Fishing Reports index> February 2007

Queenstown and Surrounds Fishing Report

From Chris Dore

Alls going well here in the south at opresent, and while we havent had too many cicada upon the waters of the south, trout are seeing just enough of them to recognise a big dry. The shores of lake wakatipu are producing a few fit fish for those drifting a manuka beetle or cicada patern around the bush lined edges, and the local lakes, moke, diamond and johnson are fishing well to the dry in the evenings, just as the sun leaves the water.

Further south the Mataura is turning on some nice hatches in its middle reaches as waters warm mid morning, and again later on in the evening, again when waters cool to within a comfortble temperature range for mayfly activity. At present, the middle of the avo appears dead in the heat of the day, although fishing a couple of wee wets across and down style along the deeper willow lines will often produce fish.

It is important to keep in touch with what is happening on this river, for trout can change to a different stage of the hatch like a switch.
This happen just the other day at ardlussa. The Traysers were fishing out a dun hatch around 0900 at the head of a long flat, and we were hitting em nicely on the DHE for a good half hour when all of a sudden, the fly would just drift untouched, as if the trout didnt even know it was there, even though they continued to dimple the surface. Looking towards the sun I could see that whilst there were still a few duns coming off, the hatch was tapering off, and above me I could see thousands of wee spiners returning to lay their eggs, and fall spent upon the surface. The fish were now locked into the spent spinners, so a mahogany imitation was soon launched and fish again hooked fast and furious. 20 mins later, the spinner fall dwindled and a refreshed raft of duns came down river. Again tying on the emerger we stayed in the game, showing us the importance of keeping an open, observent mind when fishing out a hatch situation.

Also of note was the importance of quick, acurate casting, for whilst these fish were siting just below the surface, they moved around a bit, and even with long 6x tippets, presenting the fly wel upstream and drifting it down would often result in a refusal - micro drag I think. I soon had the guys dropping their flies repeatedly above the fish, leading the rise by a mere metre, ensuring a slack leader and drag free presentation. This slack leader presentation was easily acheived by using a very long tippett, and throwing a very high forward cast, allowing it to parachute down to the water.
When sitting right at the surface, trouts window of vision is very small as they focus on fodder a mere few inches past their nebs, and close presentations will rarely alarm the fish. Micro drag however....

Have fun out there, the best of our season is still to come

Chris Dore
FFF Certified Casting Instructor
Queenstown
chris@troutsafaris.co.nz

Chris Dore is an independent fishing guide; his reports are not officially representative of Fish & Game NZ