Tackle Tactics » Tips-Techniques » Adrian-Webbs-Trout-Tips » Nice Size One Day, Small the Next
Nice Size One Day, Small the Next
By Adrian (meppstas) Webb
I was in two minds about where to fish today. As much as I wanted to head off to the Mersey River and fish a tough stretch of water, I could always take the easy way out and head back to a small and easy to wade tannin stream. I took the latter option and fished the tannin stream. As it turned out it was a pretty average decision, with only a few small to medium size trout caught and released.
While making my way to the stream, I had to avoid some annoying young bulls who weren't all that happy with me being in their paddock. Even though it wasn't where I wanted to start off the spin session, I had to hop the barbed wire fence and then make my way down to the stream. I was in the water by 12:35pm and caught a trout on the third cast and retrieve, while using a March Brown coloured Mepps Bug spinner. It was a nice, well-conditioned, plump 345 gram brown and like all tannin water trout, it was a beautifully coloured fish as well.
Seeing as I wanted to start my spin session further downstream and with the cattle still standing next to the wire fence keeping an eye on me, I headed into the bush on the opposite side of the stream and then bush bashed my way down to where I reached my starting point. The water level had dropped several inches since my last trip five days ago and the river bottom had a fair coverage of green algae on it. Instead of making the first cast upstream, I flicked the March Brown downstream into a deep pocket of water.
Casting and retrieving a lure downstream is something that I rarely do, however that pocket of water had given up trout before when using this technique. I was glad that I had done it again today too, as on the first cast and retrieve a bow wave appeared behind the spinner and in no time at all it was fish on. It was a nice trout, that put up a good tussle for a short time before it tired and I eased it into the net. The trout itself was a reasonable length, but a little on the thin side for one reason or another. It was a nice female brown trout and it may have been a late spawning fish, hence it's condition.
From here on the trout fishing slowed down to a crawl, with hardly any trout to be seen. Those that did have a go at the variety of small Mepps spinners that I used weren't all that aggressive. Those trout were all little fish too. One of them that I hooked was so small that it looked like a sardine. There were patches of sunlight hitting the water, plus the easterly breeze that had arrived didn't help either. Shallow water in full sun is never good for trout fishing.
In the end I did catch another four small brown trout, from six hook ups, with the last one being my smallest trout of the day. As much as I wanted to keep on fishing this small tannin stream, I knew that it wasn't worth the time or effort, with the trout being so few and far between. When I decided to call it a day, I couldn't believe that I had been in the stream for nearly two and a half hours. I really felt that I was in for a good day in this little stream today, especially after my last trip when the trout were nice solid fish. It wasn't to be.
Adrian (meppstas)
Equipment Used:
Okuma Celilo Finesse Spin Rods - ULS 1-3kg Trout Rod
Okuma ITX Carbon Spin Reels - ITX-1000
Platypus Pulse Mono
Platypus Stealth FC Fluorocarbon Leader
Mepps Inline Spinners -
Mepps Bug Inline Spinner