wrasseman

nice report and fishies, those silvers are great fish, heaps of fun to catch. Any chance of sharing your rig with us?? cheers col.

There's lots of good trout streams in the mountains both on the ridge and in the valleys. I used to fish a fair bit in the tributaries of the grose for small brownies and some nice bass as well as some bright orange yabbies that went well on the coals. With winter coming, the Kowmung and lower cox's should also fire for good sized rainbows and browns if you're up for a walk. My best day there, 2 mates and I pulled 11 fish from the first pool (stopped counting after that) up to 7lb. But its a fairly long walk, not day-trip. Beautiful country down there, well worth it just for the scenery and wildlife but some pretty good fishing can be had to. Cheers Col.

Great sesh, great report and great pics. Well done. Good one with the PB too. Cheers Col.

Thanks mate. As far as closed seasons go, I believe that there is a closed season on cod in some states and on barra in Qld, though i don't know the details. There may also be others I'm unaware of. Here in Tas. though the only native fish targetted by anglers are grayling and blackfish and both are rarely targetted and have no species specific closed season. Grayling are completely protected anyway though. The closed seasons in Tas. however applies to the waters and not the species so most waters are closed from end of april to early may with some opening and closing a month later (designated rainbow waters) and a few lakes open year round. The exception to this is if using a "bush pole" basically a "ned kelly" rig ie a stick with line tied to the end which I think you can use year round though salmonids must be released in the closed season or if not licensed. Some designated bream waters (eg. derwent river downstream of bridgewater) may also be fished in the closed season but salmonids musy be released. Cheers Col.

2 pbs in a day, gotta love that. Nice breamski too. Well done. cheers Col.

Hi all, Well winter's coming, and down here along with the shortening days that means the end of the trout season for a few months so I had to get out and make the most of my last few chances in the last week. Thankfully the weather was perfect and after the rains the week before last, the previously very low rivers were looking great too. This is a 43cm brownie I took from a smaller tributary when the main river was a muddy mess on the 22/4 (apologies for the pic, phone job). The silvery colour of this fish lead me to believe that the rain may have motivated a few sea-runners to head up river. By Thursday, things were looking up and the north esk had cleared so I headed out for an early morning pre-work sesh, managing 2 fish, the better of which was this 40ish brownie. By the weekend, all the rivers were looking good. On saturday (29/4) I headed out to the Meander river for a bit of a spin sesh. I had a follow from a nice one on my second cast and started seeing lots of small fish rising too, it was shaping up as a nice day. I soon caught my first (very close to where I scored my first for the season), a little brownie of just 28cm. Thankfully from there they got bigger and I finished with 7 brownies of 28, 31, 32, 35, 36, 38 and 40cm and a rainbow of 49cm. Brownie of the day. Fattie. Another brownie. This rainbow gave me hell as i had to climb throuh a tree to get to a piece of bank where I could land it whilst it wanted to set up home in the log-jam at the tree's base. it was an unusual capture in this (unstocked) river. Spotty head. On Sunday, I planned an early start at work to give me time for a quick evening sesh in the north esk on the last day of the season. Unfortunately I got stuck at work and only managed a very short sesh. As well, I had a bit of a shocker, jumping off my first fish and missing or pulling hooks on quite a few others, even flicking my lure out of the mouth of one nice one because I initially thought i was snagged. Nontheless, though I didn't get the thumper i was hoping for, I managed one small fish of 35cm to finish the season on, though we both got a bit muddy in the process. Oh well, that's it for another season, guess I'll just have to chase the bream, salmon, trevally and wrasse for the next few months. Cheers col.

Trout don't pull real hard compared to saltwater fish like Aust. salmon, bream, trevally, tuna etc. however they are very good at throwing hooks with lots of jumping and just generally going nuts. A decent fish will make some reasonable runs too. Rainbows definitely go harder than browns. Koons, Trout season in Tassie goes from August til april for most waters though some "rainbow waters are a month late and a few lakes are open year round. The best time of year down here depends where you are, generally the low altitude areas fish best early and late in the season and the highlands are at their best in high summer. It also depends on technique, if fly fishing the warm weather brings out the insects and gets some dry fly action happening but this is less of an issue if lure or bait fishing. Cheers Col.

Hi all, After hearing reports that a local lake (4 springs) that spends most of the season clogged by weed had finally cleared for winter, I headed out there this morning hoping to beat the wind. It wasn't to be however and the lake wasn't safe in my little kayak so it was back to the south esk to a spot that I haven't tried at all this season. After putting the yak in at Evendale I headed upstream and it wasn't long before I'd missed my first fish, however shortly after I managed to get one to stay connected and things were looking up. I went on to score 17 trout and one redfin in a couple of hours from the yak and shore, nice little pre-work sesh. Most of the trout were around the same size (34-35cm to fork), but showed quite a bit of variation in colour. Cheers Col.

Thanks guys, take enough piccies and some will be nice. Haraka, its just a 3.2MP olympus I'm afraid. Lunker-hunter, not PBs sadly, just biggest on the new rod. Cheers col.

Hi all, I thought I'd finally put a report up here. I headed out to the south esk river at Hadspen after work yesterday. Now with daylight savings over, it was always going to be a very quick sesh but I had the hope of finally getting a big fish on my new ultralight trout spin rod which I've now had for a couple of weeks but unfortunately haven't had much chance to use and then I've only scored littlies. Sadly this wasn't to be though I did manage one trout for the evening (34.5cm) which at least beat my previous best (30.5cm) on the new rod so they're slowly getting bigger. Second fish is the larger more recent one, other is prev. best. Cheers Col.

Hi all, This is my first post here. I'm in tassie ATM though I'm from sydney and return there fairly frequently. I finally scored this bream last week, first one close to home (north coast) rather than having to drive 2hrs south or east. Cheers CJ