A day at Chilbolton on the Test costs £175 for trout. For grayling, on the same water, it costs £55. Nothing about the river changes between the two. The trout season has simply closed, the grayling season has opened, and the price follows the calendar rather than the scenery.
Today, 16 October, is the biggest single day in that calendar on FishingBeats. Eighteen beats start selling a dedicated grayling ticket today, after thirteen that opened on 1 October and a handful more in between. Across the site there are 35 beats on nine rivers with a grayling ticket that has its own published dates and price, and they run from £35 to £125 a rod per day. The median is £74.
Why spend a winter on grayling
Thymallus thymallus is a salmonid, but you will not mistake it for a trout. The dorsal fin is tall and sail-like, and the old name for the fish, the lady of the stream, suits it. On these rivers the fish are wild, not stocked.
Grayling shoal, and they hold in the same runs and glides through the colder months. Find one and there are usually more nearby, which makes a day on the water less of a lottery than it sounds. Most are caught on small weighted nymphs, often fished under an indicator. On a mild day with a hatch on, they will also take a dry. A cold, clear winter day can be very good.
The Grayling Society, formed in 1977 for the conservation and angling of the species, is worth a look if the fish gets under your skin. We are members. Their site is a good place to start.
What a grayling day costs
Take the 35 beats with a grayling ticket and compare each one with its own cheapest trout day. The median trout day on those beats is £100. The median grayling day is £74, which is 42% cheaper than trout on the same water. Some of the gaps are large.
Chilbolton is £55 for grayling, from 15 October to 31 December, against £175 for trout.
Chilbolton Fishing Beat
A 280-metre stretch of the main River Test adjacent to Chilbolton Common in Hampshire, this single-bank beat offers one or two rods a private day on one of England's most significant chalk streams. The beat has two mid-stream islands, which break the flow into varied current seams, slacker inside bends, and defined lies that reward careful reading before the first cast. During the winter of 2021, the Wessex Rivers Trust carried out extensive bank improvements resulting in better access and a more sinuous river profile. The beat is reached via an 800-metre walk across the flat, open common and is fished from the left bank only; no wading is permitted. The fishing is for Brown Trout, Grayling on upstream dry fly and nymph only. April brings Large Dark Olive, Grannom Caddis, and Hawthorn to the surface, while mayfly can be expected from mid-May to June, the most productive fortnight of the chalk stream calendar. The latter half of the season is largely dominated by hatches of various caddis flies, with olives and terrestrials filling the gaps through summer. The beat is rated beginner-friendly, open banks and readable water make it a sound introduction to chalk stream technique. All grayling must be returned, as must all trout under 12 inches. The season runs 31 March to 30 October. Day tickets are priced at £175 for a single rod and £330 for two rods during the main trout season; grayling-only days are available at £55. On site there is a rustic fishing hut with tables and chairs, a BBQ, and a selection of wellies and hire tackle, along with a fishing jetty, an outside fishing table, and a composting toilet, everything needed for a full day without leaving the water.
Lower Mill, Longparish, also on the Test, is £70 from 8 October to 15 December. Its cheapest trout day is £240. Abbots Worthy on the Itchen is £55 from 1 October to 13 December, against £120 for trout.
It is not always so dramatic. Ilsington on the Frome asks £100 for grayling and £125 for its cheapest trout day. At the top end, Whitchurch Fulling Mill on the Test is £125 for grayling, and the four Bullington Manor beats on the Dever are the same. The Dever beats cost £225 for trout, so the winter ticket is cheaper, but nobody would call it cheap.
Further down the scale there is plenty. Donnington Grove on the Lambourn is £63 from 1 October to 28 February. The Bull Hotel water at Fairford on the Coln has a winter grayling ticket at £50, from 1 November to 31 March.
There is no single grayling season
Every fishery sets its own dates, and the range is wide. Of the 35 beats, openings run from 1 October to 1 November. Closing dates run from 15 November to 31 March.
Several Test and Itchen beats finish early. The Parsonage closes on 15 November, Kanara on 30 November, and Abbots Worthy, Ginger Beer and Lower Mill in the middle of December. Six beats run to 31 December.
The longer seasons are mostly elsewhere. The most common closing date is 14 March, and all eight of the beats that use it are on the East Burton Estate on the Frome. There, Beat Eight and its seven neighbours are £35 a day, from 16 October to 14 March.
Beat Eight (North Stream)
Beat Eight, known as North Stream, is a narrow carrier forming one of the estate boundaries, on the River Frome in Dorset. It runs 1 mile, fished from the right-hand bank, with parking shared with Beats Three and Four. This is very much an early-season beat: the stream weeds up as summer goes on, so the best of it comes before the weed takes hold. What it offers is close, careful stalking of wild brown trout and grayling in skinny water, and it's a favourite with anglers who enjoy spotting a fish before they cast to it. In winter, salmon and sea trout use the beat to spawn. The estate maintains a good head of wild brown trout, with light supplementary stocking on the main river, and grayling are plentiful. Fly only is the rule, with careful, accurate presentation counting for more here than on the wider main river. Day tickets start from £40 during the main season. Grayling days are available from £35. Accommodation can be arranged through the estate, and a riverside hamper, lovingly prepared by the estate and full of home-made breads and pastries, can be ordered and delivered to the beat at a time of your choosing.
The same £35 buys a day at Cotton’s Fishing Temple on the Dove in Derbyshire, from 8 October to 28 February. The beat takes its name from the fishing house Charles Cotton built there in 1674, and the cheapest trout day on it is £65.
Cotton's Fishing Temple
Cotton's Fishing Temple sits in Beresford Dale, near Hartington, on the River Dove in Derbyshire, and takes its name from the fishing house Charles Cotton built here in 1674. The doorway still carries the entwined initials of Cotton and Izaak Walton, with the inscription Piscatoribus Sacrum, and the building stands on the beat to this day. Cotton wrote the fly-fishing half of The Compleat Angler, and there are few places on any English river where that history sits so close to the water. The beat itself runs 2 miles of double bank, entirely wild: Brown Trout, Grayling, with no stocking on this stretch. Years of habitat work have narrowed the river to an average of 12 to 20 feet, pinching down to as little as 6 feet in places where the bankside growth closes in over summer, so this suits shorter rods and lighter lines: 6ft to 8ft 6in, 2-5wt, stepping up a little in spring and winter. Fish rise freely to good hatches of mayfly, blue-winged olives and a variety of sedges. The beat suits one or two rods well, or a party of three at most, with a maximum of three rods and no dogs. The keeper is usually on hand to meet rods on the beat and show them round, and the fishery has been steadily improved over the past three years. Wading is possible where preferred, though the beat fishes perfectly well from the bank. The season runs 1 April to 28 February, covering both the trout season and a distinct grayling season from 8 October. Day tickets start from £65 during the main season. Grayling days are available from £35.
The mid-March finish is not arbitrary. You cannot fish for coarse fish on any river in England and Wales from 15 March to 15 June, and grayling count as coarse fish for that rule even though they are a salmonid. That is why river grayling fishing stops in the spring and why so many winter tickets end on 14 March. You need a rod licence from the age of 13.
Planning a winter of it
Many beats hold grayling without selling a dedicated ticket. Some sell one all-season ticket and others publish no winter rate at all. In total, 204 beats on 34 rivers hold grayling, which is a much longer list than the 35 above, and worth reading before you decide where to go.
The grayling species page covers the fish and the rivers they live in. The grayling beat list shows every beat that holds them, and the map can be filtered to grayling if you would rather start from where you live. The day-ticket price analysis sets one river against another. Each beat page carries its own prices and dates, and those are the ones to trust. Not every beat is open today, so check the dates before you book.
