A three day angling festival on the River Wye in Hereford has been a huge success!
Over 2 tonnes of fish were caught by anglers in the epic River Wye Festival!
This week saw the annual River Wye 3-Day Angling Festival take place in Hereford, with the countries top river anglers travelling from all over to compete.
With all the recent rain and high river levels, it was feared the event might not go ahead.
Luckily the Wye dropped low enough, not only to see the event (which is in its 18th year) go ahead, but also some incredible catches taking place.
Over the 3 days the 72 competitors amassed a total of 4,533lbs of fish. Species caught included roach, perch, barbel, dace and chub.
After 3 days in very muddy, wet conditions it was local Wye expert Hadrian Whittle who came out on top, scoring a perfect 3 section wins to take the title.
Multiple tactics were used, but Hadrian who now has 5 of these festival victories to his name, finished with a dazzling display just above the Old Bridge, to weigh 65lbs of mainly roach.
4 anglers tied on 4 points for 2nd place but it was former Wye Champion Lee Edwards from Caerphilly, who finished runner up on weight count back, just ahead of England international Matt Godfrey from Sheffield.
Event organiser Dave Roberts was delighted with the way the event turned out.
“After what seems like weeks of constant wet weather it was a relief for the river to drop to an acceptable level, so the festival could run.
“However, for the river to then fish so well was a bonus.
“Proving once again why it’s the best coarse fishing river in the country.
“This was the biggest festival we’ve ever run attracting anglers from all over. This brings a nice little boost to local businesses in a traditionally quiet time for Herefordshire tourism.”
