The Ancient bridge
River Usk at Glan-yr-Afon.
April 18th
What a lovely day. The sun came out, the water was clear and low. (It had rained the day before and neurotics like me saw in our minds eye torrents of muddy water). The water was a chilly 50F. There were Lesser Celandines, Wood Anemones and Bluebells along the banks.
There were waves of Grannom drifting up river, some dipping to lay their eggs, others just motoring along with the wind. As the morning progressed, Large Dark Olives began to hatch off, and even a very few March Browns. What was surprising and a little disappointing was that the trout were not really rising to the greet the mass of flies. There were rises but they were sporadic and it was hard to fix on individual fish.
But the fishing, whilst was challenging, was great fun and ultimately productive. The gloriously beautiful Usk brown trout grabbed the offered nymphs. What was curious was that some trout were keenly consuming the ascending Grannom pupa, but others had ignored the hatch completely and were feeding on shrimp. Fishing is a wonderful past-time, there is always something new to learn.
The Ancient bridge