Some excellent catches are being reported around the state, just in time for the school holidays. It's great to see fishers out and about again since restrictions were lifted.

Written by Stephen Smith - Rubicon Web and Technology Training

Parent Category: Articles

Category: IFS, DPIPWE, MAST and Peak Bodies

Published: 07 July 2020

Hits: 2926

• IFS, DPIPWE, MAST and Peak Bodies

Read more: Winter fishing report 2020

After five days of not being able to fish due to windy and wet conditions today I headed back to the same little tannin stream in the hope the trout may be out and about seeing as the river is running a little higher than my last visit. The weather today wasn't all that bad either, plenty of cloud cover with patches of sunlight every now and then, the cool air temperature ( 9 degrees ) was also bearable for a change. It was a late morning start as well, just on 11:10 am when I finally hit the water after a nice long walk to get there. Seeing as the little well used gold #00 Aglia did the job a few days ago I stayed with it to start off the spin session. With the water level running a little higher and faster I did think about going for the larger #0 gold Black fury but decided to wait and see how the little gold Aglia performed first.

Written by Stephen Smith - Rubicon Web and Technology Training

Parent Category: Articles

Category: Trout Fishing

Published: 07 July 2020

Hits: 1175

• Adrian
• Trout Fishing

Read more: 400th trout of the season

With most of the larger rivers running high & fast I thought it best to head over and hit the small streams again as they're much safer to fish, even though there's plenty of water in them they are still okay to hop into and chase trout.

The weather was damp with light drizzle showing up every few minutes and a very cool air temperature of just eight degrees. I arrived at the area I was about to fish when a couple of young boys (7&10) who were helping their parents repairing a paddock fence wandered over for a chat and wanted to know how to catch trout.

I spent around thirty minutes giving them all the info they could take in, before heading off through the bush I gave them a couple of Mepps booklets plus several Mepps spinners to get them started. It was 2:40 pm by the time I hit the water and started flicking a #0 Aglia Fluo rainbow spinner into the cold dark tannin water.

Written by Stephen Smith - Rubicon Web and Technology Training

Parent Category: Articles

Category: Trout Fishing

Published: 01 July 2020

Hits: 1201

• Adrian
• Trout Fishing

Read more: High water and damp conditions

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

Written by Stephen Smith - Rubicon Web and Technology Training

Parent Category: Articles

Category: IFS, DPIPWE, MAST and Peak Bodies

Published: 18 June 2020

Hits: 809

• IFS, DPIPWE, MAST and Peak Bodies
• Trout Fishing

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.

Written by Stephen Smith - Rubicon Web and Technology Training

Parent Category: Rivers

Category: Mersey River

Published: 17 June 2020

Hits: 1767

• Mersey River
• Adrian

Read more: Upper Mersey Wild Brown Trout

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.

Written by Stephen Smith - Rubicon Web and Technology Training

Parent Category: Articles

Category: IFS, DPIPWE, MAST and Peak Bodies

Published: 17 June 2020

Hits: 1142

• IFS, DPIPWE, MAST and Peak Bodies

Read more: Anglers’ Report - Tagged fish from the Bradys Chain of Lakes

Yesterday saw many inland waters come to the end of their 2019-20 season.

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

Written by Stephen Smith - Rubicon Web and Technology Training

Parent Category: Articles

Category: IFS, DPIPWE, MAST and Peak Bodies

Published: 02 June 2020

Hits: 1116

• IFS, DPIPWE, MAST and Peak Bodies

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.

Written by Stephen Smith - Rubicon Web and Technology Training

Parent Category: Articles

Category: Trout Fishing

Published: 02 June 2020

Hits: 1453

• Adrian
• Trout Fishing

Read more: Cattle end the trout fishing

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.

Written by Stephen Smith - Rubicon Web and Technology Training

Parent Category: Articles

Category: IFS, DPIPWE, MAST and Peak Bodies

Published: 30 May 2020

Hits: 1029

• IFS, DPIPWE, MAST and Peak Bodies

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/.

Share via: Facebook, Twitter, or Email

Written by Stephen Smith - Rubicon Web and Technology Training

Parent Category: Articles

Category: IFS, DPIPWE, MAST and Peak Bodies

Published: 30 May 2020

Hits: 1084

• IFS, DPIPWE, MAST and Peak Bodies