Auckland / Waikato News Index> November 2007

Round-up November

Waipa Power Station
It got a fair bit of publicity in the Waikato media, but Auckland anglers will be unaware that Hydro Energy Limited and Mr Neal (earthworks contractor) were sentenced in the Environment Court for their breach of resource consents for the construction of the Waipa Power Scheme.

Hydro Energy Limited were fined a total of $86,500 and ordered to pay a further $43,800 to Environment Waikato to cover the costs of investigating the offending and bringing the prosecution.  Furthermore, the Court made enforcement orders for remedial work to be undertaken to repair the effects of the rock spill at the top of the Waipa Gorge, estimated to cost $100,000. 

Neal was fined $25,000 and ordered to pay court costs to Environment Waikato of a further $5,000 after pleading guilty to three representative charges relating to earthworks carried out on the site by him and his employee’s. 

Whanganui River: new waters
Transit New Zealand have recently removed willows from about 900m of riverbank bordering the Whanganui River downstream from the Piriaka Power Station.  The willows were removed so Transit could carry out work on the rock wall bordering the highway.  The removal of the willows has opened up a large area of superb fishing water that is now easily accessible by anglers. 

Parkinson’s Lake
Another twenty juvenile grass carp into Parkinson’s Lake to control the oxygen weed and enhance angler access.

Awakino River
The Awakino River had a massive flood on Monday 5th November with about 180mm of rain overnight.  The river rose to about 280 cumecs – nearly ten times the normal flow of the Tongariro – flooding over the road in several places.  Other rivers in the King Country were not affected as it was a very localised storm.

Green beetle time 
Green beetles live on manuka trees and provide a significant food source for trout from about mid-November until the end of January.  Fishing with a green beetle fly can be very productive and a lot fun.  It is also easy fishing, much easier than nymph fishing as you can see the fly and thus controlling line drag is less difficult. One of the myths of dry fly fishing is that it is only productive when fish are observed rising (taking surface food).  Indeed trout do spend much of their time feeding on nymphs, but they will still devour any surface food drifting past. 

I recently (early November) fished with a couple of green beetle flies in the Awakino River, ignoring the large pools and concentrating on the runs and pocket water.  The objective was to catch rainbows under 30cm for a research project on trout aging.  Sadly it was a frustrating day as time-after-time the fish gulping down my fly would turn out to be excessively large!  The “worse” culprit being a 51cm rainbow that greedily devoured one of the flies in a knee-deep run. This highlights one of the advantages of fishing with dry flies over nymphs – that it is much easier to fish pocket water in rapids and runs, and these waters often hold good fish. 

Any river with a bit of manuka on the banks should provide good dry fly fishing, and that definition would include most rivers in the region. 

Good web sites
We’re still getting enquires over web sites for local stream conditions.  The following sites should be included in the bookmarks on your web browser:

Auckland/Waikato rain radar
www.metservice.co.nz/default/index.php?alias=akradarlast24hrs

Waikato: rainfall
www.ew.govt.nz/enviroinfo/riverlevelsandrainfall/LatestReadingRainfall.asp

Waikato rivers: flows
www.ew.govt.nz/enviroinfo/riverlevelsandrainfall/LatestReadingRiverLevels.asp

Whanganui rivers: flows
www.hydro.genesisenergy.co.nz/AllFlow.asp

Whanganui headwaters rainfall (Whanganui at Te Porere)
www.horizonsmw.govt.nz/default.aspx?pageid=172

Ben Wilson
Fisheries Manager
Auckland/Waikato Fish and Game

Back to Reel Life