Feedback & Reports

The river was much clearer here than the previous day at Penpont but was still fairly high, There were plenty of hatches due to the sunshine of Mayfly and a few smaller flies of black or cream colouring. All 4 fish were taken from the lower end of the beat on dry flies immitating the small cream hatches. A couple of fish were lost in the middle section of the beat where the hatches were less prolific and a PTN was fished through the head of some broken water and into the slack at the banks.

4 Trout

After two very wet days, including one wash off, we finally got to see what the Usk has to offer. An excellent location and lots of hatch activity after all the rain. Two small trout caught (and returned) and two others hooked but lost.
We were very impressed with WUF and will return.

2 Trout

Weighted nymph, fished down and across. Trout around 5". 3 other fish hooked but not landed.

1 Trout

Found the river in good condition, fining down nicely after the recent rain. There was a steady hatch and fish rose throughout the day. A stiff downstream wind in the morning led me to fish a team of wets down and across with a heavy GRHE on the point. The lowest field was the most productive, I hooked five and netted three - the biggest a lovely fish just over a pound. Met a few other friendly anglers on the beat but there was plenty of scope for everyone. Definitely worth coming again.

3 Trout

All returned including nice fish of 2lb and 1.5lb

14 Trout

2 x trout 10 and 15 inches, spiders. It's still pretty cold, up there at Brecon, and on this day we had a very strong downstream wind. Locals were telling me that March Browns have been coming off, regular as clockwork from one o'clock on most days recently, but the trout have unaccountably not been reacting. On this day, the one clock hatch of March Browns happened, just as foretold, and lasted about 15 minutes or so. Some large trout did react on this occasion, and I managed to lose two of them hooked on a dry fly and took a small one on a spider. About an hour later, another hatch on another pool, but this time no rises at all although the mallard ducks were having a wonderful time gobbling up the big flies. When it was all over, out of the blue as it were, a nice 15 inch trout took on a Woodcock and Hare's Lug fished well down, just to be contrary, although I was suitably grateful of course. Quite a confusing afternoon altogether.
PB of Upton on Severn reports (20/4/13 Chainbridge) being similarly confused in an attempt to match the grannom hatch - I do sympathise! If you tie flies, try some of the emergers designed by Dave Collins of Moccas (you will find them on Google), or another approach is to fish a team of spiders across the river and just under the surface, especially in the early stages of the hatch as the pupae are coming up. A yellowish-brown Hare's Lug and Plover on a size 14 or 16 seems to work quite often.

2 Trout

Two fish both returned. 3 lb approx and 3/4 lb approx on nymph

2 Trout

Nothing caught.

5 x trout 13-15 inches, spiders. A last minute diversion to the middle Usk after the upper Wye rose a foot and muddied up during the night. As you might perhaps guess, these were taken during a large dark olive hatch between 1.30pm and 3.00pm. Generally speaking, rather than a sudden and intense spring olive hatch which lasts 15 minutes, I would prefer a sparse hatch of fly over a longer period - this was one of the latter. For the rest of the day, the river might have been empty.
I have to say that, so far, we have all been finding this a really tough spring and very slow to start for trouting. I think it was JH from Surrey reporting on 14th March who wondered whether the tributaries would not warm up first and be the best place to start? There are always exceptions, but my own experience is the opposite: that we usually find the main stems come on to fish first first, the Usk tending to be a little in advance of the Wye, then the upper rivers and medium size tributaries, and finally the brooks, the high altitude ones being last of all to warm up. But, as I have already said, this cold spring is an exceptionally tough one. Don't worry; warm weather will get here sooner or later.

5 Trout

1 x 14 inch trout, Waternen Bloa. Usk was very low and clear, and this was the day the cold weather arrived, an icy wind from the east resulting in steadily dropping temperatures. Still, by lunchtime I had hopes that a large Dark Olive hatch might produce some sort of result. So I sat down out of the wind to watch a likely spot, and eventually the little grey sailing boats appeared one by one on the surface. I had counted up to 20 by the time I realised that no trout had risen to them and I eventually concluded they weren't likely to on this occasion. So I moved to a pool tail upstream where it seemed the trout were interested and managed to get just one before the hatch and rises ceased for the day. And that, as they say, was that.

1 Trout