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May 9, 2016

Recent Turangi fishing updates

Do you know of anywhere else in the trout fishing world where there is such a variety of interesting and informative and encouraging and usually conflicting trout fishing advice available on a regular daily/weekly/monthly basis as for the Tongariro River.  i.e.

From Sportinglife yesterday:

Whispers on the wind

There are whispers around town this morning of a big Brownie being caught yesterday on the Tongariro, a rare monster from the deep, fooled into feasting on an anglers perfectly presented fly, hounded by fishing paparazzi like myself then comforted and told everything is going to be okay, before being released to be home in time for fish happy hour.  (it was definitely not me)

I haven’t seen this Tongariro Goliath myself and it may just be whispers, but i was fortunate enough to run into good friend and local fishing guide Mike Hughes as I wandered along the banks of the Tongariro yesterday and as I did, Mike himself was getting stuck into a smaller cousin of Goliath Brown. Good stuff Mike.

There are still some really nice fish holding in the Tongariro, the pressure on them at the moment is low, on my walk I spotted outside of Mike only 2 anglers.

The last few fish I have landed have been back on the Nymph rig which has been fun after a solid 2 months of predominantly swinging streamers (Woolly Buggers and the like). Pheasant Tails and Green & White Caddis doing the damage here.

I have found myself on the odd occasion lately being lazy with my nymph setup and not changing the leader or flies to suit when changing water and found myself missing opportunities I should have capitalised on with a few easy adjustments. Don’t be like me guys, do the small things you need first to maximize the big picture.

Have a awesome day and see you at Sporting Life Turangi.

Andrew

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And did you know they even provide the most up-to-date fishing report on Facebook – i.e.  For yesterday: (Yawn…)

Sporting Life Fishing Outfitters

Its quite a lazy day here at Sporting Life this morning. John 007 is in the workshop putting together some reels and lines. Peter Carty called in and I made him a cup of tea which is about as productive as my day has been so far.

Big changes are afoot at Sporting Life which we hope our customers are going to love and renovations are supposed to be underway right now, but our Tradies haven’t turned up, so looks like a slow day ahead. But we will keep you posted with some photos of how things are going and the changes being made.

Have a great day all and see you at Sporting Life.

Andrew.

 From Creel tackle yesterday:

7714f1c4-a5ba-4ced-9538-75b1460b8c63Creel Tackle Report

Greetings from Turangi, what a stunning Autumn we have had, beautiful weather, alas, no rain which the rivers badly need.

Up until last week the Tongariro was not holding a lot of fish however since the last day of drizzle which was last Thursday / Friday there has been good numbers of fish throughout the river, going out briefly after work have had no problem bagging a couple of nice fish each time, the hen below was as orange as a salmon, (sorry about the bad quality of both pictures)

The 8 1/2 lb Brown caught under the main Rd Bridge (Hawkes Bay orchardist)

Walked the TT last week counting well over a hundred trout all fitted with “angler radar” of course, Fished  the fast water managing to land four very nice fish.

Photographed this angler about two weeks ago the Brown weighed 7lb, he hooked another two after this one.

We are of the opinion this winters fishing will produce some nice fish, there is a school of thought which suggests taking fish to reduce numbers and encourage growth, I agree.

 

From Greig Sports yesterday:


20160507_142159[1]Anna was out fishing with Michael from Something Fishy over the weekend they got some nice fish on white Boobys.20160507_133030[1]Given that we could do with a decent shake with the weather the fishing on the Tongariro has been good in places with some very nice fish been caught . Lyn The reliable got some great fish out of the Tongariro on Saturday hunt around and you will come up with the goods. And there is plenty of room to hunt about Angling Pressure remains light on both the lake and the Tongariro….

 

 Raised Hackle report

May 2nd 2016
                         As all you anglers out there do no Paradise weather is warm, and as yet we still have not had any good frosts  , fishing in and around Paradise is still a little slow as we need rain for at least a week . River mouth fishing is on the up and the Back Country river are fishing very well. Yesterday i took to keep Newplymouth anglers out to Lake O, as they wanted to learn how to hook and land large Trout. Stephen Kyle & John Hardie-Boys just did that. On there way home to NewPlymouth i told them to have a fish in a stream , which they also hooked 4 nice fish as well . 
Tight Line John O & Blonde 
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From Shane French

Slackers Report For The 02nd Of May 2016

May 2, 2016

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Yes sorry for the horrific lack of reports, will try harder to provide more Intel!

What a calm spell we are having in Taupo. Really warm still days, with perfect blue sky’s. That means low rivers and spooky trout!

The Waitahanui had some good fish go through last week and the amount of Brown trout in there would certainly keep most anglers happy, just casting to them. The Rip looked amazing the other day, going straight out, with a strong flow. It has been getting a fair amount of attention over the school holidays by anglers, I hope you pulled a few.

The Hinemaiaia looks like it is in fantastic condition this year.  The poor old Hinemaiaia is going to get a pounding this year by anglers and it can’t sustain that pressure!

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Like the Hine, the Tauranga Taupo in in beautiful condition. The pools are snag free and I can see how amazing this river will be with some extra flow to it. The TT is pretty low right now and that will definitely have an impact on the running trout. This river can change in a flood and “That special piece of water you had”, can be inches deep with a snag in the middle of it, once the levels drop back down. However new water opens up and this river once again can be fun to explore. I love the TT.

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Ross from TRM, (Tongariro River Motel) was scratching his head the other day, as to where the Trout were in the river. What I did notice, was the lack of angling pressure. I spoke to a friend of mine who had fished the week before and also commented on that. The two trout I hooked that afternoon were fat silver little buggers that fought sooooo hard it was funny. Three pounds of Silver Fury! I did however put a load of work into hooking up, so for that section of river I thought the fish numbers were low. I don’t care if we have a later start to the season, the weather is not helping there. However what I don’t want to see are lots of skinny, silver fish, after a run goes through. This hasn’t happened yet, I just don’t want to see it happen.

The fishing on the lake has improved over the past three weeks and most drop offs have numbers of trout building up, waiting for the next decent rain. Taupo anglers are going to get our first taste of the 2016 Winter Season, soon. I can’t wait to see what it has install for us.

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Lets have a little chat about casting:

I consider myself a good caster. I can cast light Dry’s on a 5# or Heavy Streamers and Bombs on an 8#, with everything in between. However I have not always been able to Biff Line, it has come with lots of practice, self correcting and watching others do it right. There was a great fisherman who visited our parts of the world, fishing. His name was Jeremy. Now this guy could cast and had caught pretty much every large species of Fish in exotic parts of the world as one would get. We were fishing early one morning in the Waitahanui Rip together. I had a bloody monstrous 10 foot 8 weight rod that I was trying to throw out Heave and Leaves with. By 9 am everyone had left apart from Jeremy and myself. I was trying to throw as much line as I could with this Beast Rod and was pretty much stuffing it up 7 out of 10 goes. I really wasn’t feeling the rod. We both left the Rip at the same time and when we got to the edge Jeremy asked if he could have a throw with it. I remember him stripping 90 feet of sinking line off and 10 feet of backing. He loaded it up with four false casts and let it rip, throwing over 100 feet of line. Bugger, there goes the theory it was the Rods fault, I sucked. I watched him a few more times as it had to have been a fluke, but nah it was me. So what did I learn from Jeremy? Well lots actually. I noticed his crisp casting, it wasn’t slow between the 10 and 2 positions. This means his “Line Speed” was fast. When you have fast line speed you can throw further. I also noticed on his last “Haul”, that he followed his previous Haul all the way to the first guide, paused, then really hauled down. Man this thing had some line speed. However the main thing was his timing. He let line out both ways while extending line, he could feel when the line had straightened out before his next Haul. In that ten minutes of watching and talking I gained years of experience.

So what do I see as a guide and as someone who watches most fishermen he comes across. I see to many anglers breaking their wrist past the 2 o’clock position, on their back cast. This immediately drops the load off the rod and that final desperate cast they make ends up around their feet. You must stop at 2 O clock and “Pause” for the main line to straighten out. If you do not pause for this to happen, then as you start to come forward, you create a “belly Of Line”, (slack line really) that makes the Rod Lose the Load and it ends up around your ears, (again). So you must “Stop At 2 O clock and you must Pause to let the line straighten out”. So to create the ability to have the line moving fast enough to “Straighten Out” you must have a “Clean, Crisp” action because if you can not generate line speed to make it straighten out, you will have slack line, (in the belly) and it will fall down around your ears. Sounds reasonable and easy, well we all know it isn’t.

I can give as much advice to a client as they wish, however if they don’t self correct a bad cast and just blunder on, then they will never get any better, or it will cost them a tonne in Nymphs before it does. If I stuff up a cast I immediately question line speed and timing. When I am in that “Groove” and casting well, the whole fishing experience is just so much more pleasurable.

There is a Forum section attached to this post. You can log in and have your say, if you like.

Tight Lines

Shane

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Taupo fishing report, 13 April 2016
by Gary Lyttle,

Fly & Gun Hunting & Fishing Taupo

What an amazing start to the winter fishing here in Taupo, the reports continue to relay great fly fishing on most of our local spawning streams now with good numbers showing very early for the time of year, not only are the numbers good but the size and quality of the fish being caught have been exceptional.

The Tongariro continues to have a really amazing run of stunning brown trout still running through the system we are definitely starting to be the envy of the fly fishing world with so many stunning wild brown trout now in the fishery.

The Tauranga-Taupo also continues to have fish running throughout the length from the bridge all the way up although the fishing has reportedly slowed a little as the water level has receded, lots of fresh silver bullets of between two and four pound being caught and back to the condition we have come to expect of Tauranga-Taupo fish.

The Hinemaiaia has good numbers of fish in the river now though surprisingly a good number of dark spent fish are showing already so the Hinemaiaiahas had some very early runs this year. You can clearly see the reds and spawning areas now with many fish in the act of spawning so please be careful not to wade through these areas and walk round and target the fresh runners, they will give a far better account of themselves.

The Waitahanui has also enjoyed some excellent fishing over the last week or so with some stunning rainbows being caught all the way from the bridge up. The big browns are still showing up but are getting increasingly challenging as the winter fishing pressure increases, the river mouth itself has been on and off as a there has been a big moon to contend with this week but on the overcast nights there have been some very good fish caught.

The weather forecast as I write is for more rain this week increasing toward the weekend so you if you haven’t already been out there yet get those waders and jackets on and get out and enjoy some world class fly fishing in our stunning Taupo outdoors.

Why fish run.

Thu 5th May, 2016

I mentioned last time that there had been an improvement in the fishing which has continued this week. Anglers reported fish moving through the lower river on Tuesday and now that we’re into May these runs should gradually build in frequency until numbers peak around October.

News travels fast in Turangi and there were several anglers in and around the Bridge pool early yesterday morning. I watched them for a few minutes before I met up with Bevis and one of them landed a nice trout as I was about to leave.

It will take a little while before you get an even spread of fish throughout the river so it still pays to keep moving. Up to now they seem to be in small pods here and there.

We started around town a bit farther up and had a couple of rainbows and an unsuccessful attempt at a brown. But with a few anglers around and more showing up we decided to relocate.

We had a quick flick in Big Bend but this place tends to produce consistently later in the year. Last year it was a “banker” pool from around the end of June on … often fishing well all day long.

It was a different story just down river and we spotted half a dozen as soon as we arrived. Bevis took two on a small gold-head before they spooked and disappeared into the deeper water.

So after a quiet few weeks it looks as if things may have kicked off on the Tongariro at last.

But why do fish run?

Rain or impending rain is often cited as one of the key triggers … but there’s obviously a lot more to it than that. So is it coincidence that all of a sudden the fishing improves and then a day or two later the forecast rain arrives. I have a feeling that in the unlikely event we had no rain from now until Christmas the fish would probably still run … but what are the facts?

Michele Dedual explains the science behind it:

Hi Mike

This is a really good but big question and I’ll try to provide the most salient points.

1) Fish need to reach maturity before spawning and maturity is triggered by several factors. Growth is an obvious one, when fish grow quickly they will spawn earlier. If they don’t grow quickly they will “wait” longer in the lake before running trying to maximise the output of eggs. However, at some stage there is a trade-off between growing further with the risk of mortality and running a bit smaller. This is also when the sexual hormones cycles controlled by temperature, day length and also fat content (like in humans fish need some fat to metabolize hormones and again if the growing conditions are not right they will affect the maturity) become the dominant trigger.

2) There are also environmental triggers as you indicate. In the Tongariro our radio-tracking experiments indicate that the early spawning fish are entering the river in an early state of maturation with eggs not in the advance stage of development (vitellogenesis). These fish will react strongly to freshes to move upstream but they will stop when conditions returned to normal milling in the same pool for long periods until the next fresh when they’ll push further. During this early phase of the run some fish can take as much as 89 days to move from the Delta to the Waipa Stream…This is probably why at the moment fish in the lower T-T are concentrated in such densities that I haven’t seen for many years, they are waiting for the next fresh. Interestingly these fish are really nervous and hard to catch having something else on their mind than just grabbing a nymph!

3) Later in the season (Sep-Nov) fish are running in a more advance stage of maturity and are less reactive to freshes with some fish rushing through the river in 9 days.

This indicates that the early running fish are very important for the fishery as they sustain the typical winter fishery. This is why we looked at the genetic make-up of the early v late running fish and more importantly if fishing (in the lake) was more likely to remove early running fish. We didn’t find any evidence of this but this is also where we met the limit of science.


4) Water temperature and water flow are other triggers but how fish use them is not fully understood. There are some theories that the flow in the gravel which can go up or down is important and even used differently by brown and rainbows but again the science on this is not that strong.

5) The presence of fish spawning is another strong trigger as it provides a “smell” to the water that will attract others, in that sense it is the first run that is the hardest to get, after things are more predictable.

Tight lines

Michel

The rain hasn’t stopped all day in Turangi but it has made very little difference to the flows. Tomorrow … overcast with patchy drizzle to start. Then a brief let up as we head towards the weekend before a change early next week with more persistent rain on the cards.

It could be an interesting weekend .. .keep an eye on the lower river and town pools.

See you out there.

Mike

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