Tackle Tactics » Tips-Techniques » Adrian-Webbs-Trout-Tips » Trout Starting to Show Up

Trout Starting to Show Up

By Adrian (meppstas) Webb

After being laid up for a while with a torn muscle in my back and then giving it a short two-hour workout in the Mersey River yesterday, from which I pulled up okay, I decided that I would get a spin session in again today. With rain looming in the distance, I headed off to one of my favourite small tannin streams for a morning spin session, in the hope of catching a few trout before the rain arrived.

As soon as I arrived, I darted over to see what the water level was like. It was running high, much higher than I thought it would have been. The 60mm of rain that we had here four days ago had really lifted the water level. It was still at a safe wading height however the downside was that I would be in for a tough time finding trout in the faster flowing water.

After a twenty-five-minute walk I was at my entry point, where I started fishing for trout. My lure of choice was a #0 Mepps Aglia Fluo Phospho (white) lure. The reason I chose this lure was because of its white coloured blade, plus the Aglia blade is a wide blade that would send out plenty of vibration through the water as I retrieved it. Hopefully that would be enough to attract a few trout.

As I started fishing my way upstream, I couldn't believe how cold the water was. It was very cold on the legs, which was something that I wasn't expecting today. To make matters worse, I didn't wear my thermal gear today either, thinking that the water temperature would have been okay. Yesterday, when I fished the Mersey River, the water temperature was around the 12-13 degrees mark. Here it was only around 7-8 degrees.

During the first few cast and retrieves with the Aglia Fluo I had a couple of very soft taps. They weren't aggressive taps at all. I stuck with the Aglia spinner for close to twenty minutes, without a hook up, so made the change of lure. This time I went for the Mepps Gold #00 Aglia Mouche Rouge and it wasn't all that long before I had my first hook up.

A small brown had snapped it up as I retrieved it downstream in the bubble line. Just as I had it in reach... it tossed the spinner. Thankfully it was only a tiddler of a trout, so I wasn't all that upset over losing the first fish of the day. I was hoping that the gold colour may be the go-to colour with the trout and it was just that too.

A little further upstream I had a solid hit but missed hooking up with that trout. Then, a few minutes later, a nice brown took the spinner as soon as it hit the water. This time it was well hooked and stayed on. After a short battle, the first trout of the session was landed at 9:25am. This was a medium sized, well-conditioned fish and a beautifully coloured one at that.

I was getting some great distance with the little 1.5 gram Aglia Mouche Rouge, thanks to the new Okuma ITX-1000 spinning reel, which was paired up with a 6' Okuma Celilo Finesse ULS 2-6lb trout rod. The strong and ultra-thin 4lb Platypus Pulse mono was holding up very well too. All of this, with the Mepps spinners, combined together to make a great lightweight trout fishing setup for any small stream/river.

From here on it went a little downhill. The trout were here but there wasn't any aggression in them. It was back to the light tap on the lure from them. For one reason or another they just weren't on the take. It may have been due to the weather that was moving in, with the barometer falling probably not helping either. I was sure that I would pick up one or two more before I called it a day or before the rain arrived.

It wasn't until I moved into a knee deep stretch of water and I flicked the spinner into a flat water to the left of me, like I had done earlier, that as soon as the lure hit the water it was taken by a trout. That trout didn't stay on. It tossed the lure as quickly as it had taken it. I had missed the chance of landing another solid brown.

After that, I had several trout follow the little Gold Mepps Aglia Mouche Rouge as I slowly fished my way upstream. These were like the majority of trout I'd seen, non-aggressive. It was time to try another spinner and this time I gave a #0 Mepps March Brown coloured Bug spinner a little bit of a workout, without seeing a trout. The same result was had with the White Miller Bug too. What lure do I go to now I wondered, then I remembered the #0 Mepps Aglia Micropigment Brown spinner had done well here on a few of my previous trips, especially when the fishing had been tough. It was a good choice and a little further up the stream, after a long cast into a shallow fast water, I picked up a small brown as I retrieved it.

I moved into a wide, waist deep stretch of medium flowing water, that deepened the further I moved into it, so I didn't go any further into it. I had quite a few cast and retrieves in it and had several trout follow the spinner. That's as far as it went with them. It was time to go around this deep water and get back in further upstream, where the water was much safer and not as deep.

I had a few more soft hits on the Aglia Brown spinner, in two short stretches of water, before I went for another lure change. This time I went for a #00 Gold Mepps Aglia, a small spinner that I had placed a #00 Black Fury sticker on, along with a small red piece of plastic on the shaft of the treble hook. I did this to several small inline Aglia spinners as a trial to see how they'd go on the trout in these small streams. Today was the day to give one of them a bit of a workout.

As I continued to work my way up the stream, casting and retrieving the spinner along the flatwater areas, I did have several hits and one hook up from a small trout, which I lost. I just moved into a narrow, shallow piece of water, that was well covered with tea trees and had quite a few caddis moths hovering close to them and just above the water surface. I did a backhand cast under the tea trees and instantly had a hook up. A small brown had taken the spinner and this little fish stayed on. Trout number three was landed and quickly released.

Ahead of me was another deep stretch of water, which I bypassed, then hopped back in at the top end of it. The heavy cloud cover opened up for a short time, so I flicked the little Aglia into a shaded area, next to the opposite side of the stream. On the retrieve a nice brown moved out and followed the spinner right to where I was standing in the water, where it spotted my movement and darted off.

I was certain that trout was going to take the spinner too and not all that happy when it didn't. My next cast was a long one, straight up the stream and into waist deep water. As I retrieved the spinner, I spotted a nice brown that came out of nowhere and moved in fast behind the lure. I kept the spinner at the same speed as the flow of the water, then gave the rod a light twitch. That was enough to get the trout to take the spinner.

The first thing that came to mind was 'please don't spit the lure' and once the trout was in close enough, it looked like it was well hooked in the top lip. Seeing that was a relief and so I filmed it right up to when it was in the landing net. Once in the net, out popped the little spinner. Here I was thinking it was well hooked too, however, had it made one more leap from the water, it may have been a different result. I was thankful that it didn't make one last leap.

After its release, I gave two more stretches of water a go. In the first one, I hooked and lost a nice brown and the second there wasn't a sign of a trout to be had. I could see heavy clouds building up again and it was time to call it a day and head back to the car before the rain arrived. The forecast was for 20-40mm of rain. Something that I really didn't want to happen as it meant that the rivers and streams would all be running much higher and faster than what they were now.

With just the four trout caught and released, from seven hook ups, it wasn't all that bad in the end. The good thing is that the trout are starting to show up. I doubt I'll be back in a river for several days now, with more rain on the way. With only half a dozen trips for the month of October, due to high river levels, I am well behind where I was this time last season.

This time last season I had made 22 trips to the rivers/streams, for 104 trout caught and released. So far this season I have only managed 18 trips, with just a measly 56 trout being caught and released. My end of season catch will be interesting, when it wraps up on the May 1, 2022. My season target of 500 trout will take some doing, that's for sure.

There was one disappointment from today's trip. It was my new anti-slip wading boots, that I bought for fishing small rivers and streams. I can tell you now, they're not anti-slip at all. The rocky bottom was very slippery today and it was like skating on ice for most of the time that I spent in the water. The boots are good quality, very light and comfortable to wear... it's just a shame that they're not up to scratch in terms of what they state they are.

Equipment Used:
Okuma Celilo Finesse Spin Rods - ULS 1-3kg trout rod
Okuma ITX Carbon Spin Reels - ITX-1000
Platypus Pulse Mono Premium Mono - 4lb
Platypus Super 100 Premium Mono - 4lb
Platypus Pre-Test Premium Monofilament
Platypus Stealth FC Fluorocarbon Leader
Mepps inline spinners

Adrian (meppstas)