I am interested to understand what, if any, lasting impact these high river levels will have, or have already had, on our rivers.

My local (Derbyshire, spate) river has been high and brown for the past seven weeks or so (I haven't fished it since the beginning of June): my uneducated fear is that this year's Brown Trout fry might not be able to cope with the force of the water and may have been washed miles downstream. Will the Grayling fry have been affected, or are they still at the ovum stage?

What about fly- and other aquatic-life lower down the food chain?

Thanks if you have any knowledge which you are willing to share. Andrew

The main impact will be gravel movement, a couple of stretches of the Dee I fish were completely different after the winter floods. Pools had been filled in/excavated somewhere else, gravel bars had appeared where there had been none before, one pool that I couldn't wade is now knee deep (it may have changed again after this flood). The gravel will have had a good flush out and be almost free of algae, this will help the trout and grayling eggs after spawning.

As for the fish they will be out of the main flow, in front of/behind rocks, in depressions in the bed, in the margins or on the bed of the river etc. As for the insect life it may put the main hatches back, it may not.

The higher flows will certainly dilute some of the agricultural poisons that have been stuffing our rivers throughout Wales and the rest of GB, last season's low water was very worrying from that perspective. The reduced angling effort and predominately cool water will all benefit the fish this season so I'd say the unusual amount of rain we've experienced has been a Good Thing.

Even when the river's in flood there's still a lot of calm water in the margins which the fry benefit from even if some do become stranded when it drops. A lot of the small aquatic creatures, particularly shrimps head for the edges of the flood water to get some rich pickings when high water covers bank side vegetation.The edges of the Taff in particular can be literally crawling with invertebrates as the water drops back from flood.

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