With some reasonable weather and a rare bit of spare time on our hands dad and myself headed out at silly o’clock this morning in pursuit of a new species for both of us. Living in essex has many advantages but it is a bit lacking in chalk streams. That somewhat limits what the local rivers can habitat.  Todays trip was to the famous river test at the timsbury fishery in hampshire.   We arrived as dawn broke on a grey January morning. We got parked up and tackle up before heading down to the river. We were greeted by a lovely stretch of the test along with a couple of carriers further up stream. With no idea where to start we were spoiled for choice and headed down stream first of all. Bites weren’t very forthcoming as we trotted maggots expectantly  though several likely runs. We had made it to the far end of the beat before I got a phone call from dad to gloat about his success. I quickly photographed his first grayling for him before it was released and made a fast exit before he could gloat any more. In truth we were both pleased just to see one and I was pleased he had achieved his goal for the day. We fished here a while longer and both managed a few bites from what seemed to be small fish  as well as dad adding a brown trout to his tally. Time was getting on now so we followed our bellies back to the truck for tea and lunch. We spoke to the owners and they advised us to head up stream and gave us a few pointers too. After lunch we had a walk around the rest of the fishery which includes two beats, one on the main test and one on carrier. We tried trotting down several stretches with no success before heading our separate ways to try the parts we had fancied most. I managed a few bites before my first fish of the day which was a nice brown trout. After this bites came a lot faster with several small par out of the same run as the brownie. I had a move after this and after a couple more par I had my first grayling. To be honest I didn’t realise they made them that small but it was a start! I moved around a bit and had a few perch, some roach, more par and a minnow. I winkled out another grayling a tad bigger but still no size. After another lap of most of the two beats I ended up next to dad who had settled down for a while to feed a swim up. He had a couple more grayling here along with a rainbow trout. I ended the day with a load of trout around me and lost a nice rainbow before landing another brownie. We headed back just before dusk and made our way back home. We were both very pleased with the success we had along with the variety of species in such nice surroundings. We are already talking about heading back again when we can.