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Browns and Bows in Windy Conditions
By Adrian (meppstas) Webb
Finally, the weather had settled enough for me to head off to the upper reaches of the Mersey River for a spin session, with the hope of catching a few brown and rainbow trout. Most of the large rivers that I fish have been running high and fast and could only be fished from the riverbanks. Even when I arrived at the river today, I could see it was still on the high side and I knew then that it was going to be a tough time in the river.
I normally start the spin session off fishing from the opposite (RHS) side of the river, which is normally the shallow side that’s easy and safe for wading and fishing my way upstream. Today there was no way that I could cross the river where I always do. The water level was at least 60cm (2ft) higher than I would have liked, and it was not worth the risk of trying to cross over. I knew that there was a shallow, fast water stretch of river further upstream, where I could cross over and fish at least one hundred metres of river before having to cross back over to the left-hand side to fish from the next long shallow side of the river.
Before I moved to the first crossing, I decided to have a few long casts and retrieves with a Mepps #1 Aglia TW inline spinner from a rocky ledge that I was on. I knew that I could get close to the shallow, slow waters on the opposite side of the river, where I felt there may be a trout or two holding out. It was on the second cast with the TT Red Belly 7’, 1-3kg spin rod, that a nice medium size rainbow trout took the Aglia TW spinner, and I had the first trout of the day in the net.
Several casts and retrieves later. from the same rocky ledge, I hooked and landed a small brown trout. Two trout in pretty quick time was as good as it gets when one's chasing trout in high water. It was time to make my way further up the river and across the shallow, knee-deep fast waters, to fish from the shallow side of the river for at least one hundred metres. From there I had to cross back to the left-hand side of the river, due to the right side being the deep side.
Before I went to cross the river, I also made a lure change. A Mepps #1 Aglia Fluo Micropigments brown spinner was the lure of choice that I went for. With the river now being in full sun, I felt that the gold Aglia TW would be a little too bright from here on in the shallower water. As I started to make my way across the river, I decided to flick the Aglia brown into a shallow flatwater and no sooner had the lure hit the water, it was smashed by a solid trout.
I couldn't believe my luck when that happened. It was a good fish as well and it played hard to get as it ran straight into the fast-flowing water. Thankfully, after a minute or two, I finally had it close enough to slip the net under it. Once it was in the net, I weighed it and then deducted the 310g net weight, which left the trout at 520g. Once released, I continued across the river and fished a small backwater, where I had a couple of trout follow the spinner. Those two trout showed no sign of aggression, so I headed back into the main stream. Not long after I was back in the main stream, the wind arrived from the East. Thankfully it wasn't all that strong, and it was coming from behind me which was good.
The fishing in the main stream started of reasonably quiet, so I made a change of lure. This time it was a #1 Mepps Aglia Fluo Micropigments rainbow that went on, and it wasn't on for all that long either as I never saw a trout. So, I went back to the #1 Mepps Aglia Fluo Micropigments brown spinner. Well, it only took a few casts and retrieves, straight up the shallow side river, before I hooked and landed another brown trout. That fish was a nice medium size fish. It was only a minute or two after its release that I had another cast into that same shallow water and hooked and landed another brown trout. This time it was only a small trout, still a fish is a fish, and they all add up at the end of the day.
Five trout caught and released so far wasn't all that bad. The biggest disappointment was the wind, that had picked up and was getting stronger by the minute. It was still coming from the East, but every so often it would ease off before it turned and came straight down the river. This really ticked me off. When it did finally ease off, I was lucky enough to catch another brown trout in a shallow run. That trout was caught fifteen minutes after the fifth trout, so the wind that arrived certainly did change the mood of the trout.
The wind didn't stay away for very long at all. Five minutes on from catching the last trout and it was back and blowing harder than ever. It was making it near impossible to cast the lure straight up the river. Casting across the river wasn't too bad, providing I allowed for the wind that carried the spinner offline several times. Twenty minutes had passed by since the last trout was caught, for just a solitary hooked and lost rainbow trout. So, I decided I would give it a little longer before calling it a day.
Twenty-five minutes later, when I was near the end of the last stretch of river that I was fishing before heading back to the car, I hooked and landed a nice medium size rainbow trout. The funny thing is that I was about to get out of the river but couldn't resist having one more cast and retrieve. That's when I hooked onto that rainbow. Was it instinct... no it wasn't. It was just pure luck that went my way and I'm glad it did. In the end I finished up catching and releasing five browns and two rainbows, which was a good result in the end, given the windy conditions. The biggest disappointment was that the river was running higher, faster, and much deeper than expected, which wasn't all that good for casting and drifting the inline spinners.
Adrian (meppstas)
Equipment Used:
TT Red Belly Spin Rods – RBS702L 7’, 1-3kg
Okuma ITX Carbon Spin Reels - ITX-1000
Platypus Pulse Mono Premium Nylon Line
Platypus Stealth FC Fluorocarbon Leader
Mepps Inline Spinners -
Mepps Aglia Fluo Micropigments