Sea-run trout fishing this year got off to a cracking start in most areas, with the majority of anglers employing nearly every trout fishing technique to secure fish in local estuaries statewide.
Even those anglers fishing the "off-season" lower down in our estuaries for sea-trout commented on the number of fish moving in early August.
Please check all relevant authorities before fishing - www.ifs.tas.gov.au and dpipwe.tas.gov.au . Don't forget issuu.com/stevenspublishing for years of back issues !
A campaign to accelerate the recreational fishing community involvement in fish habitat restoration was launched today by OzFish Unlimited.
Through a series of powerful images, the online campaign flips the cliched bragging right photo of an angler and their catch with the waterways in focus instead of the fish.
Click here for more information.
Source: https://www.ifs.tas.gov.au/news/2020/jun/17/focus-waterway-health
Community involvement river restoration work
With fine weather this morning with rain forecast for later this afternoon I thought I would get a spin session in before the rain arrived. This trip was to the upper Mersey River, an area on private property and one I haven't fished for a couple of months. The reason I haven't fished here all that often this trout season is because it's a rough & tough area to get into, plus the river itself has to be one of the toughest stretches of water to fish. The rocky river bottom is always covered in a brown slime and so slippery under foot at times it's near impossible to stay upright, not only that the rocks roll underfoot. Another problem here is the water weed growth that has spread along the river making spin fishing near in possible in most stretches of water. Another reason I headed here was that I wanted to give the tannin waters a rest as well as a change of scenery, another reason for heading to the upper Mersey. It was close to 9:20 am when I arrived & parked the car on a narrow bush track on private property, then after a lot bush bashing followed by a long walk I was at the river by around 10:00am. The river was running a little higher than I had expected and still at a safe wading depth, the water was a light tannin colour, the river bottom was it's normal poor condition as I stated earlier.
In May – June 2019 3,500 adult brown trout were caught in the fish trap on the River Derwent at Lake King William. They were tagged with a numbered green tag, and released directly into Bradys Lake. During the 2019-20 season, a total of 95 of these trout were reported to the IFS as being caught by anglers. Of these fish, most were kept, with just 5 reported as being released.
As all tagged fish were transferred into Bradys Lake, we could look at where they moved to within the chain of lakes. Of the 95 tagged trout caught and reported by anglers, 27 were from Bradys Lake, 46 from Lake Binney and 22 from Tungatinah Lagoon. This indicates that 71% percent of these tagged fish had moved out of Bradys Lake, with 48% moving into Lake Binney and 23% travelling down into Tungatinah Lagoon. One fish was reported from the Bradys white water.
Read more: Anglers’ Report - Tagged fish from the Bradys Chain of Lakes
Waters managed for rainbow trout closed:
Dee Lagoon
Junction Lake
Lake Meston
Lake Rowallan
Lake Skinner
Lake Youd
Mersey River above Lake Rowallan
River Leven upstream of Loongana Road
Weld rivers (both North and South)
It was the end of the first year of the river season extension trial, closing:
Brumbys Creek downstream from Weir 1 to the Macquarie River (Note: the day use facilities are currently closed).
Macquarie River downstream from the junction with Brumbys Creek to the South Esk River.
Meander River downstream from Strath Bridge (on the C735) to the South Esk River
South Esk River downstream from the bridge on Storys Creek Road at Avoca to Beams Hollow upstream of Lake Trevallyn, delineated by a straight line between grid reference 506358E 5406426N and 506467E 5406414N.
And Lakes Mackintosh and Rosebery closed.
But it is not the end of fishing for the 2019-20 season. There are many waters open all year. You can find the full list on our website, along with information about fishing during the Roadmap to Recovery.
Source: https://www.ifs.tas.gov.au/news/2020/jun/01/inland-waters-reached-end-their-2019-20-season
Headed off for another afternoon spin session in a tannin stream, hit the water just on 1:45 pm in what was reasonably good conditions. The water level had dropped by a few inches since yesterdays trip so I'm hoping there will be a few more trout out and about today. When I left home it was nice and overcast, by the time I hopped in the water the clouds had parted and the sun was out, good thing was there was plenty of insect life hovering above the water. The first thing I noticed was a small trout jumping in the pool I had just entered which was a good sign. After several casts around this knee deep tannin water with the copper Aglia I finally had a hit from a small trout and that's as far as it went so I moved on to the next narrow stretch of water.
Check out this video of Norm Cribbin, an avid Tasmanian fly fisherman. When trout season closes Norm keeps his passion for trout fishing alive from home. He pulls out his gear, checks his lines, ties flies, and hops onto the IFS website to research waterways and keep up to date with trout transfers and stocking.
Brown trout from this years spawning run at Liawenee |
Spawning brown trout have been running thick at Liawenee, despite COVID-19 restrictions forcing the cancellation of Trout Weekend 2020. With good rain and large flows being released from Lake Augusta, trout spawning conditions have never been better at Liawenee. These conditions have seen good numbers of brown trout running into the Liawenee fish trap.
Each year we weigh and measure 200 fish to assist in monitoring the fishery. This year the average weight is 804g and the average length was 415mm, with some fish reaching 1.4Kg. This is very similar to last year where the average weight was 795g and 412mm. The fish are in good condition.
We have been busy moving these fish to popular angling waters around the state. The fish that have been moved to greener pastures, are able to turn from ‘good’ condition to ‘great’ condition in the coming season. An up to date record of our fish transfer and stocking activities can be found here https://www.ifs.tas.gov.au/fisheries/stocking/.
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Brown trout from salvage |
Over the past couple of days we have salvaged 348 trout from the River Clyde downstream of the Lake Crescent outlet. As there is no requirement for a water release at present these fish had become restricted in their movements.
Of these 171 were returned to Lake Crescent and 177 were released into Lake Sorell. The fish ranged in size up to 3.5kg.
Source: https://www.ifs.tas.gov.au/news/2020/may/26/fish-released-lake-sorell-salvage
After some decent rain a few days ago I felt a trip back to the tannin waters may be the go, with plenty of water in them there should be a few hungry trout around. This trip was to a stretch of water I haven't fished since the 8th March which is exactly a month ago, on that trip I caught and released nine trout. If I can catch that amount again on this trip I'll be pretty stoked seeing as this tannin stream has slowed down with the trout on my previous trips. Seeing as it's been a month since I've actually fished this stretch of water it will be interesting to see how it fishes this afternoon.
Curries River Reservoir is located off the B82 road, between George Town and Bridport. The fishery serves anglers from the greater Launceston area. Over the years this water has produced variable fishing for both brown and rainbow trout. However, the fish are always of excellent size and condition.
During August 2019 we did a survey of Curries River Reservoir to assess;
- the number of brown and rainbow trout,
- - the size of the brown trout population,
- the length structure of the brown trout population and,
- the condition of all fish.
In summary, there were very low numbers of both brown and rainbow trout. However, the resident fish we did catch were in great condition.
Before the survey, 1 175 adult brown trout with their adipose fin clipped were released into the reservoir. These fish weighed around 721 g and were on average 420 mm long. By the 2020-21 season they should be approaching 1.2 kg. The fin clip enables to identify the released fish and estimate the size of the brown trout population.
As a consequence of the survey, we plan to boost fish numbers in Curries River Reservoir with stockings of brown and rainbow trout over winter 2020.
For the full results, read the Fisheries Performance Assessment Technical Report – Curries River Reservoir 2019.
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Here is a list of all of the Article Categories. The number in Brackets, eg (13) is the number of articles. Click on Derwent River and all articles relating to the Derwent will be displayed in the central area.
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Presented from Issue 105, August 2013
Christopher Bassano fishes over 250 days a year. This interview was recorded just before he headed off to fish for Australia in the World Fly Fishing Championships in Norway 14-17 August 2013.
I live on a small stream and at the start of the season I like to go off on a bit of a discovery mission and fish the headwaters of the creeks and rivers I feel an affinity with.
These small rivers include the St Pats, Meander, Forester, Little Forester and others. The further up you go on these rivers the clearer and lower the levels. They are often less affected by the rain and runoff and you get some good opportunities. Get as close to the source as you can and you will find some good dry fly fishing. Don’t limit yourself to those I have mentioned. Most headwaters will hold trout.
Read more ...