New Zealand Fly Fishing Expeditions late season Rainbow trout

Fishing a small beaded streamer as a nymph can also induce strikes from fish that are not responsive to anything else.  Try not using a indicator and watch the fish, strike went it finishes the sideways movement or if you feel a knock or tug, tug back.

New Zealand Fly Fishing Expeditions Brown Trout Underwater

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The last week  saw a very wet storm front stall over the Fiordland and South Westland which dropped around 400 – 500ml of rain. This stuffed my plans to helicopter into a remote west coast river to do an overnight guided expedition with a client so when wisely changed plans and headed east away from the rain and had some good fishing  in quite low water conditions and still got trout to lift and take cicadas and blowflies.

Another big rain came thru and hit Southland and many of the rivers that way saw the biggest floods of the season with the Oreti going to near 500 cumecs. It’s  dropping and clearing now but in some of the mid sections has radically changed the lay of the river as much river bed has moved. It will certainly be a matter of finding old channels with good rocky structure and there you will find the fish.

New Zealand Fly Fishing Expeditions - an ugly snout on a trout

I had a day in the backcountry yesterday and although the Southerly wind was cold the sun was out and the cicadas were singing happily and we got stuck into some nice fishing in an extremely beautiful little mountain stream with some good success.

New Zealand Fly Fishing Expeditions - wee rainbow

This afternoon I pick up a client and we are heading out for another  mission into the wilds with one night in a remote hut and then one night in the bivvy cocoons further up the system before we finish back in Queenstown late Friday night. Hopefully we will track down some big trout that were eating mice early in the season and are super chunky and haven’t seen a fisherman in a while. The weather is looking conducive so it should be a great trip regardless.

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New Zealand Fly Fishing Expeditions - Colours of Brown trout

My special pattern X has also continued to solicit responses from difficult fish where all else has failed.

It’s certainly getting closer now to when the mad mayfly hatches start that we all look forward to near the end of the season down here in the lower South Island streams and rivers.   Remember all the lowland waters close the last day of April so make the most of it between now and then and the back country waters close on the last day of May.

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New Zealand Fly Fishing Expeditions 8.5lbs of brown trout

The interesting thing of note over the last few weeks has been the number of trout we have raised using cicada patterns. Getting the right presentation has lifted the fish to open it’s mouth and chomp the cicada. Many times however after the success of getting the right cast and presentation has resulted in no hook up due to the rod holder being to quick on the strike. It’s a hard thing to get right when you are not used to slow takes of big New Zealand trout and the urge to set the hook too early is strong in many anglers. Remember an appropriate pause is required to allow the fish to close its mouth before you set the hook. There are a few factors that influence when to set the hook.

Size of fish

Speed of water

Speed of take

Upstream or downstream take

My general rule of thumb is to say “God save the Queen” or “God save Dick Chaney” (he really needs it)! This  gets altered slightly depending on the variables above to be either slightly faster or slower (slower usually being the case).

Now the above may not work for you – you need to find something that does work for you to create the appropriate pause before setting. It needs to be something that works for you and your personality.

I have had clients say various things such as “not now but now”, “  don’t set the hook”, ” set the hook now”, “what a hog and set”, ” got you you bastard”, “look at the hooters on that”, and my all time favourite ” it’s as big as a thigh wader”!

Ok, you get the point now go catch some big New Zealand trout on the dry fly.

New Zealand Fly Fishing Expeditions - bent rod on a hog

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Fly Fishing Expeditions - Great Condition Mid season Rainbow trout

Well done HB on recent your PB.

Tip of the week – get cracking early to the water you want, the early bird gets the worms as such. If some one else is there already have a chat to them, stick to the arrangement you make. If you don’t know what the etiquette is on the rivers ask someone and what ever you do don’t jump other anglers – it’s a recipe for disaster for both parties.

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New Zealand Fly Fishing Expeditions 10.25 lbs beautiful brown trout hen

The hard yards getting into (and back out of) these areas when the weather was right saw most fish caught on terrestrial patterns – Cicada and Blowflies being the big winners along with one of my home tied flies we will just call the Wilkie Wonder!

New Zealand Fly Fishing Expeditions 7lb back country brown trout

Many of the fish that were caught was on the first cast. Making it count first time up makes life much easier in catching New Zealand South Island trout.  Over the week we landed approximately 40 trout and lost another 15  – 20 fish – what a week! It doesn’t get much better.

New Zealand Fly Fishing Expeditions 10lb back country brown trout

These particular clients are some of my regulars who have fished with me on quite a few occasions now. They have been applying the tips and tricks I give them and better still before each trip with me they get some practice in ensuring when they get here they can do the business, after all the guy on the end of the stick has to do the job at the end of the day. The Scott rods  were bent all week, the Airflo lines were making light work of the wind,  my new C&F design fly patch worked great – I didn’t lose a single fly all week while crawling thru all sorts of spiky New Zealand river side foliage while trying to find unsuspecting trout.

New Zealand Fly Fishing Expeditions - team work

These guys work really well as a team, both with each other and me as the guide. Between us we got some great video footage – so keep an eye out for some new videos at my You Tube channel or/and Hook TV

New Zealand Fly Fishing Expeditions releasing a brown trout

I’m at home for about 36 hours before I head out on my next Safari trip so it’s catch up time with my family and restock all the kit ready to hit the rivers in the lower 1/3rd of New Zealand’s South Island for another blast of trying to fool big NZ trout.

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4 days camping out in quite remote back country proved very successful for these visitors to New Zealand who landed some good fish each day and lost a few too. Most of the fish were caught on Cicadas or similar terrestrial patterns.

Once again apart from one fish it came down to making the first cast count. If we got it right first time, right line and right drag free presentation the fish were into it – if not hey presto the magic disappearing trout. The only time this was not the case we worked a fish for 1 hr and had it swing over to the fly and look several times but refuse. Many, many fly changes later the fish finally took the fly and client forgot to say ” God save the Queen”, probably only got the G in God out before setting and nothing there but the fish stayed in its feeding position and kept feeding. About 20 minutes later a “random” fly choice got another response from the fish and this time all went to plan with a great 6.5 lb trout to the bank. This sort of scenario is quite rare but the client never made a bad cast and the perseverance paid off.

New Zealand Fly Fishing Expeditions - Perserverance pays off

New Zealand Fly Fishing Expeditions - Scotland on Steroids

New Zealand Fly Fishing Expeditions - Scotland on Steroids with Rainbows

New Zealand Fly Fishing Expeditions - Happy Scots

New Zealand Fly Fishing Expeditions - Happy Scots and big New Zealand Brown trout

I’m off again tomorrow on another Safari trip for 8 days and will in search of some more majestic scenery and big trout – watch for the next post.

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I recently took a trip into one of these places – a long, rough 4WD and then a considerable walk gave us the access. The weather was perfect blue skies and hot temperatures. Our initial fly selection was a black blow fly and proved very successful in fooling the trout. Late morning gave us the sound of Cicada’s and so we switched and continued with our success.

New Zealand Fly Fishing Expeditions Green Cicada

Due to the nature of this small stream of the 12 trout hooked we only managed to get 5 to the bank, all the rest were long line release – pretty happy with that.

I had the pleasure of using a new gadget on this trip. Fly fisherman fall into two categories, the gadget freak and the guy’s that have jack shit but still catch all the trout. This gadget is not for catching trout but for making life easier at the beginning or end of the day or whenever you are back at your vehicle. The C&F Design Magnetic Rod Holder is great, set your rod up and clip it into the rod holder (I place mine on the front of my truck so I don’t forget the rods are there and drive away dragging them down the road) and then rig whatever you need to start your day with no worries of been blown over, stood on, trapped in a door or the myriad of other ways you can damage a fly fishing rod around a vehicle and trust me I know many of them! It certainly makes life easier.

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Here are some recent photos from a trip.

New Zealand Fly Fishing Expeditions - 7.5 lb brown trout

New Zealand Fly Fishing Expeditions - Wee Rainbow trout, great locations

New Zealand Fly Fishing Expeditions - Old 8.5 lb brown trout

New Zealand Fly Fishing Expeditions - Wee Rainbow trout, Great locations

I’m off this evening to hit the evening sedge session on the mighty Clutha River’s Deans Bank, its a very warm afternoon and with luck we will see some excellent sedge action – will let you know how its goes.

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New Zealand Fly Fishing Expeditions - Nice Brown trout

It payed dividends doing the miles as we did find some good clean-ish water, well clean enough that I could do a fair amount of spotting and mix it up with some blind fishing. As the water was high and still slightly discolored I choose to rig up with a very special pattern that gets fished like a nymph – it proved deadly and soon I had a happy client with a fish to the bank. By the end of the day (still fishing special rig x) we had 4 to the bank and dropped 2, one of which was a very solid fish that went upstream like a freight train about 150m and took us well into the backing before steaming under a bank with no intention of coming out and thats the way it stayed bemused looking angler and one big fish gone! We missed about 4 or so to boot so all in all considering the water conditions a pretty bloody good day out.

New Zealand Fly Fishing Expeditions - Great condition rainbow trout

Sometimes it pays to get up early and be prepared to drive f#@king miles.

Looks like we should be in for some settled weather over the next few days to a week and I am a wee bit excited as I have heard the odd bit of Cicada action in the 2 five minute periods when it has warmed up – all it needs now is a couple of hot days and they should be under way.

I am about to start a series of multi day safari fly fishing trips so will be all over the shop around the lower 1/3 of New Zealand’s South Island. No doubt we will find some good weather, rainbow trout smashing cicadas, mouse eating big brown trout and who knows what else to pit our skills against.

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