ENTION TO any British game- fisher and they think “sea-trout”. Quite right, too. Wales has some of the finest sea-trout fishing in the Northern MHemisphere. But there’s more to it than that. Wales is John Brown also the home of one of the best British salmon rivers has been fishing south of the Scottish border. That same river for more than provides some of the most challenging and 60 years – the productive fishing for wild brown trout to be found past 40 mainly for sea-trout. anywhere in Britain. Welcome to the . After a career in “Usk” (Welsh Wysg) is derived, like all the Esks, journalism and from the old Gaelic word uisge, meaning “water”. education, he has Rising on the western edge of the Brecon Beacons The pride now retired to National Park, it flows 77 miles through Sennybridge, spend more Brecon, Crickhowell, Abergavenny and Usk town, time fishing. reaching the Bristol Channel at Newport. It runs mainly over red sandstone, but enough of the course of the main river and its tributaries is over limestone to offset the acidification now plaguing many rivers rising in forested uplands. of Wales The upper riverbed is a mixture of bedrock and shingle and wading can be tricky. A gorge starting John Brown takes an in-depth look at the just downstream of Brecon runs almost to Crickhowell. The middle and lower riverbed is River Usk, which is phenomenal for wild brownies predominantly large shingle and wading is easy. and, given water, first-class for salmon, too The river is fast-flowing, descending rapidly in a series of pools and runs. It is home to a variety of species: salmon, sea-trout, brown trout, dace, chub, barbel, perch, carp, pike, shad, lamprey and bullhead. Flounders appear as far upstream as Usk town. Bass numbers in the tidally affected lower river have recently increased. A heavy elver run in 2013 reversed years of decline. The presence of salmon, shad, lamprey and bullhead have ensured EU Habitats Directive Special Area of Conservation status. There are no grayling, though they are present in all neighbouring rivers. “In late May or June you can expect to see running fish if we get water”

The main claims to fame are its runs of salmon and its wild brown trout. Augustus Grimble, in his The Salmon Rivers Of England and Wales (1904) devotes more space to the Usk than to any other river, calling it “one of the most famous of English salmon rivers”, a description that could have had the Sons of Glyndwr reaching for their matchboxes in more recent times. Now that is again a Welsh county, the Usk flows solely in Wales. The Usk is neither a spring salmon river nor a summer river, but something in between. Forty years ago I was told that the first flood following April’s second spring tide would bring fish up into the middle river. That is probably still true, but early Spencer season catch figures are now deflated by a lack of pre- John fishes June 16 fishing effort. Anyone fishing in late May or Crickhowell & in June on the lower or middle river can expect to see District Angling Society’s pods of fish coming through if we get water. Pant-y-Goitre Recent grilse runs have been sparse. beat. He caught The Usk, unfairly, isn’t seen as a big-fish river. For a salmon shortly years over-shadowed by the “portmanteau” after this photo (40 lb-plus) fish that regularly came off the Wye, it has

PHOTOGRAPHS: JOHN BROWN was taken. always been capable of producing big multi-sea-

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and a director of the Angling Trust. On his watch as finds that Czech nymphs winkle out the bigger trout. fisheries officer the thorny problem of a major illegal Fishing around Tal-y-Bont and Brecon, he has “My best bag was four trout net fishery in the Usk estuary was finally tackled head regularly caught 3 lb-4 lb lunkers on the deep nymph. on and, with the help of Steve Barker and his His best brown last year was nudging 6 lb. Stuart is a averaging 2½ lb on the dry-fly” bailiffing team, the poaching was stopped. Numbers highly skilled and thoughtful angler, but he also has of salmon entering the river increased. Since then we that quality that Napoleon valued so highly in his these days to catch five good salmon in six hours have seen a putcher buyout, phasing out of the last generals. He is lucky. And that luck rubs off on those remains to be seen. Some, perhaps uncharitably, feel legal Uskmouth drift-nets, closure of the western around him. On June 16, 2002 his then 15-year-old that his salmon fishing career may be downhill Ireland drift-net fishery and a reduction in Greenland son, Jack, caught a beautiful fresh 29 lb springer all the way from now on. netting. Salmon numbers should have kept from Glanusk’s Camp pool, hooked in the dusk Sea-trout are few and far between. Noted Usk town increasing, but they haven’t. and finally landed over an hour later in full angler Chris Brain is the only man I know who targets The Usk isn’t the best trout river in the UK, or even darkness. This remains one of the best fish off them seriously. Chris, who once managed to catch a in Wales. That honour goes to the recently the river in recent years. salmon on camera for a passing TV news crew – not regenerated River Taff, with its dry-fly-caught 5 lb and Last year, again on June 16, Stuart went along to easily done – puts in a couple of weeks of night effort 7 lb wild brown trout, but it runs the Taff a close help a visiting Glanusk rod. Lyndon Mayo’s family every year and catches some very good sea-trout, second. Lower-river trout average ¾ lb. As you travel had bought him a day’s salmon fishing as a father’s best so far 13¾ lb. Harry Legge- winter fish. Best fish last season was Hugh Wallace’s upstream that average goes up quickly. I haven’t had a day present. He had never fished for salmon before. There are few books describing fishing on the Usk, Bourke searches 32½-pounder from one of the Monkswood beats, fish over 3 lb – my best bag was four trout averaging Almost immediately Lyndon caught his first salmon, but knowledge is passed on through a living tradition. for an autumn possibly the biggest fly-caught salmon in Wales in just 2½ lb on the dry-fly, fishing below Crickhowell – a bright-silver 12 lb fish, on the Flying C Stuart Usk’s most famous angler, Harry Powell, the “Wizard fish at Glanusk’s 2013. Another Monkswood beat produced a fish of but several of my fishing friends have broken through provided. Shortly after he caught another, this time of the Usk”, was an inventive and imaginative fly-tyer Church Falls. 35½ lb in 1974. Mike Scott had a fish of 42 lb off that 3 lb barrier. If you want big trout, concentrate 11½ lb, almost a pigeon pair. By late morning Stuart who ran a hairdressing business in Usk high street one of the Llanover beats two years ago. your efforts upstream of Abergavenny. Better still, headed home for lunch, thinking the day’s excitement between the wars. It was there, in 1924, using hair “Below the Other 30 lb-plus fish appear periodically and fish in fish the upper river above Brecon. One beat I fish up was over. At 4 pm he received a phone call from from a customer’s dog, that he devised the Dogsbody, Bridge” at the high 20s are regularly caught. there has trout averaging around 1½ lb and it was Lyndon Mayo, who was driving home, having caught still one of the most useful general-purpose dry-flies. Glanusk, with Most of the Usk is good fly water. It colours heavily there that I hooked (and lost!) my best-ever river three more fresh fish of 14 lb, 9 lb and 8 lb. Powell started selling fishing-tackle out of his the water at a in spate but fly becomes effective once the river starts brown, a fish of at least 4 lb. Apparently Mr Mayo had decided to call it a day as hairdresser’s, established a relationship with tackle- good height falling. I favour an Ally’s Shrimp on the dropper and Stuart Jarvis is a well-known and widely respected he’d found catching all those salmon a tad tiring. makers Rudge of Redditch and moved round the and colour a Kenny’s Killer or a Black Brahan on the point, but figure on the Usk. For many years he was head keeper Whether he has yet realised quite how unusual it is corner to Porthycarne Street, to open a tackle-shop, for the fly. I’m still old school enough to think that the most on the Glanusk Estate above Crickhowell and gillied important four words in salmon fishing are “right for rods on the estate waters. Now retired, he still place, right time”. If you put a lot of faith in fly pattern, fishes almost every day. He prefers the dry-fly, but you can hardly go wrong with the Usk Grub, developed for the Usk but now widely successful elsewhere. Apparently this was the first fly pattern “Fly-fishing becomes ever tied to imitate a shrimp, pre-dating the wide range of Irish Shrimp patterns. The 1970s version I effective once the fished had a rear body of either orange wool or seal’s fur. Modern versions often trade in orange for red. river starts falling” Salmon numbers have held up. The five-year average rod-catch from 1993-97 was 786 salmon, 1998-2002 (713), 2003-2007 (820) and 2008-2012 (800). These figures are consistent, but slightly misleading. A fresh-run Fisheries scientist Dr Guy Mawle worked for the 10 lb Usk Environment Agency and its predecessors for 26 One of Jean Williams’s salmon caught years and was Usk fisheries officer from 1986-1992. Usk Grubs, tied for the Usk but in late June. Now retired, he is a Wye and Usk Foundation trustee successful elsewhere, too.

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species have changed. March browns, iron blues, ‘licences of right’ for rivers such as the Usk … large dark olives and blue-winged olives have designated as Special Areas of Conservation under declined. Other species, notably the grannom, the the directive”. Both CRT/DCWW and the Wye and Usk yellow May dun and even the Mayfly, have Foundation are currently researching abstraction. increased (heavy grannom hatches can carpet the Who exactly runs what is a bit of a mess at the river from bank to bank) and the trout show moment. Environment Agency Wales has just merged greater willingness to respond to them. with the Countryside Council for Wales and Forestry Last year the March browns reappeared in Commission Wales to form Natural Resources Wales, numbers. This may be a result of the recent probably resulting in further cutbacks for already cypermethrin ban or 2012’s summer high water, hard-pressed fisheries staff (whose work we all value). followed by massive winter floods, washing out silt The Usk Local Fisheries Group, the EAW’s means of build-up in the river. Either way, it was a welcome consulting the local angling/fishery-owning return. March browns get trout going. community is, sadly, probably being phased out. The river has its problems. Predation by fish-eating The Wye Foundation took on the Usk in 2002 to birds has worsened. Low flow levels haven’t helped. form charitable trust the Wye and Usk Foundation. Fortunately the Usk Fishing Association recently WUF’s spraying programme for controlling invasive gained a special licence for the limited control of fish- weed species is well regarded across the board. Many eating birds and hopes to do so again. local fishery owners are keen to see WUF continuing The British Canoe Union and Canoe Wales are their work on habitat restoration. Enthusiasm for this Harry Powell, soon employing an assistant, Molly Salter. By 1946, trying to gain unrestricted canoe access to all rivers organisation is more muted in the wider angling the Wizard of Molly had married Lionel Sweet, a keen local angler, in Wales, despite the fact that, unlike anglers, they community. The WUF Passport scheme has opened the Usk, and casting instructor and frequent national tournament pay nothing for any access and can damage salmon up a number of Usk beats to visiting rods and WUF some of the champion, who claimed to have courted Molly to spawning. The Welsh Assembly Government, has been very successful at attracting public funding flies he tied guarantee a source of fish hooks, scarce throughout following consultation, originally suggested himself in the the war years. She took over the shop, ran it as Sweet’s voluntary access agreements between canoeists and 1920s, including Fishing Tackle and became an internationally known fishery owners. BCU/CW now refuse to negotiate such “The Usk valley remains the famous Jean Williams behind the counter in Dogsbody. and respected fly-dresser in her own right. agreements and are pushing for legislative change. In 1962 Molly Sweet took on a Saturday morning The Sustainable Access Cymru Campaign (which one of the most beautiful Sweet’s Fishing Tackle – a treasure (From Trevor trove of fishing goodies. Watkins’s assistant, local schoolgirl Jean Lewis, training her as includes the Angling Trust) is opposing this and collection of a fly-tyer. Molly died in 1974 and Jean, by now Jean needs our support. Their website – www. places in Britain” Harry Powell Williams, took over the business. Jean has been accesscymru.org – has full details. flies and running Sweet’s as a tackle-shop and bespoke fly- The biggest issue is water abstraction. Usk, Crai, in the past, but questions are regularly asked about tackle.) tyer’s ever since. Her knowledge of the Usk and its Tal-y-Bont and reservoirs impound accountability and staffing costs. A perception, fair or Factfile fishing is encyclopaedic. The shop is an Aladdin’s rainfall from the upper river, three of them otherwise, of a historical over-emphasis on habitat ■ Access to the river is good. Much of it is on the tidally affected cave and stepping into it is like stepping back into (controlled by Dwy Cymru Welsh Water) servicing restoration, at the expense of stocking or water issues, under the control of angling associations or lower river. Isca bygone Britain. Great old-style fishing shops, public water demands. The Canal and River Trust has raised concerns. As another fisheries scientist put local councils. currently has vacancies overflowing with accumulated tradition and local draws off 25 million litres of water a day at Brecon for it, “Funding for habitat restoration virtually never ■ Gwaun Cae Gurwen Angling Association for new members. For knowledge, are getting very thin on the ground the Monmouthshire and Brecon Canal. DCWW also allows for subsequent maintenance or monitoring. has two good beats above and below further details contact Below right: these days. Sweet’s Fishing Tackle remains draws off substantial amounts from the lower river, Basically it’s fit and forget.” Sennybridge. Trout average over 1½ lb, with temporary secretary A pretty Usk one of the very finest. just above Usk town, which go into Llandegfedd The politics of angling can be intensely tedious but several around 4 lb taken last season. Weekly Guy Mawle: guy. trout is briefly The Usk, running mainly through farmland, has reservoir. Climate change is exacerbating the effects they do affect the quality of our sport. Still, it’s not all ticket £35, season £85, plus £30 joining fee. [email protected] admired before Contact secretary Lynn Martinson ■ Usk Town Water comprises being put back. never suffered the industrial pollution that, until of abstraction and both smolt migration and adult doom and gloom. The Usk has it problems. What UK ([email protected]) two miles around Usk town, trout Below: Stuart recently, so affected western neighbours, Ebbw and salmon access to the river are being affected. As Guy river doesn’t? Last season was one we all want to ■ The Brecon Usk Fishery Association has a fishing only, no chest waders, £15 a day, Jarvis fishes Taff. Its alkaline waters support plentiful aquatic fly- Mawle, who has been enormously helpful in the forget. But 2012 was a bumper year. And 2014 will be, mile and half below Brecon town bridge £45 a week, £135 a season. Tickets dry-fly for life. Forty years ago, the Usk was an early trout river preparation of this article, explained, too. If you get the water, you get the fish. www.brecontowncouncil.org.uk/Core/ from Sweet’s Fishing Tackle. trout on an famous for its hatches of March browns. Iron blues “Implementation of the EU Habitats Directive has The Usk valley remains one of the most beautiful Brecon-TC/Pages/Fishing_1.aspx ■ Glanusk Estate is increasing the amount of upper beat. were common. Over the years the dominant fly meant that at last it has been possible to review places in Britain, the fishing for wild brown trout is ■ Crickhowell & District Angling Society has water available to visitors for the 2014 season phenomenal and the salmon fishing, given water, is water at Crickhowell, Grangrwney, www.glanuskestate.com/sport-at-glanusk/ Abergavennny and Pant-y-Goitre: fishing-at-glanusk/ first class. The Gliffaes Country House Hotel is one of www.crickhowellangling.co.uk/ ■ Llanover Estate, with a long-term average the last real fishing hotels and their afternoon tea is ■ Gwent Angling Society has a number of of 100 fish, is probably the most productive to die for. A visit to Sweet’s is always memorable and good beats from Glangrwney to Abergavenny salmon fishery on the river. It has done a lot of fun. Once you have caught and returned enough and on the lower river, below Chain Bridge. A work in recent years to improve the fly-fishing salmon to appease your conscience, take a fish to the go-ahead club that emphasises conservation: on its beats. Elvira Jones, tel: 01873 851 892; Black Mountain Smokery at Crickhowell for them to www.gwentanglingsociety.co.uk/ e-mail: [email protected] work their magic on. Christmas isn’t Christmas ■ Methyr Tydfil Angling Association has ■ The Wye and Usk Foundation’s booking excellent beats above and below office can arrange fishing on a number of Usk without some of your own smoked salmon Abergavenny and on the lower river at beats: www.wyeuskfoundation.org and Black Mountain Smokery is almost as good Kemeys Commander. Very well run and the ■ Sweet’s Fishing Tackle, 14 Porthycarne a spot as Sweet’s for finding out exactly what is largest club on the river. Treasurer Tony Rees’s Street, Usk, NP15 1RY. Tel: 01291 672 552. happening up and down the river. MBE “for services to angling in South Wales” Jean Williams is able to arrange day and I read Oliver Kite’s A Fisherman’s Diary was richly deserved: www.mtaa.co.uk season rods on a number of Usk beats. (with its description of early season Usk fishing) ■ Abergavenny Town Water comprises ■ The Gliffaes Country House Hotel is in 1973 and started coming here from two and a half miles around Abergavenny. everything a fishing hotel should be: London every spring to fish. After 20 years Further details from secretary, www.gliffaeshotel.com/fishing Phillip Starmore, on 01873 857 771. ■ The Black Mountain Smokery will smoke I moved down to live almost on the banks of ■ Isca Anglers has water on the middle river your fish and tell you what else is being the river. I’ve never regretted it. and the very productive Crown Fishery down caught. www.smoked-foods.co.uk It’s a little bit of Heaven.

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