Mike, Dan and I had venison and egg sandwiches with avocado and wasabi mustard on ciabatta rolls when they arrived. We got to Rabbit Bridge just on noon. It was sunny, relatively calm and the day was ours to play. Mike had never casted a fly rod nor ever went fishing for trout before. We put him in the front with Dan's rod. Dan sat in the middle and I was captain, of course. We barked out instructions as we floated along sipping cold Waikatos. Mike picked it up pretty quick and within minutes, missed his first fish.
We floated down to the flats and we were absolutely blown away. The sky was clear, the water was clear and the trout were clear to see swimming around and rising everywhere. It was like a big fish bowl but we must have looked like sharks. If we could see them, they could see us back. These fish spook easily and you need a reasonably long cast and leader to do well here. Nevertheless, Mike picked up his first two trout.
Dan and Mike took turns with Dan's rod and they were casting woolly buggers. I was only looking for dry fly opportunities, and I found them. I scored with a parachute Dad's Favourite, red damsel, fishing spider and a foam blowfly. That was plenty for me as all were new patterns to catch a trout, with the exception of the red damsel dry fly. The red damsel was used as clearly, trout were targeting the adults. Let me tell you I had dozens of refusals from cruising browns. Then I finally caught a beauty after missing two others. It was hard work.
It really was just amazing seeing so many fish. Mind you, most were medium to small rainbows but they are such good fun to target in the shallows. We did take a couple of goodies for the smoker. It will certainly hone your skills and these trout are willing participants. They will take something that looks like food!
It is so crazy having a world-class trout fishery at your door step with no one else there! Blair was camped out at the other end of the lake for the last few days. Dan spent two sessions with him near the camp ground. They had incredible sport and even caught fish without me to hold their hands!
It was another Lou Reed song kind of day.
I strongly recommend you get over there and at least have a paddle around and enjoy the scenery. Do be careful wading around the flats. There are sink holes to be wary of. Just watch for changes in the sediment where soft stuff may build up below trees in the water, etc. But please go and give it a try. The whole lake from one end to the other has hungry trout just waiting for you.
So I just prepped two trout for the smoker. The first was the brown I got on the red damsel dry fly. I do not normally kill browns but we were desperate for a little tucker. Now I know why it was so hard to hook one on the dry fly; its gut was full of damsel nymphs. Dan did get a couple on the marabou damsel nymph but these same browns refused his presentation too. I guess he did not have the finesse-thing working so well.
So the second trout we killed was a rainbow. I got it with a foam blowfly. There were at least two blow flies in its gut with an adult damsel and some other random stuff. It all makes sense now. A little bit of observation tells the story. A science background still comes in handy from time to time...
