The last week in Southern New Zealand has seen quite a change in the rivers with the arrival of some wet storms instead of the dry windy ones we have seen over the last 2 months. The rivers have pretty much all come back up to much more normal spring size with the additional flows of water coming from the mountains. The fist series of storms were warm to high elevations and created some good size spates. The next lot of storms to come through were colder at elevation – in fact it snowed up high and the spates were not so big but keep the river volume high.
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZNBHY3zgF5k]
Many of the rivers have felt the impact with discoloration especially lower on the systems. The upper parts of most system have remained sight fishable but it has been much harder work finding the trout due to the extra volume of water. Generally the trout have been sitting in the same places but now that means they are down much deeper and really heavy nymphing gear is needed to get to them. We have been swinging streamers with some success with some big brown trout hammering the woolly bugger like a freight trains and putting up tremendous fights.
The weather looks like we will see another fairly disgruntled week with some wet storms again towards the end of the week. Lake Wakatipu has gone from being unusually low for the time of the year to just below the first flood warning criteria – watch this space over the next few weeks!
I think its a great thing that we have finally seen some good run off and it will freshen everything up and certainly give the fish some respite going into the busy Xmas and New Year period.
Certain isolated areas down here have mice populations going nuts and the result is the fish in these areas is to be seen to be believed. Most fish even in the areas where there are no mice are in very healthy order due to the easy spring we have had and the lack of big water knocking the trout around and will provide some excellent quarry over the next few months.
I can’t tell you how much I appreciated everything you did to make my fishing trip unforgettable. That trophy brown was totally unbelievable! Frankly, I’m surprised we were able to land him. That was one of the longest fights I’ve ever had with a fish. Fighting that trout and the river current was a whole new experience for me. Your advice and help were invaluable. I will definitely call you the next time I get to New Zealand. And I really enjoyed your website article and photo. Thanks again for putting me in position to catch the fish of a lifetime. And it was almost a few fish of a lifetime. All in all…brilliant!!!
