Fishing Reports

As the summer season draws to close in the Bay of Plenty, the best is now upon us. Squillions of rainbows are running the rivers and streams in the BOP, and we have the next two months to tally and tangle with little three to six pounders, which look reasonable tiny next to the "dolphin" sized browns that are flowing through as well. A client recently remarked that these huge trout looked  "like a dolphin in a small stream!".

We saw five or six trophy browns yesterday on a favourite small spring creek... sighted over two hundred rainbows, and banked 18 fish, best going just a tad over 6lb's - yes - he screwed up his brownie opportunities.... pretty hard to hold it together for that all important first cast when faced with such huge beasts! All this and it turns out we were fishing up behind two other anglers, one of which had recently made the NZ Fly Fishing Team! Just goes to show how easy it is at present!

No real action yet from the shoreline lake fishing, however boat fishing on Lake Rotoiti off the southern shoreline is turning up average 3.4 kilo fish. The lads fished the log pool at Okataina last week, and caught two fish for five hours fishing....whether the fish aren't rreally in there yet, or the lads are just useless, remains to be seen. Reckon it's a few weeks to go as yet tho before places like Ruato, The Dump, The Pipe, and Tarawera really hot up.

My main Photog, Cory Scott, fished the Tongariro yesterday.... pulled six out of the Hydro, including a solid six pound minter, and a smaller five pounder in top condition, plus one out ot the Boulder just for fun. Used his new rod, which got a bloody good blooding by the sounds of it.

Was planning a good wee East Cape mish tomorrow, but there has been serious rain and the rivers are something straight out of Wonka's Factory! Hope the smaller fish hang on in there, as it is these fish that tend to die in the big silt-ups, and are the future of these wild fisheries. Thankfully the spring creeks out of the Mamaku Plateau are fishable - high, but fishable, and with twenty pound browns holding in there you can even spot fish!

Sunday arvo found us out at Schooner Rocks in the dingy for a dive, a snapper, and a kingie. Great vis, no crays... twenty snapper to 18lbs...three small kingies. There are huge schools of trevally fizzing on the surface at Schooner .... hours of fun for the whole family on SWF gear!

Tip of the month.... try using 20lb mono and a small globug next time you're on the river and see if it makes diddly difference to your catch rate! Use split shot to get it down - placed 4 inches above. Kinda makes a huge difference when a 16lb brown takes you into the sticks! Pioneer Flexline is one such mono... with a slightly finer diameter than most.

The South Waikato spring creeks are fishing nicely, and if you feel like a day of solitude and aren't quite ready to put your dry flies away for the season, head over there to any one of the twenty or so creeks and enjoy a stream to yourself for the day! The rises are getting quite splashy - but they're still very much taking off the surface!

Hook into it - Quack!