Fishing News index>April 2007

FISH AND GAME WEST COAST NEWS

For outdoor inclined individuals it’s been a great year so far.

Last spring a better than average whitebait season – in the south at least, and albeit fairly late - led into some good early season trout fishing, and big sea-run browns provided the major attraction up until January which heralded a brilliant run of fine weather.

This got the upland fisheries cracking and prolific cicada hatches coupled with a moderate ‘mouse year’ – primarily from the Grey catchment north - was responsible for producing some outstanding head-water fish.

As if this wasn’t enough the ‘Coast has just experienced a remarkable salmon season with fish being caught in most major rivers south of the Grey.

The lake-based salmon fisheries at Paringa, Mapourika and Moeraki produced particularly well and as word spread the lakes attracted more than the usual number of anglers from neighbouring regions. The true extent of the salmon run will not be revealed until the May spawning counts but it seems safe to predict that 2007 will be a good year for natural recruitment in the key salmon catchments.

At the time of writing the ‘roar’ is in full swing and an abundance of young stags is helping to compensate for a dearth of true trophy heads which, apart from a few select areas, the ‘Coast has never been renowned for.

Continuing on the positive theme there have been some encouraging signs on the environmental front. In recent seasons Fish & Game has received numerous angler complaints about agricultural discharges – both direct and non-point – and the downstream effects on trout fishing opportunity. However this summer we received not a single complaint.

While there remain a few outstanding issues the West Coast Regional Council – with a little prompting - generally appears to be getting on top of their statutory responsibility for protecting fresh water. Their work with dairy farmers coupled with the recently introduced policy on stock crossings can only be expected to improve the situation further.

In a similar vein the recently commissioned Reefton sewage treatment plant has reportedly done wonders for the trout fishing in the mid-lower Inangahua River. While adverse effects pre-treatment were not immediately apparent to the naked eye, (no floating turds for example) there were obviously some nasties in the discharge that the river is better off without.

So with a mere three weeks until opening day it is comforting to think that when the gamebird season ends in August it’s only a month until the whitebait season starts…….when the cycle begins again. I wonder what they do in the cities!

Chris Tonkin