The Nadder

So, why have I ended up fishing the Nadder instead of all the other beautiful rivers in this part of the world?

Well in truth I do fish the others, I even travel to more far flung places to fish but I find myself drawn to my little slice of Wiltshire heaven, 70m from my door, more and more. There is something magical about the oft-forgotten Nadder valley.

It may not get the main-stream applause that it’s lofty cousins the Itchen and Test get, nor the fuss heaped on it’s mum, the Avon or sister, the Wylye. To my mind however it’s the most alluring of all of them; The fishing can be hard, the fish are slow growing, wily and easily spooked…

The Nadder is not a true chalkstream. It has it’s source up in the hills beyond Tisbury and rises in greensand not chalk. It’s banks are steep, tree lined and often up to 6′ above normal water levels and spates are common after heavy rain. More akin to freestone rivers than a chalkstream. The river changes nature as it moves into the chalk beds near Burcombe, it starts to pick up more alkaline water from a number of springs and begins to look more like a classic chalk stream. The Nadder will still colour very quickly after rain and will remain coloured for days after a heavy downpour. In my experience however fish will come back onto the feed more quickly here than on other local rivers.

Having passed Wilton, particularly once the Wylye has joined the Nadder it becomes very wide for a chalk stream and as it flows behind the industrial units of Churchfields in Salisbury it feels like a very different river than the small murky sandy-banked stream encountered upstream of Tisbury.

The Nadder officially ends where it joins the river Avon in Salisbury and our water then rushes off through the justifiably famous coarse fishing stretches around Fordingbridge and Ringwood before emptying into the English Channel at Christchurch.

The river to my mind has the widest range of environments out of all the local rivers; from ranunculus heavy wide gravel bedded stretches open to the sun, right through to dark, tree covered deep (and I mean really deep) pools.

Anecdotal evidence suggests good Salmon and Sea Trout runs up the Nadder to spawn and salmon are often returned by anglers plugging for Pike on the coarse fishing stretches of the river near Salisbury.

If I’m asked about why the Nadder captures my attention I wonder to myself, is it because its different to other local rivers? Is it because of its enormously varied fishing? Is it because it isn’t as famous and thus overfished as some of its more well known neighbors? Perhaps its all of these things? To be honest its all of these things and none of these things, its something I can’t quite put my finger on.
Fish it for a while yourself and you’ll know…