This stone was found inside a brown trout landed at Major Jones Pool (together with five Rainbow trout) recently. The river was flowing at about 80 cumecs and was a dirty pumice stained colour. OK?

What this proves once again is that the choice of fly may not be as important as most imagine. In the past, lumps of pumice or wood chips and even a pencil butt has been found in the stomachs of trout when I was cleaning them.

The brown trout had been gorging on trout eggs and must have sucked in the stone with the eggs. After cruising around the lake feeding on slow smelt for three years their entire diet changes once they start on their spawning runs. Unless the trout have read these reports they do not even know what they are supposed to eat, so they just swallow anything that drifts into their mouths. Often the feeding is more about spawning behaviour to show off – one fish will look at it and another will pinch it just to piss him off.

I cannot identify the angler as he and his buddy are here without their usual third mate, who failed to appear and wimped out just because he has broken his ankle. I suspect he will be carefully studying every TRM report in nervous anticipation to see how well they are doing without his guidance.

Other photos are more well presented fishos from West Island i.e. wearing TRM’s hats, plundering our natural resources. After the well-earned Bledisloe Cup rugby result when they were thrashed, we now know that these West Islanders never admit the rules that rugby was the winner…