Worth a Read

Wayne Thomas has run this site since 2016, collecting news, results and articles from anglers across North Devon and Exmoor. It covers sea, coarse and match fishing as well as game, so the fly fishing sits next to club results and competition reports.

The game fishing pages are worth following through the season: write-ups from the rivers and from South West Lakes Trust waters such as Roadford, often by the anglers who fished the day.

Reuben Manicom talks to Hampshire river keeper Nick Parker about fishing chalk stream trout: reading the hatch, casting upstream to rising fish, and the tackle he trusts. He also talks about the River Test and what is changing on it.

Theo Pike is a fly-fishing writer, editor and river restorationist.

Between 2001 and 2021 he helped to lead the revival of south London’s River Wandle as a thriving chalk stream fishery. He now works for the Wild Trout Trust as their communications and Trout in the Town officer for the south of England.

Theo’s books include ‘Trout in Dirty Places’, ‘The Pocket Guide to Balsam Bashing’ and ‘River Trout Streamer Fishing’. He also contributed a chapter to Salisbury & District Angling Club’s ‘Chalk Stream Fishing: A 21st Century Anthology’, and is editor of the Flyfisher’s Club Journal.

A 20km circular walk from Stockbridge, out to Danebury Hill Fort and back past Longstock Water Gardens and the Leckford Estate, finishing back by the River Test in the middle of town. Allow about five hours.

The Sussex Flydressers’ Guild meets on the first and third Thursday evenings of each month, September to April, at Hurstpierpoint Village Hall, with tying evenings, demonstrations and guest speakers.

It runs fishing trips too, and its site has a guide for novices and tips on tying and tackle. Beginners and experienced tyers are both welcome.

The Hertfordshire branch of the Fly Dressers’ Guild meets on the second and third Monday of each month from September to June at Woolmer Green Village Hall, near Knebworth, with a guest tyer at the vice most evenings.

They also run tying classes, and the season ends with a casting clinic in May. A good place to start if you want to tie your own flies.

The Hungerford Historical Association’s page on the town’s fishery: five miles of the Kennet and the Dun, and the commoners’ old right to fish it free on Mondays, Thursdays and Saturdays.

The pictures are the best part: an 1851 advert letting the fishery, a 16lb fish caught at Hungerford in 1911, a 5lb 6oz River Dun trout from 1953, and Devlin’s 1977 map of the water.

Angling Stays lists holiday lets picked for anglers, and its Hampshire Avon page covers the whole river, from the wild trout and grayling of the upper valley to the barbel and chub water around the Royalty at Christchurch.

Useful if you want somewhere to stay near the fishing. Some of the lets, such as Riverside Lodge and Mews Hill, come with fishing of their own.