I took Harry for an afternoon session at the Barrell the other day. He caught both brown and rainbow trout on pink/orange/chartreuse globug, orange/red/yellow globug, orange red white globug, orange/red/yellow muppet, champagne muppet with a fluorescent yellow dot, bead head pheasant tail nymph with rubber legs, bead head pheasant tail nymph and a copper John nymph.
Lake Aniwhenua, a hydroelectric dam on the Rangitaiki River, was recently lowered by two metres for weed control. They spilled all of the water through the dam. With it went a lot of trout. I am sure some got washed down to the main river. The majority get washed over then try to make it back up. This cannot happen as there is no fish passage for them. So they sit in the big pool below the dam and wait for the opportunity to travel back upstream. Today went went to the next pool down stream.
Harry is one of our hunting/culling crew for many years. He is currently living near Queenstown with his partner. He came up for a flying visit to see his nan before heading up to fish the Kubota Tournament. He had an afternoon free so we headed to Aniwhenua in Galatea. Harry has been doing some fly fishing down south but he is a beginner. What a perfect place for a beginner to get some action. There were literally at least 100 trout in clear view right in front of us. I started him with a bead head pheasant tail nymph with a globug trailing below. Once we worked out a simple cast, he was into fish after fish.
We went just below the dam for a while and got a couple more but the sun was high and these fish were not active. We headed back down to the original spot and caught some more. The place is full of trout that will lose condition over time. So get down there for some easy fishing.
