Well conditioned brown trout
This is a typically well conditioned jack brown trout, typical of the many fish over the 50cm mark. This wild brown trout is 56cm, taken on a pink lady sparse mayfly red spinner imitation. Image credits: Gary France
Trout rising over there
From October a major local focus for mayfly hatches is on rivers, for which the Macquarie River is fabled. In the right conditions there are light winds, favourable for enough spinner on the water to get the trout's interest. Here the telltale rings of a rise are evidence of one fish moving rather consistently through the reeds. An adult red spinner mayfly pattern, well presented to consistent feeders, can bring excellent results. Image Credits: Gary France
Trailing a mudeye
It was a tough day on the mayflies so trailing a mudeye just sub-surface behind an emerger, cast close to the moving reeds, enabled Cindy to bring this strong brown trout to the boat. Cindy and Mike came fishing in Tassie in November. Image Credit: Gary France
Good days on a lowland lake
This year, from October on the lowland lakes the mayfly hatches are into a good consistent swing. On the right days - good cloud cover and intermittent sunny breaks changing the light levels, variable winds usually coming from the northern quarters, we drogue down the lake looking for quantities of hatching duns and fish showing to them. Image credit: Gary France, Trout Territory
Portrait of a wild brown trout
The strikingly beautiful profile of a wild brown trout. This hefty 56cm wild brown trout went almost to the backing. Fish like these are reasonably common in Four Springs Lake, and other quality Tasmanian trout waters. Photo credit: Fiona Dewar
Cloud and patchy blue sky
Water temperature hovering just above 13 degrees Celsius. Light to moderate winds with a few gusty spells and small squalls. Nice steely grey light in a mixture of good cloud cover with occasional sunny breaks. Excellent conditions for mayfly hatches. This location is Four Springs, not far from Launceston in the northern midlands region of Tasmania.
Rainbow trout on a two fly rig
Mayfly duns drifting down, just a few. Two fly rig, one emerging dun and a nymph underneath. This rainbow trout chose the nymph.
Mayfly time
It's that time of year again where mayfly begin to appear in significant numbers and the fish take a great interest in them as a food source. We are seeing a number of duns in these cloud and patchy blue conditions, and a few fish showing on the surface to cash in on the bounty. This is on Four Springs Lake around the magic 2pm where both browns and rainbows came to the fly. Gary and Fiona enjoyed a few hours on the water this weekend. Here's Gary with a 56cm wild brown trout.
Tamar Estuary Fishing Experience
Tamar Estuary Fishing tours are available all year round. Tamar River estuary has many species of fish. Most of the fishing we do is in the last few kilometers of flow into Bass Strait where the water is usually clear and it has a strong tidal influence with a tidal variation of around 3 meters. Any fish species will take fly, and for some, the challenge of adding new species to their fly fishing experiences is not far away. Whether fly, lure, or bait fishing, major fish species that we target include Australian Salmon, flathead, whiting, barracouta, bream, silver and [...]
Why is weed important in the trout’s habitat?
For trout living in still waters, weed is a significant part of their habitat. Just as the clean water and sub-straight - the silt, soils, or whatever makes up the base layer, contribute to the whole environment, weed growth has a lot to do with the exchange of oxygen, and provides cover for macro invertebrates, crustacea, Galaxia, and the foods that they live on. The trout is an apex predator in its environment, so with a really good structure of microscopic and macroscopic members of the food chain living in the weed, and using the weed as a primary shelter [...]