Tackle Tactics » Tips-Techniques » Adrian-Webbs-Trout-Tips » Season Ends with Eight
Season Ends with Eight
By Adrian (meppstas) Webb
Today, being the last day of the trout season saw me heading off to try another piece of tannin water in the middle of the bush and yes it did require a little bush bashing to reach it. As tough as it was getting to that small tannin water, it was well worth it because I was sheltered from the gusty wind that was still blowing.
As I reached the water, I could see that it would be a pretty tough spin session as the water was very shallow and this meant I would have to go into stealth mode. Not that it was going to work here, with the water being low and a rocky bottom to walk on... plus I can be a little clumsy trying to move quietly at times.
Seeing as I was fishing another new tannin water though, I felt confident that it would be holding a trout or two because it wasn't all that far away from the one that I had fished yesterday. Well, it wasn't long before I spooked a couple of small trout, as I slowly (and a little clumsily) moved on upstream.
This trip I started off with a well used #00 Mepps Copper Aglia Mouche Noire... one that was nearly ready for retirement. A few casts directly up a shallow run and I soon had my first trout on for the morning. A little further up I had another brown take the little copper spinner and soon after releasing that fish, I had my third trout hooked and landed. Three trout caught and released in the first twenty minutes was just what I was hoping for on the last day of the season.
Some stretches of the stream were nice and wide, however the water was still shallow. It was the small, narrow, deeper runs where I concentrated my efforts and that's where I caught the trout. A trout was caught every fifteen to twenty minutes on the copper Aglia, which by now was looking a lot worse for wear. The black and red tagged treble hook only had a little bit of black and red left on it... actually it now looked more like a plain copper Aglia spinner.
I caught one more small brown on it before I couldn't go on any further unless I wanted to bush bash my way through a large mass of blackberry bushes. With seven trout caught and released so far, I was tempted to take a punt on getting through the blackberry bushes. I decided I wasn't going to tempt fate trying to get through them, let alone ruin my $450 breathable waders.
I headed on back to the car and tried another area where I knew I could easily access another small stream. The stream I headed to was running even lower than the one that I had just left. I spent an hour fishing there, where I had one follow from a small brown. I knew I was wasting my time here and called it a day.
Just before I hopped out of the river I flicked the copper Aglia into a small pool and picked up trout number eight, the smallest fish of the morning. I did think about heading to one of the other small tannin waters that fished well a few days ago, before thinking it was best just to head for home.
Those eight trout caught and released took my 2018/19 seasons catch to 573 trout, which wasn't a bad result for the season after all. Of the 573 trout caught during the season only one brown trout was kept.
Equipment used:
Okuma Celilo Finesse Spin Rod - CE-S-602UL-1 6' 1-3kg
Okuma Helios SX Spinning Reel - HSX-20
Platypus Super 100 mono line
Mepps inline blade spinners