Longbridge Fishery

Wiltshire

River Ebble

The River Ebble is the smallest of the four chalk streams that meet the Hampshire Avon around Salisbury, and it is often held to be the purest of them. It rises at Ebbesbourne Wake at the head of the Chalke valley and runs east for around 14 miles through Broad Chalke, Bishopstone and Odstock before joining the Avon at Bodenham, a few miles below the city. It is a genuinely small river, narrow enough to step across in places, with clean gravels, heavy beds of ranunculus and water clear enough that the fish see you long before you see them. Fishing the Ebble is stalking rather than covering water. The river holds , the trout wild and mostly modest in size, the grayling worth the trip in their own right. A short rod, fine tippet and a long look before the first cast count for more here than distance. The valley is quiet farmland and water meadow throughout, crossed by few roads, and the fishing has stayed almost entirely in club and private hands. With 0 beats listed on FishingBeats, the Ebble is one of the hardest chalk streams in Wessex to get onto. Salisbury and District Angling Club holds the water at Longbridge near Broad Chalke and at Homington Meadows between Odstock and Homington, both fished by members on a rod limit, both managed wild with catch and release advised.