400-dAdrian's 400th

Trout number 400 reached today. 6/4/2015

Needing another six more trout to reach the 400 for the 2014/15 season I thought a trip back to Merseylea would be worth a shot. I knew the Mersey River still had a good flow of water coming down and this area would give me the best chance of reaching the mark. I was in the river by 4.30pm and didn't realise how low the sun was, with daylight saving out of the way it was much lower than I expected. Still I knew I would still have at least two hours to get the trout I required. The first run of fast water didn't show any signs of a fish, but in the next run I managed five hook ups for three browns caught and released. This was just the start I wanted and I had only fished some twenty meters of this fast water. It went quiet for the next ten meters before I had another brown take the little Mepps black fury, it was soon in the net. With only two more required I was feeling pretty confident of reaching my target before I made it to the end of this fast run in which I still had some thirty meters left to fish. It didn't happen, the rest of the run didn't give a yelp much to my disgust.

 

400-a


'" Five browns including number 400 taken in shallow flat water along RHS of river.''

The next two sections of river also drew a blank too!! I still had one good stretch of fast water ahead of me yet and the confidence was still fairly high and only slightly dented from the last couple of fast water runs. This next one was a pretty fast one so I concentrated on the flat shallow sections along the right hand side of the river. It was just running too fast deeper out to be holding any trout. These flat sections are no more than 120mms deep but I have caught several browns in them before, so I'm counting on them firing up again today. It was now just after 5.30pm and darkness was setting in fast so I had to get a move on. Two casts directly upstream into the flat water I was on, a nice solid brown had gabbed the little black fury. Didn't take too much longer before this fish was also in the net. This brown (410gms) was trout No: 399 for the season and was landed at 5.35pm. All I need know is for one more trout to be in the next thirty meters of flat water, take the spinner and stay on until it was in the net. Sounds pretty simple, but as simple as it sounds it doesn't always go as we want it too does it.

Today it did! Four cast later into a very shallow (100mms) of river I had number 400 take the black fury and it did stay on for me as well, all the way to the net right on 5.39pm. I can tell you now I was still a little nervous leading this fish to the net as it only takes one head shake and it's gone. So trout number 400 was photographed and released back into the river by one very relieved fisherman that's for sure. I fished the last fifteen meters of flat water and picked up another three medium sized browns. The decision to head to Merseylea was a good one after all and so was the end result catching and releasing nine well conditioned browns from eleven hook ups. It only took one and a half hours of fishing too as I was back at the car by 6.10pm.

400-b

 

400-c''

Trout number 400 for the 2014/15 season.''

Go to top
JSN Boot template designed by JoomlaShine.com