January

Great Lake was again fishing well when Tarquin Dinsdale visited in the New Year and a trip to Lake St Claire with Willem Dekker was something different. The fish there were smaller than in previous years and Willem managed to hook and land two at once while loch style fishing.

Carl Rubben spent a day on Great Lake with me after the falls festival. It was not a case of “you should have been yesterday” for Carl, as the fish were visibly feeding from the moment the engine was cut until we decided to call it a day in the late afternoon. Carl is a lovely caster and made the most of good conditions landing 25 fish and leaving others feeding at the end of the day for “next year”. I am not so sure it could be any better than this time.

Jeff Mount returned for more punishment and once again caught good numbers of fish. This time it was the dry fly that did the damage. Gordon Ford from Canada was blown away by the polaroiding that Lane showed him, and although he found it tough, I’m sure we haven’t seen the last of Gordon.

My good friend Christof Zauner was over from Austria in January and caught very good numbers of fish in Arthurs and Great Lake in spite of the ridiculously low water levels. We visited Lake St Claire again along with Laughing Jack, King William, the Derwent River and other ‘western lakes’ in the area. All fished well but are hard to recommend above those destinations closer to Miena.

Michael Andrews from Sydney was unlucky with the weather and had difficult fishing during his stay in the middle of the month. Having been a member of the all-conquering western lakes party that extracted so many double figure fish a few years earlier, it was probably Mother Fishing’s way of getting her own back. Although he managed to catch some beautiful fish, the numbers were down on those we had expected.

Henry Masterman had brought his son in law down for his annual trip at the end of the month. They were joined by the ‘usual suspects’: Nick, Bill, Tino and Rob. Many different waters were fished during their stay, culminating on Woods Lake where Tino and Rob both caught their largest ever Brown trout.

February »