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Only Gold Today
By Adrian (meppstas) Webb
After five days of wild and windy wet weather, today wasn't all that bad. With a good amount of sunshine across the state and warmer conditions, I decided to have a mid-afternoon spin session in one of my favourite small tannin waters. Even though the weather was fine, there was still a strong gusty south easterly blowing, so I headed to a stretch of tannin water that had plenty of cover along both sides, that would act as a windbreak.
It was 1:50 pm by the time I hopped in the stream, and it was good to see it was flowing quite well, following the 60mm of rain that we had over the past five days. The water itself was a nice dark tannin colour in the deeper runs and filtered off to a lighter tannin colour in the knee deep and lower runs. So, I stuck with the same Mepps #00 gold Black Fury inline spinner that I had used six days ago when I fished this tannin stream a kilometre from where I fished today.
The first cast and retrieve that I made was straight up the middle of a deep narrow stretch of water and resulted in a nice solid trout following the spinner right up to where I was standing. That was it. That trout showed no sign of aggression towards the little gold bladed Mepps Black Fury, which was pretty disappointing. Still, it was a good sign to see a trout so early into the spin session.
Just as I was about to slowly make my way upstream, I noticed some movement near the shallow lefthand side of the stream. It was a nice sized Tasmanian freshwater lobster, which is a protected species in Tasmania. It's the first one that I've seen in this stream for at least seven years, so it was great to see after so many years.
From there I moved into the next stretch of knee deep, medium flowing water, and it was there that I caught my first trout of the afternoon, after making a long cast straight up the centre of it. No sooner had the spinner hit the water and it was fish on. It was a nice one too and after it had made a few runs and leaps from the water, I had it in close enough to ease it into the net. It was a beautifully coloured brown and in the best of condition. It was released back into the river once I had removed the lure and taken a photo of it.
As I approached the next slow flowing run, I spotted a trout surface feeding and lobbed the little gold bladed Black Fury spinner a few metres ahead of where I saw it surface feeding. All it took was a few turns of the reel handle and that trout spotted the spinner and took it. This fish was much smaller than the last trout, not that it mattered as they all count, plus they're fun to catch.
In the following stretch of water, the same thing happened. I spotted a trout breaking the surface, presented the same cast and retrieve, and had and the result. Trout number three was landed. As it was five days ago, the little Mepps Black Fury was certainly the flavour of the day at this stage. The next water that I moved into was a shallow run, where I hooked and lost a small trout.
On the next cast a gust of wind hit the spinner, just as I made the cast, and that gust of wind carried the spinner well to my left and straight into a large overhanging tree. When that happened, I then had to make my way over to retrieve the spinner. In doing so, I spooked two trout out of that stretch of water.
After I retrieved the lure, I had a cast into a nice medium flowing run and hooked and landed a small trout. A little further up the stream, as I moved into a narrow faster flowing run, I hooked another solid brown. This was another lovely, well-conditioned fish too, that made it safely into the landing net. Once released, the fishing slowed down. It wasn’t that the trout weren't there, the fact was that I kept hooking and losing them.
I made several lure changes (copper Aglia Mouche Noire, March Brown coloured Bug) over the next forty minutes. Each lure that I tried was taken by a trout and every one of those hooked trout tossed the lure. To make matters worse, the sun was well overhead now, hitting the water surface and the sun glare off the water was right in my face. I thought about calling it a day but decided to continue for a little longer. In doing so, I went back to the little gold Black Fury and that turned out to be a good decision as I went on to catch and release another three trout from four hook ups.
So, my spin session finished (4:30 pm) with nine trout caught and released from seventeen hook ups, which I wasn't overly impressed with. Still, I've had worse days than this one. The long and winding stretch of stream that I fished today is one that's very tough on the body, due to the amount of large log jams that one must contend with. I know that I will return here again before the season closes and I'm sure that the result will be better than it was today.
Adrian (meppstas)
Equipment Used During the Trout Season:
TT Red Belly Spin Rods – RBS702L 7’ 1-3kg 2pce
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 Premium Nylon Monofilament Fishing Line
Platypus Super 100 Nylon Monofilament Fishing Line
Platypus Pre-Test Nylon Monofilament Fishing Line
Platypus Stealth FC Fluorocarbon Leader
Mepps Inline Spinners