Brindabella trout

[willbb 0]

About a week ago, my new Sage txl-f 3wt 7'10" rod arrived along with a rigged up Sage Click III and an ultralight BlueSky furled leader. That day, I took it into the backyard to try casting it a bit. I decided that this weekend, I had to try it out. On saturday afternoon, My dad and I set out for a camping spot almost an hour and a half away from Canberra, but after one missed turnoff and half an hour of going around in circles in the labyrinth of dirt roads, we stopped at a clearing by a tiny creek. The next morning, as soon as the sun was up, I got up and spent half an hour getting a good fire going, rigged up my new rod and headed off for a fish. after twenty minutes of extremely tight quarters fishing in this stream that was no more than 1.5m (4"11') wide I reached a nice little pool and started casting my terrestrial insect imitation working my way up the pool, when I saw movement beneath the undercut bank about a metre in front of me. I cast the fly about 30cm in front of where I'd seen the movement, so that the current drifted my fly right up against the bank to the fish. The trout slowly drifted out from its hideaway, then lazily followed and swallowed the fly. When I set the hook, this nice rainbow went crazy, jumping and splashing about everywhere. With this rod, I could feel every single head shake and tail movement. I got the fish out and it was a beautifully coloured 10" rainbow. After a cooked breakfast,we rolled up the swags and headed for Tumut, which has quite a big (by australian standards) trout river I decided to try the 3wt on a bigger river, rather than take out my 5wt. I was able to cast a decent distance, but trees right behind me made the back-cast difficult, but with a ten o'clock 12 o'clock stroke, I was able to do a decent cast. In the current in the middle, the trout were massacring insects on the surface, but since I was restricted to the bank, I could only watch as my fly fell two or three feet short each time. I eventually moved a bit further upstream and tried a scud imitation in the current further up, after working my way up stream for about half an hour, my dad came to tell me that it was time to go home. I started working my way back downstream with a black nymph, when the drift in leader changed slightly,I set the hook optimistically, only to be disappointed by a dead weight on the end. After tugging for a bit, the snag seemed to be slowly coming towards me. Once it was about seven feet away, I saw that there was something huge on the end. I had pulled in a monster rainbow, almost two feet long! But this fish was very unwell, one side of its face was rotten looking white flesh and it had two big milky white patches on its flank on the same side. I put it back in and tried to give it some oxygen and help it recover, but when I brought my dad back ten minutes later, it was belly up at a snag a few metres downstream. I was disappointed that my biggest trout to date hadn't even tried to put up a fight, I don't think I'll count this one as a catch, as I suspect that it may have been snagged, because in its state, it would have been unable to seek out my nymph. All in all, I had a great day and I'm making plans with my neighbour to head back up there for a week sometime soon, but I'll need to get some waders before then to properly fish this great river. I'll post a review of the new rod sometime soon, but I'm a bit swamped with work , because of upcoming exams.

If any australian members read this please contact me, because I'd like to try to organise an australian fly swap sometime soon, but I'll have to contact Smalliehunter first, because I think there are some rules about organising swaps through this site.

 

Tight lines,

Will Barker

 

P.S. Someone on the bank took a photo of the big one and I gave them my email, so I hope that they send it to me, so that I can post it on here.

[ikerajala 0]

That was an exciting story to read over a cup of coffee this morning. Thanx Will![/color]

[willbb 0]

Hi Ikerajala,

 

I'm glad that you enjoyed my story. I should have another one in a few weeks, when I head back there

[willbb 0]

Here's a picture of me with the trout, you can really see how sick it is. It's quite a big file, so it might take a while to load.

Edited May 21, 2012 by willbb

[Flyman416 0]

Here's a picture of me with the trout, you can really see how sick it is. It's quite a big file, so it might take a while to load.

Wow that is one sickly looking trout but nice catch anyway. What do you think happened to it?

[FlyFishin'Jam 0]

Zombie Trout! That is what spawned out salmon look like

[DazWah 0]

i would send that photo to NSW fisheries and see what the heck is wrong with that fish....