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End of Season Trout
By Adrian (meppstas) Webb
Seeing as it was the last day of the 2022/23 trout season, and because I didn't feel like going yesterday, I thought I had better go today to see if I could add a few more trout to my season's tally. Being the last day of the season also meant that there would be quite a bit of traffic in the rivers, in terms of other trout fishers, so I decided to head to one of the small streams that I like to fish.
The conditions weren’t all that bad either, with a mainly overcast sky and the odd patch of sunlight popping through the clouds every now and then. It was a late start when I did decide to head off and it was 10:40 am when I finally hopped in the water, which I found to be very, very cold. The water level wasn't too bad, and it still had a reasonably good flow to it, with a nice tannin colour to top it off. All I hoped for now was to catch a few trout to end my season on a good note.
The Mepps lure that I used to start the session off was a #0 Mepps Aglia Fluo Micropigments brown inline spinner and it didn't take all that long before I was onto a nice solid, medium size brown trout. The fish was taken after I had made a backhand cast into a nice run of water, under an overhanging tea tree. Two turns of the reel handle were enough to get that trout's attention and encourage it to take the lure.
This was just the start that I was hoping for. Five minutes into the spin session and I had my first trout of the day in the net. It was a beautifully coloured trout too. After the release of that trout things went a little quiet, so a lure change was made. This time it was a small #00 Mepps Gold Aglia that replaced the brown spinner.
That didn't work out all that well for me either and after hooking and losing three trout in a row, I went for another change of lure. The #0 Mepps March Brown coloured Bug spinner was the lure of choice this time. Nothing happened for a short time, as I slowly made my way up the stream, while fishing a waist deep stretch of water. It was there where I caught the fish of the day.
It did take a while before I finally hooked it and I reckon I must have had a dozen or more casts and retrieves in that deep water before this solid trout took the March Brown. I was glad it did and after a good tussle with that fish I did get it into the net. This fish weighed 505 grams. After the release of that beautiful brown trout, things went back to normal. The trout were nowhere to be seen, apart from the odd small trout darting off several metres ahead of me in shallow water.
With most of the stream ahead of me being much shallower than what I had been fishing in, I went back to the small #00 Mepps Gold Aglia spinner again. I still had faith in it and felt that it would come good sooner than later. It didn't let me down either and I went on to catch another three medium-size, well-conditioned trout and one small brown trout. After catching the small trout, which made half a dozen for the session, I called it a day.
I would have liked to continue for a little longer, however a cold 20-25 kph south westerly wind had arrived and that was enough to send me home. Had I fished for a longer period I'm sure that I would have eventually caught and released a few more trout but it wasn't worth the pain in doing so. I can tell you now that my 2022/23 trout season ended with a total catch of 562 trout, of which only five trout were kept due to gill damage. Those five fish were not wasted either, they all went to a good home. So, now I can rest up and get the body right for the 2023/24 trout season that's only three months away.
Adrian (meppstas)
Equipment used during my trout season:
TT Red Belly Spin Rods - RBS702L 7’,1-3kg
Okuma Celilo Finesse Spin Rods - 1-3kg
Okuma ITX Carbon Spin Reels – ITX-1000
Okuma Epixor XT Spin Reels - EXPT-20
Okuma Ceymar HD Spin Reels CHD-1000HA
Platypus Pulse Mono
Platypus Super 100 Mono
Platypus Pre-Test Mono
Mepps Inline Spinners