 60lbs plus of chub or 60lbs plus of barbel not to mention 20lbs plus pike.

The first year I fished it, I fished eight 60 peg plus matches with an average weight of 44lbs. 69lbs of roach on my first visit for a win including 2 roach well over 2lbs, followed by two more wins, one with 66lbs of roach from an unfancied peg and a 59lbs mixed bag of roach, dace and perch.

If anybody wants a day they will remember, whether on Roach, Dace, Chub, Barbel, Perch or Pike, Dave's your man. His match record is only surpassed by his knowledge of the river and he's one of the few genuine all round match anglers who's every bit as good when it comes to speci hunting.

 

[Zerkalo]

The Wye is without a doubt the best river in the UK. There aren't any rivers that I can think of where you have a realistic chance of catching 50lbs pounds of roach, 40lbs plus of dace, 40lbs plus of Perch, 60lbs plus of chub or 60lbs plus of barbel not to mention 20lbs plus pike.

The first year I fished it I fished 8, 60 peg plus matches with an average weight of 44lbs. 69lbs of roach on my first visit including 2 roach over 2lbs, a two other wins, one with 66lbs of roach from an unfancied peg and a 59lbs mixed bag of roach, dace and perch.

If anybody wants a day they will remember, whether on Roach, Dace, Chub, Barbel, Perch or Pike, Dave's your man. His match record is only surpassed by his knowledge of the river and he's one of the few genuine all round match anglers who's every bit as good when it comes to speci hunting.

I have read about some of your successes there over the last few days, including iirc The Wye Championships.

 

[Silverfisher]

Does seem it's a truly epic river when you get in the right place at the right time.

I've found it a fairly hard river myself but it's always been very low and cold or very low and hot and not on particularly renowned spots so guess I haven't really been in the right place at the right time yet. Been spells of lots of dace, bleak and trout with the odd chub but I've yet to really string together a full session of good fishing on it yet on a handful of attempts.

 

[dave brittain 1]

Silverfisher the fish shoal on the town stretch in Hereford in winter and from November to mid February the sport can be fantastic with good access and platforms on the Asda bank. In Summer and Autumn places like Bartonsham offer superb sport for barbel and Chub in particular.

The best advice I can give you is to visit Woodies tackle and buy your bait there in addition to your day ticket. If you ask Woodie where to go he'll put you right. The river, unlike most rivers fishes best with 2-5ft on in winter so make sure you check the gauges and that the river is either steady or falling when you go, (it takes around 20hrs for the water at Glasbury to hit Hereford so if it's rising in between and Glasbury is high forget it as the river can rise 3ft in a couple of hours).

Note it's an attacking venue and you have to be very positive, however a day with somebody like Dave would stand you in good stead and very likely give you a day to remember for some time.

 

[Silverfisher]

That's kind of the challenge in that it's beyond day trip range for me and in the last couple winters we've either been restricted by this virus or floods so planning a trip ahead of time is a challenge. When I've fished it before I managed to time it a couple days before a lot of stretches were closed due to heat in August and the other times in October in the hope it would be starting to get a bit of colour but it was still very clear so not ideal. That's out in the sticks that mind you, each time I've looked at it at Hereford it's been near empty!

 

[baggy]

The Wye is without a doubt the best river in the UK. There aren't any rivers that I can think of where you have a realistic chance of catching 50lbs pounds of roach, 40lbs plus of dace, 40lbs plus of Perch, 60lbs plus of chub or 60lbs plus of barbel not to mention 20lbs plus pike.

The first year I fished it, I fished eight 60 peg plus matches with an average weight of 44lbs. 69lbs of roach on my first visit for a win including 2 roach well over 2lbs, followed by two more wins, one with 66lbs of roach from an unfancied peg and a 59lbs mixed bag of roach, dace and perch.

If anybody wants a day they will remember, whether on Roach, Dace, Chub, Barbel, Perch or Pike, Dave's your man. His match record is only surpassed by his knowledge of the river and he's one of the few genuine all round match anglers who's every bit as good when it comes to speci hunting.

I’ve got a day with Dave booked at the end of July (hopefully I’ve had the vaccine by then). I haven’t fished a river in 20 years and never had a barbel from a river. I‘m sure it will be a great experience

 

[NoCarpPlease]

That's kind of the challenge in that it's beyond day trip range for me and in the last couple winters we've either been restricted by this virus or floods so planning a trip ahead of time is a challenge. When I've fished it before I managed to time it a couple days before a lot of stretches were closed due to heat in August and the other times in October in the hope it would be starting to get a bit of colour but it was still very clear so not ideal. That's out in the sticks that mind you, each time I've looked at it at Hereford it's been near empty!

Silverfisher,

woody’s in Hereford is about 1hr 25min drive for me on a weekend morning ... so probably best part of two hours for you From Bicester.
Dave B lives in Somerset and travels there for matches ... that’s how good it can be.

but yes ... low and clear is definitely not the best conditions unless you land on a chub flier where they’ve all shoaled up.

I’m sure Dave B won’t mind me mentioning the first time we met .... back in about 2008 on the Wye 3 day festival. It was -7 Celsius overnight with a low clear river. We drew in the same section as each other every day ... and iirc on two of the days we both blanked (bar trout). The other day Dave won the section from next to me opposite the rowing club (just over 20 pounds of bleak and chub on shallow waggler). I persevered with usual Wye tactics of pole to hand and had a lot less..

 

[Silverfisher]

Silverfisher,

woody’s in Hereford is about 1hr 25min drive for me on a weekend morning ... so probably best part of two hours for you From Bicester.
Dave B lives in Somerset and travels there for matches ... that’s how good it can be.

but yes ... low and clear is definitely not the best conditions unless you land on a chub flier where they’ve all shoaled up.

Yeah takes me about 2 hours to get there. Hopefully can get over that way again this year when things calm down again. As much as I love fishing my local Thames and did it as often and as well as ever last year it is nice to get away and fish other rivers as well which is something I only managed once last year.

 

[dave brittain 1]

Silverfisher,

woody’s in Hereford is about 1hr 25min drive for me on a weekend morning ... so probably best part of two hours for you From Bicester.
Dave B lives in Somerset and travels there for matches ... that’s how good it can be.

but yes ... low and clear is definitely not the best conditions unless you land on a chub flier where they’ve all shoaled up.

I’m sure Dave B won’t mind me mentioning the first time we met .... back in about 2008 on the Wye 3 day festival. It was -7 Celsius overnight with a low clear river. We drew in the same section as each other every day ... and iirc on two of the days we both blanked (bar trout). The other day Dave won the section from next to me opposite the rowing club (just over 20 pounds of bleak and chub on shallow waggler). I persevered with usual Wye tactics of pole to hand and had a lot less..

Alex Dave B or Dave Roberts? I was working in Korea in 2008, and Dave just managed to get me in for the 2009 Festival when I came over on holiday and won it, having not fished since July 2008 when I went out there.