Wye & Usk Update - 18th March 2005

News of the first salmon caught on the Wye started to come through to us in the afternoon of the first day of the season. A 12lb fish was caught from the Caradoc beat below Hereford at 11am on 3rd March by a delighted Mr Round. Surely this had secured him the bottle of Pol Roger champagne on offer for the first fish. That evening, however, we received the news that a superb 17lb salmon had been caught on the Cadora beat at 10.15am, which as things stand, is the winning ticket! If you can beat this, or know someone who has, please let us know. No reports of any Usk salmon yet……champagne still on offer!



Following a dry winter, water levels on both rivers were very low for the first two weeks of the season. The upside is that fish have started to hatch and there has been virtually no damage to redds. The lower Wye beats have produced a few fish, the furthest up river we have heard of anything caught is at Caradoc. After heavy rain on Wednesday, the rivers are currently up and with more rain forecast, we hope to start seeing fish further upstream bringing the Upper Wye Beats and the Usk into play over the weekend and into next week.



Trout fishing on both rivers has been mixed with some good catches reported from the Usk and hatches of large dark olives on both rivers bringing the fish to the surface at around midday. Overall though, the cold water temperatures of early March have kept sport on the slow side. The milder weather and rise in water temperature should liven things up next week, including many of the yet to be fished tributaries.



NEWS JUST IN - a 2lb sewin (sea trout) caught very high up on the Usk yesterday on the Abercamlais water at Sennybridge.