Tackle Tactics » Tips-Techniques » Adrian-Webbs-Trout-Tips » From River to Stream

From River to Stream

By Adrian (meppstas) Webb

Another forecast of rain was on for tomorrow, so I shot up to the Mersey River at Weegena in the hope that it wasn't running as high as last week when I fished it. Once there (8:40am), I could see the water level was a few inches higher than last week. All I could do was hop in and fish a short stretch of water along the left-hand side of it.

I started the spin session off with a #1 Mepps Aglia Mouche Noire and never had a touch from a trout, so changed to a #1 Mepps Aglia Streamer and the result was the same… thirty-five minutes without seeing a trout. I was going to get out and head to another stretch of water further upstream, however once out of the water I decided to go back to the car and head to a small stream. My hope was that the water level wouldn't be too high and fast.

Once there I could see it was running higher than my last trip here, however on that day I caught and released four trout, so I decided that I would give it a go. This time I was fishing a different stretch of water. This one was at least a kilometre further upstream from where I had fished on my last trip to this stream. After a fifteen-minute walk, through a stretch of light scrub, I reached my entry point, a small shallow fast water run.

Thankfully, I did take two Okuma Celilo Finesse (6'6'' & 6') ULS 2-6 lb trout rods with me today, for this very reason. If the Mersey was running too high and I wanted to fish a small stream on the way home, I had the 6' rod on hand. The reel was the same little Okuma ITX-1000 that I've used in the small streams over the past few trips. The lure of choice was the same little #00 Mepps Aglia Gold that I used on my last trip to this stream.

The small pocket of water that I entered had a nice deep run in the centre of it, with a shallow run on the right side. My first cast was to the top right hand side and I retrieved the spinner along the area where the deep run met the shallow water. Halfway into the retrieve and a trout came out and followed the spinner, without taking it. I repeated what I had just done and this time the trout charged at the spinner and took it!

This was just the start that I was hoping for too. A hook up on the second cast… it doesn't get any better than that. It was a nice medium size brown, that played up for a short time before I eased it into the landing net. This was a nice well-conditioned trout to catch first up and the colour of this trout was right up there with the best of them as well.

From here I had to make my way around a tea tree, that was in the middle of the stream. The riverbank had collapsed, which put the tea tree where it now lay. The only way it would move is when the stream floods from heavy rain again. Once past it, I moved into a nice knee-deep run. This was one that had given up a few trout on previous trips, in fact many times.

My first cast here was into a small flat water to my right and on the retrieve a trout came out of nowhere and followed the spinner for a short distance before it turned and moved away, not to be seen again. I then moved a little further upstream and made a backhand cast into a small flat water that had good cover over it. A few turns of the reel handle was all that it took before a trout turned up and took the lure. It was an aggressive take and the trout made several short runs, along with a couple of leaps, before I had it in close enough to slip the net under it.

On the top left-hand side of this stretch of water was a nice bubble line and it was also the faster flowing side of the stream. Each time I have fished here it's been that area of the river has given up a fish, so that's where my next cast with the Mepps Gold Aglia went. The spinner no sooner hit the water when it was snapped up by a solid trout. This fish was full of fight and did it's best to toss the spinner as it made several leaps from the water. The spinner held tight though and the trout didn't get off, making it all the way into the net. Three trout now caught and released in the first twenty minutes, making this one of my best starts of the season by far.

I was feeling pretty stoked with how the spin session was going, however that soon faded to frustration. From here on I had a fish come out of a deep dark pocket of water, take one look at the spinner, turn away and move off. That was the first fish that I had seen in thirty-minutes, after I had caught and released my third trout of the session.

I had to bypass a couple of deep narrow stretches of water, before I could get back into knee deep water that was safer for wading. I had also made a change of lure as I saw quite a few caddis moths hovering above the water. I went for the #00 White Miller Bug spinner to see if that would attract a trout. The first cast was to the left side of the stream and on the retrieve, as the lure came past a fallen tree, it was hit hard by a trout. Unfortunately, that fish missed being hooked.

My next cast and retrieve was to the slower flowing, right side of the stream, where it was taken by a small/medium sized trout. That fish tossed the spinner a few seconds later. With quite a few deep and narrow stretches of water ahead of me, I decided I'd had enough. The flow was just too fast and deep here to continue any further. My day was done.

I could have tried other areas on the stream but, with the water being on the high side, I thought it best to call it a day. I'm sure that once the river level drops and water temps rise, the fishing will improve. It's just a matter of when this will happen… with the way the weather has been over the past three months.

Adrian (meppstas)

Equipment Used:

Okuma Celilo Finesse Spin Rods - ULS 6’ 1-3kg
Okuma ITX Carbon Spinning Reel - ITX-1000
Platypus Pulse Mono Premium Monofilament
Platypus Stealth FC Fluorocarbon Leader
Mepps Aglia Inline Spinner