Went chasing some of the New Zealands Central North Island trout today and had a great day out with my mate Carl Sawyer pictured here with a 7 lb he landed. I landed a bigger one of 8.75 lb that was an absolute cracker of a fish but unfortunately the photos did turn out. Carl lost the biggest of the day – likely around 11 lb. Caught several more smaller fish and Carl lost 2 good ones on dry fly. I felt better about todays results as normally I am the one busting them off!

Tongariro Report

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River Conditions: Low and clear

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Overnighted out in the bush last night with my mates Ross, and Johan – after walking into a river that we have fished before but wished to explore further. Took the rifle in as well but saw no deer. Had great fishing the biggest a 6 pound brown trout which was 1 of 3 taken on nymph out of about 30 hooked between us for the two days. The rest were all taken on dry fly with about half taken sight fishing and about half blind fishing the dry fly up some riffles and runs. The median size was around 3.5 to 4 pounds and mainly rainbows. Slept very well in the bush last night after sharing the majority of a 3 litre cask of red wine with my mate Ross Wilson who works for Northpower in Hamilton. Had to be quick at releasing the trout before the eels got to them or me. Gave one a prod with the end of my rod and it quickly snapped back and latched onto the end of the rod – furtunately it didn’t twist around hit. I hate eels!!

Tongariro Report

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River Conditions: Low and clear

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Guided Barry from England today on River 4 beats 3 and 4. Barry was a very modest fisherman and was a far greater caster than what he had told me. I don’t have a photo here because he let the best fish of the day – a 2.5 pound brownie go. Barry lost a couple of rainbows one of which would have been 3 to 4 pounds and landed around a dozen smaller fish up to a 2 pounds. In general the fish were smaller than usual but Barry still had a great time and found the fish much bigger than he is used to in England and enjoyed the scenery and complete privacy of the fishing.

Tongariro Report

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River Conditions: Low and clear

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Went fishing myself again today trying to find trophies and ended up being bust off by a 5 pounder in the first pool in the exact same manner as the other day. It ran up between the same two rocks. Landed a 6 pounder and a 5 on dry fly to make 3 hookups for the day. Was in trohpy hunting territory where fish numbers are small and size big so this was OK. Haven’t quite gotten used to taking photos on the timer with my camera yet as you can see by my missed hat – but getting there.

Tongariro Report

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River Conditions: Low and clear

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Went trophy hunting today and managed to land only one fish out of 6 hooked. This one here is around the 8 pound mark and took a Royal Wulfe. Lost one nice brown around similar size and several smaller rainbows. Saw a couple of other good ones.

Tongariro Report

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River Conditions: Low and clear

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Guided Jeff from the USA today, a young 20 year old fly fishing guide who works in Alaska and up state New York. Had a fantastic day but covered some serious miles on foot. Jeff was a fantastic fisherman and a piece of cake to guide – though our New Zealand trout gave him a bit of dealing to on a few occasions. Jeff hooked 20 of which 17 were on dry fly and 3 nymphing. Over half of these were sight fished and the fly of the day was no New Secret – just a plain old size 10 Royal Wulff! Amongst the catch were 2 brown trout with fantastic spots and the rest were rainbows all in the 3 to 4.5 pound range. We spooked a few but Jeff pretty much hooked every fish we saw – plus a few we didn’t see coming. The only issue were the dirty tactics employed by the fish in this river which insisted on heading into holes in the boulders – pretty much everytime. This means I need to get back to the fly tying desk and tye up a few more Royal’s as I have little remaining faith left in shop flies!

Tongariro Report

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River Conditions: Low and clear

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Picked up Jeff Jeffery this morning for his first attempt at fly fishing in New Zealand and his first attempt at fly fishing for several years since a couple of tries with friends back home in England years ago – he actually fished the famous Test (not sure of spelling) on his first ever day years ago.

Had a great morning with around a dozen hook and plays, landed 5 including 2 that were sight fished on dry fly.

Tongariro Report

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River Conditions: Low and clear

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Spent the past view days roaming the Taupo area and beyond looking at new water with my friend and fellow guide Mike Burgin. We also did a bit of dry fly sight fishing in another river that we fish a bit and were quite disgusted to see the rubbish lying around from recent visitors! If you are reading this and are one of those people who leaves the odd coke can or chip packet or cigarette butt by a river, then think what happens if everyone else does the same thing! Plus your rubbish won’t disappear. It will stay there for years adding to all the other rubbish that people leave there and detracts from the whole experience of being in such a beautiful place. If you find the odd bit of rubbish by the river, then do as I do and pick it up and stuff it into a pocket with your offcuts of leader material and simply slip it into a rubbish bin later on. If everyone does this and if you do it a few times on a river it won’t be too long before it is a more pleasant spot for everyone.

We did catch a quite a few nice trout on dry fly and found one fantastic spot to take beginners as well as a higher level spot. One particulr river got too hot by mid day hitting 24C by my thermometer and the trout went into sulk mode!

Tongariro Report

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Went for a bit of a fish today with Mike Burgin at a local lake. We each managed 3 small ones around 2 pounds. There were quite a few moving around and conditions seemed pretty good.

Tongariro Report

Barometer: Low

Cloud/Wind: Overcast with some rain

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River Conditions: A little high in the Tongariro today but fishable

Recommended Flies: Sawyers pheasant tail, hare & coppers

Guided E-Wan, Santiago, Alihandro, Monica, and George from Columbia this afternoon on the Tongariro and had a successful afternoon. The guys and girl all landed a rainbow trout each with 8 being landed in total out of around 30 hookups between the family of 5. Nothing was coming up to take dries despite a fair reasonable size hatch coming off of what looked like Deliatidium myzobranchia

Tongariro Report

Barometer: Falling

Cloud/Wind: Cloudy

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River Conditions: Up a little with a bit of colour

Recommended Flies: Sawyers pheasant tail