The regular trout season has now all but come to an end in New Zealand, with the current world events affecting us, as well as everyone else in all corners of the globe. I was fortunate enough to have some great fishing and guiding moments prior to the country's lock down, including one afternoon on a Central lake.
The brown trout were still there to sight fish on the silt flats and weedy edges with small damsel nymphs and floating lines, but we decided to take the boat out and search some deeper water ( 2-20 feet). Our target; prime condition rainbows that are starting to show up in preparation for their annual migratory run up the river over the coming months - some extremely exciting fly fishing indeed! Unfortunately we only had one intermediate line with us, so rigged the other floating line with a heavy streamer and very long leader, hoping to get it to the required depth. The day was mild enough and flat calm - a perfect autumn afternoon in Otago. The willow and poplar trees are just starting to change colours. Within the first few casts a small maiden rainbow took the bugger on the intermediate line, a sign of good things to come.
Our chosen flies were mainly small slim woolly bugger variants, but with plenty of weight, perhaps around a size 8. We found over the years that hot head beads (bright pink, green etc) and collars to be extremely deadly on the lake rainbows, and stuck with that theory during the afternoon. We both used 6wt lines for the day, although when targeting some of the larger fish with bigger streamers in the fast river sections a 7 or 8 wt can certainly be an advantage when trying to turn and land a fish.
The intermediate line proved far more successful than the other rig - getting the correct depth for any scenario fly fishing for trout is always an absolute key for constant success. I have talked about winter rainbow fishing before on our Southern and Central lakes, and depth is probably the single most important variable. Be in the wrong water column and you simply won’t hit fish. Don’t move to cover water (and therefore fish) and you will blank all day, simple as that. Anyway, we fished through several parts of the lake prospecting for trout, but consistently hit fish in the deepest part of one delta channel, that from the boat looked average and structure-less, but was holding fish. The best fish of the day Dad landed, a stunning well conditioned rainbow of 6 pounds. These are the fish worth targeting and catching! The fight was heavy and the trout leapt into the air several times. It's great when a plan comes together and this fish made the afternoon. We had a few more smaller trout come to the net before calling it a day - and unknown to us at the time, our last trip for the season - probably.
I will write up (or even video) a run down of our winter opportunities in the coming months, but if you want to get out for a great day on the water once the travel restrictions are lifted please contact me at thomas.j.mcauliffe@gmail.com
Take care, stay safe, and fish feck'n hard once we are able to again.
Below are some kind words from Philip, USA.
”My wife and I had an excellent day fishing with Tom. We had gotten stranded in the flooding last month and weren’t able to make our scheduled day. Tom was extremely accommodating in finding an alternative day that worked into our travel schedule. We ended up on a river that Tom knew. We fished hard all day. The morning was tough even though we saw fish and changed flies and set ups numerous times. But we persevered and covered a lot of ground and were rewarded in the afternoon with a number of beautifully healthy and large rainbows. Tom worked hard to get us our fish that day. He was knowledgeable of the water we fished, the insects on/in the water, and could see the fish. He’s easy to hang out with and very communicative before, during, and even after the trip. We were delighted to get an email from him a couple days afterward with a bunch of really high quality pictures that he’d taken of our day. All in all I’d recommend him and I’d go again if we have the opportunity to be in New Zealand again!”
