bombora

Got this sent through today: Wyangala Dam is set to receive its first substantial boost of rainbow trout in almost a decade with 50,000 fingerlings to be stocked over the coming months, Member for Burrinjuck and Minister for Primary Industries, Katrina Hodgkinson said today. Ms Hodgkinson said 10,000 rainbow trout fingerlings will be released into the iconic waterway by Dutton Trout Hatchery staff today. The fingerlings, produced at the NSW Government's Dutton Trout Hatchery at Ebor and the Gaden Trout Hatchery at Jindabyne, represent the first in the series of stockings this year. "Wyangala Dam used to be a great trout fishery however due to years of drought, very little trout stocking has occurred over the past decade,” Katrina Hodgkinson said. "During this time, there has been a focus on native fish stocking and the dam has gained the reputation as a fantastic native fishery. "With the dam level now close to capacity we are hoping to create a mixed fishery where anglers can get the best of both worlds with quality trout and native fish on offer.” Ms Hodgkinson said Wyangala Dam is the jewel in the crown of the central west, with a catchment area of 8,300 square kilometres and a dam capacity of more than 1.2 million megalitres. “The surface area of the dam is two and a half times the size of Sydney Harbour. “The release of 50,000 rainbow trout fingerlings over the coming months will be further boosted with planned releases of an additional 60,000 Murray cod and 50,000 golden perch over summer. “This is fantastic news for the State’s one million recreational fishers, and is further evidence of the NSW Government’s commitment to enhancing fishing opportunities across the State,” Ms Hodgkinson said. The trout and native fish stocking programs are funded in part by money raised by the NSW Recreational Fishing Fee and placed into the NSW Recreational Fishing Trust

Inspiring pics and report, as usual! Love the colours on the fish.

Hiya yes, tried a free download one which didn't work, hoping to duck out from work today as Paxtons said they might be able to help. Fingers crossed.

Thanks for the fly lesson offers guys, but I have had a bit of a modest ambition to get a 40cm plus male rainbow and brown on my little jigs before trying the fly. Don't know if the rainbow bit's been achieved because no photo momento (ha) but still gotta get an OK brown. To me a long ultralight rod, fine line and leader and tiny jig you've tied yourself and have to bring life while reading water flow has a lot of the same appeal as stream fly fishing. Was a challenge in see-thru water. The pools where I was were very very slow moving. Even a slight breeze had the leaves floating on the surface being blown aganist the flow, it was that slow. Know bugger all about the river but I can imagine a litle bit more water being good. Might have to finally get off bum and visit TCD to try for the brown.

Mate's gonna come round on weekend and see if anything can be retrieved from the devil's camera. I'd love to hear how a fly went and they'd go mental on a 5 weight, ballistic on a three weight (I guess, ha instant expert)It was all I'd hoped an Aussie bush trout stream to be with crystal water and giant trees. I kept mistaking big fish laying deep for small fish higher in the water beacause it was that clear. Ha, more things to learn.

Hiya, around Turon Gates. Still buzzing (as long as I don't think about the pics) and man my legs are totally knackered. Not match fit. I've only fished the Fish and Duckmaloi and it's a very different river to the small bits of those two rivers I briefly fished. No easy cow paddock walking beside the water, it's all clambering over fallen giant gums, following wombat tracks and wobbling over lots of cobble stones (ankles are asking for a hot bath!). But heaps and heaps of space to cast in most pools and runs and lots of jungle-stuff in little shoots running through tunnels of fallen trees, if that's appealing. Still can't get over how many fish I saw, and all so plump, is that normal? And they made runs a bonnie would be proud of. Ha I know bugger all about trout, just googled what a mayfly looks like and i think one landed on my arm when it warmed up mid arvo. Lots of midge-things (sorry, no idea again!) buzzing in groups on the surface in quiet corners, lots of butterflies, stacks of dragonflies, quite a few blowies. No rises in the morning, and went very quiet as late arvo and dusk approached. Different weather to Sydney, 24C and blue skies and a few puffy white clouds. Think I got a bit lucky. Did I say I'm still buzzing.

Did three shortish sessions on the upper Turon and just got home. It's a beautiful river. I've read that Turon rainbows have a reputation as athletic fish. My first rainbow, a 46cm jack, was a stunning looking fish. Thick shouldered and hook jawed and crimson cheeked. Fat! But it just barrel-rolled and twisted and lugged against the line a bit. He bit on my third cast. The next, a 43cm jack, and every other fish afterwards, went ballistic. This one actually rooster tailed the line across cobble stoned shallows and leapt high, then reversed the run and jumped again and fought all the way to my hand. Ended up with these two, a 39cm male, a nuclear-powered 41cm hen which also did drag screeming runs and twisting, shaking jumps, and a 35cm hen. They were all barrel chested, brightly coloured and fat as pigs. This river must really carry a lot of trout tucker. Also had about ten trillion follows. Every pool nd good run had fish follow the lure. So frustrating but makes you want to crack the code. The first two fish came on a 1/16th black wascally wabbit tailed jig, the rest on a 1/32nd darter head rabbit tailed jig in perch colours. Both are about an inch long but three pound braid and a 7'6" ultra light rod casts them far enough. Also got a 25cm redfin and one pool was home to two 3kg carp. Met two blokes using two inch stickbait plastics and celta style spinners who had no luck that arvo. For the fly boys: mid arvo saw heaps of rises by smaller 30cm fish, from gentle sips to big splashy half jumps. Photos you ask> new camera, keen to see how pics came out, touch wrong button, panic, hit another button, delete all images. Argh. Had really wanted a profle pic of a hook jawed male rainbow and got one. Ah well. Have to stay with the memories. Was magic, clambering up a river which splits huge rock peaks and tempting turbo charged trout. Could not have asked for more for my second ever stream trout trip. And only saw one snake; a one metre red bellied black.

Yep they are one of the creatures of the black lagoon! Three or four years ago another really solid jack was fooled in the goon; maybe a genuine 3 kilo job! Stinking hot late summer evenings with a thunderstorm brewing are your best chance.

1500 at least in Daiwa sizing is agreat compromise size and perfect for ultralight lines; also helps a tad more balance a longer rod over 7ft.

I love long softish rods for ultralight luring. Been thinking the same thing as until very recently it was damn hard to find a 1-2kg rod over 7foot. Lot more around now than even just a few years ago. Have a 20 year old GLoomis jig flicker (which proudly states its 95 per cent graphite!) with a very soft action which has an uncanny ability to save light traces by securing jaw hinge hook ups when using tiny jigs and Fireline. It's taken a lot of flatties on 2kg trace and no4 and no6 hooked jigs. That parabolic action also keeps small hooks in soft mouths, as has already been written. Only thing which might put me off the squid rods is that a lot are actually meant to cast relatively heavy squid jigs, rather than the tiny almost weightless jigs I like.

Run your fingers along the rod to find any rough patches, hold up to light to see if any patches appear more see-thru, look for cracks/hairline fractures. But it is difficult. Just my 2 cents but I reckon many fishos have damaged rods in transit, or while in boat holders, when the rod rubs or bounces against a hard surface. Back of the car's a classic place to do this. Then the rod is blamed. High sticking, non-stretch braids and heavy drags on thin-walled blanks is also a great way to snap a rod.

Was out yesterday (Thursday): despite securing perfect lollie-sized slimeys and yakkas, got not a sniff. Tried Long Reef, Muggs, Northerners for nothing. Nothing showed at all on very pricey, powerful sounder at each spot. Water 17.2C at North Head (on outgoing tide), crept up to just 18C at Longy. Water dirty round heads and slighly cleaner at Longy. Few if an birds, not even the usual sweep etc at Longy. Back in to North Harbour and cast jigs and bucktails round the boats, dropoff, flats etc for another big fat doughnut. Some days are diamonds, some days are..........

Damn as soon as I saw the report posted up I knew my work productivity would go down the gurglar this arvo. Fantastic pics and fish!!!!! Astonishingly stunning country. Among the best fishing reports/pic essays I've seen on the web.

Hey LA so if there's a stream there they could modify it with the right gravel, put in a simple pump and pipe for flow, and wooshka, a place for them to spawn! I'm sure it's that easy! Or maybe not.

Not eaten, re-absorbed within their bodies. Bit of an underground rec fishing issue. How many times have we all fished what are basically spawning aggregations of various species? How many times have you seen a fishing vid host hold up a fat fish obviously full of eggs? Even though released did that fish not spawn? WOuld like to know more and if all species are vulnerable but we are sometimes not as green as we like to think we are.

Can't be taken but can still be fished during closed season. Know some fish caught close to spawning re-absorb their eggs because of the stress of capture which ain't great but don't know if that happens with EPs and bass. Nice landbased Sydney lure session fellas!

Appears an some sort of artificial breeding stream with the right gravel bottom could be done (from a list of projects done by yankee company that specialises in stuff like this: "Klamath County, Oregon — Designed and supervised construction of an artificial spawning stream for native Klamath Lake Redband Trout near Chiloquin, Oregon. The stream was designed to provide optimal species-specific spawning habitat at a flow of 8 to 12 cubic feet per second (cfs)."

Yeah don't know. Found this on web from US, but don't know if dinkum: "Other than Brookies and Lake trout (which are actually Char and not trout at all), trout can not spawn without moving water. Non sterile trout (diploids), will want to spawn in a stillwater fishery and will use up a lot of it's energy going into spawn mode especially the females which still produce eggs. Because these eggs can not be released, they must be absorbed back into the body causing a lot of stress and in many cases mortality. By sterilizing the trout (triploids), the energy that would have been used for spawning goes into feeding, making for big fish, fast. Females will not produce eggs meaning less stress and mortality rates go down." And some stuff from a UK fish biologist said female rainbows don't search for moving water and don't "exhibit spawning characteristics."

Haven't even fished there yet (ha), but have read heaps and each report I read during colder months talks of desperate trout and false spawning behaviour. No suitable streams into the dam seems to produce frustration for both fish and fisho: poor old trout suffering "blue balls" and fishos suffering frusration as they try to tempt trout obsessed with trying to spawn. So why isn't TCD stocked with triploid trout? Would seem to make sense: faster growing fish and no false spawning hassles. WHile I'm here has anyone anywhere in the world created a fake "breeding stream" on a stocked dam that trout could spawn in? A fake stream set up with the right pebbles/shale that they lay their eggs in/on and a pump drawing water from the dam to the top of the fake breeding stream? WOuld it work? Not the right stream chemistry for breeding/laying eggs?? Might actually one day get to the dam!!!

Hey LA, thanks hugely for the offer but right now I've got to work through my ultralight trout spin obsession before tackling the fly!!! It's a bit of a worry. Already make tiny jighead wooly buggers and jighead deceivers and baby trout jigminnows and jighead crays/yabbies and mudeyes between 1/64th and 1/8th oz which, just maybe, even Nanook might approve of!!! (see the latest amazing Kanangra adventure!) Or not!

Brilliant report! Magic pics. Inspiring!

Thanks for the grain explantion LA. Watched the video and very interesting. Seems a legit and effective way to deliver a dry fly on a spin rod with the finesse needed for clear and shallow water, and answers some questions, like why not just learn to conventionally fly fish. Appeals to my inner contrarian.

Back again, just found the only place in the world which sells the spinfly lines (they say): http://skipsoriginals.com/STATECH_SPINFLY_FISHING_LINE_Fly_Fish_With_A_Spinning_Rod.aspx Great info on that site, now have the basics on how to use them. They are really interesting. The 30 float means yes it floats (!!), but the 30 stands for 30 grains, or the equivalent of a 1/16th jig or lure. The 50 Floating weighs 50 grains or equivalent of 1/8th casting weight/lure. The spinfly lines go up to 200 grains (1/2 oz!!!!) If I remember grains is what fly fishos use to describe the weights of their shooting head lines (true?). They are actually claimed to be used as mini shooting heads on fly rods in tiny streams as well. The 30 Float can cast dry flies of size 16 and smaller, or wets of size 12 or smaller, while the 50 Float is said to be able to cast size 12 or smaller dries, size 8 or smaller nymphs and even micro-jigs. Lot of claims made about them on the site/shop above: far superior to a bobber/float; Lays a dead flat/straight fly presentation when line is stopped with finger at end of cast (with a tapered leader a must); far better than conventional fly lines when trying to beat flyfishos curse of flyline drag in river currents because its so small (I imagine the braid on my ultralight spin reel will help too as braid floats); far more subtle when cast onto small clear shallow streams with the makers saying they look only like a small branch/twig falling on the water, which is common, rather than a full flyline. There is some other stuff including about how the Spinfly line can be guided into specific eddies, pockets, seam lines on a river in a way it's not possible or hugely difficult to do with a conventional flyline, again beause of its tiny length, but river trouting is all new to me and I'm still getting my head around all that. Lots of big claims about these lines and you gotta wonder why they didn't take off. They won best new tackle at the huge US tackle trade show when they debuted. Maybe it's the price: $US34.95 for one line! Better give mum a coupla extra bucks! Now time to watch the casting video and tomorrow to buy a couple of tapered 7 and a half foot leaders they recommend, and some size 16 Royal Wulfs!! This could be fun.

Hey Roberta, my old mum still does two days a week at a charity shop and she's always bringing stuff to me she thinks I'd be interested in, in particular anything 'fishy'. I always add few bucks extra to what she asks for as it's for a good cause. Some amazing things go through the store and when ma and pa visited an hour ago she pulled out some lovely wine glasses, a cute little wooden fish carving, and two tubes with these "weird long skinny flouro green floats''. I actually remembered, as you said, these unusual spinfly lines in the mags many many year ago, had a look at the tiny writing on the lines, and yep they are Statech spinfly lines. Ma and Pa left, I googled Statech and your four year old Fishraider reply came up!!!!!!! Ma brought two tubes they originally came in; one with a single, 30cms long line which has 30 Floating on it and the second tube has two lines, each 45cms long and marked 50 float. Equal to three weight and five weight flylines? Now off for more Google searching as one tube has sticker saying "complete with special Spinfly tapered leader, TURN ON strike indicator and special Spinfly tapered leader and Spinfly booklet with complete intructions'' but I only got the lines in their tubes. This could be fun and I'm thinking the brand new 7'6" Lox ultralight spin rod may be perfect to try them. Could be a blast on one of those tiny rivers around Oberon way. Cheers and thanks for the info four years later!

Oops forgot to add; hey Nanook love your rainbow art. Have you seen the guy who turns marlin casts into awesome things painted similar?