On Wednesday, having completed a mornings work on an Estate with 2.5 miles of fishing on the river, just above Builth it was time to put the rod up and mix business with pleasure!

I started at 1.30 and just as I did large dark olives started to hatch and a previously flat surface was soon being ringed by trout and grayling. The river in these parts is still big and, if the fish are toward the centre there are few landmarks to fix the exact position of the rise by. This was important because the fish, although well switched on to the surface food were not going to travel far off their chosen food lane to intercept so it took several casts to get the fly right over the fish so it would take.

In the two hours that the hatch was on I took 12 trout to 14" and 10 grayling to the same mark plus a very surprised chub of about 2lb. All on a #14 cdc olive emerger pattern that has caught good fish for me very consistently throughout this autumn.

LDO's will emerge even on the coldest days throughout the winter and fish on the Wye will rise to them from their first appearance.

A word of caution though, I spoke to some fishermen who had fished higher up on the river and had hardly seen a rise all day and the fish had been hard to find and catch.