A historical re-enactment has taken place in Dunedin today to mark 150 years since the first trout was caught legally in New Zealand.
Alexander Campbell Begg caught the first trout under licence in the Water of Leith on December 1, 1874 – the first day of the then-Otago Acclimatisation Society's three-month trout fishing season.
The Otago branch of Fish & Game recreated the historic moment on the Leith and invited some of Begg's descendants.
Alexander Campbell Begg. (Source: Otago Daily Times)
His great-great granddaughter Lal Mulligan had the original fishing rod at her home and was unaware of its significance until someone from Fish & Game came over.
"He spotted the rod, unwrapped it and said 'hey look, on the handle of this rod is a silver plate', and we took it into the sunlight to read it and I said, 'oh my goodness, that's special, really special'."
Councillor John Highton said he thinks Begg would have been "very pleased" by today's commemoration.
"I think that it must have been a very historic event, he was obviously eager to be the first, got up very early with a friend to do it."
Chief executive Ian Hadland said the "tug is the drug".
"If you put a line out and get a trout to catch the other end of it, there's a real thrill with that. That never gets old."
