Guided Glen and Theresa today and had and had a good day though the fishing was slower than normal. Glen managed a beatifully coloured and conditioned 4 pound brown and Theresa managed a cracker Rainbow hen of 5 pounds out of the 5 good trout hooked for the day. In all the guys and girls were happy with the day despite weather conditions and other factors impacting the fishing a little.

Met Glen and Theresa this morning staying at Spot X Lodge for 3 days back country fly fishing. Had a reasonable start to the trip landing 3 out of 10 fish hooked mainly around the 3 poundish mark. Photos to follow!

Guided Collingwood supporter Philip Norman from Australia again today and had a ball. Philip managed to land 13 out of 26 fantastic trout hooked - mostly around 3 to 4 pounds with one or 2 over this and one or 2 under this. The fish pictured here was a typical 4 pounder for the day.

Picked up the Horns early this morning for their second trip of the year again staying at Turangi’s fantastic 5 star River Birches Lodge. Being October 1, we negotiated (I suggested and they accepted) an early start to take advantage of the fishing available as the back country rivers re-open after being shut for three months and were rewarded with some superb fishing. Each of the team landed a nice trout of over 4 lbs with 8 year old Thomas’s 5 lb brown being the biggest of the lot - which he cast and hooked by himself and only required minimal assistance (just supporting the weight of the rod a little sometimes) to land by himself! By mid afternoon when Alex, Mimi, Thomas and father Peter had had enough, the team had managed to land 4 out of 13 fantastic 4 lb plus trout hooked.

Though it was a great days fishing, I would like to point out to any other fishermen reading this that in order to avoid potentially ugly incidents - and there has been many in the past few years as not all fishermen are as civilized as me - to learn river fishing ettiquette! Fishing the back country in summer is not like the Tongariro or some heavily poplulated overseas rivers where you can just turn up and jump in the next pool above. In the back country ettiquette means first in first served and if you are not there first then you should either fish your way up behind the earlier arrivals or find another piece of river to fish where you will not interfere with the future fishing of the people there before you who will be making there way up river during the course of the day - not jump in the pool above. Back country water is normally fished in beats which are a days fishing basically and if you know someone is in the water downstream of you then you don’t go near the water up to one days fishing above!! Not the pool above as was done to us today by some hopefully unknowing persons. You should also aways ask the farmer before going through any farm, and don’t block the farmers gate with your vehicle - again happened today and my farmer friend was not impressed with these persons! This kind of behaviour is likely to have farmers denying access to ALL fishermen in the future! It is not every day that you find someone else on a back-country river but angler encounters are becoming more frequent. Today after the rude fishermen went above us, we had lunch and shifted down to a public access point where there was no-one and managed to hook a few of our fish there!

Guided Ron Brown today and had a good time out back country. The fishing wasn’t fast and furious but was fair for this time of the year with Ron managing to land 5 out of 6 hooked with this fantastic Brown Trout, another Rainbow Trout of around 4.5 pounds and 3 others around the 3 pound mark. Ron has fly fished a lot before fortunately which helped cope with the strong head winds that plagued us all day.

Mark who has only ever done a little fly fishing before learnt in the first pool this morning how quick and powerful New Zealand’s Rainbow Trout are with an early bust off. Shortly after managed this his first New Zealand trout and also probably his biggest - which he did beat later on. It was a slow start for his father Roman who happily took up second position in the pools while his son learned to fish. By lunch time the total tally was Mark’s 3 hooked and 2 landed. After lunch the day got better and better with Mark hooking a further 3 and Roman landing a further 4 out of 5 legitamately hooked plus 1 other foul hooked to make 11 good legitimate hook and plays averaging 3 pounds R4BB8C.

Tongariro Report

Barometer: Falling

Cloud/Wind: A little wind today but fishable

Water Temperature:

River Conditions: Low and clear

Recommended Flies: Marcel at the new Riverway General Store and Outfitters accross the road has been recommending Green Stoneflies - a lot of his customers have been getting success on his custom tied Green Stonefly patterns.

Have been out nearly every day for an hour or on the Tongariro pracising spey casting and not seeing very many fish caught. There are a few around of course and I should imagine that numbers will be increasing at the delta. There should be a reasonable run up all rivers with the next rain. Its time!

This is my first entry for a few days as I have been sitting at home in front of the computer upgrading the web site to link this blog to a photo gallery progam so that clients can click on the photo like this one here and be taken to a photo album where they can download the full high resolution photos of their trips. It has taken a few very long days but the system is finally pretty much complete and looking good. If any one reading this has any problems viewing anything then please send me an email with the problem and your browser version i.e. Internet Explorer 5 or Firefox etc.

On another note, I have just sold my hunting rifle - a Ruger Model 77 243 stainless sythetic for a near new SAKO 75 Grey Wolf of the same caliber. Now all I have to do is find a new scope - probably a Leupold VXIII with 50mm objective lenz. Also considering a silencer for it. My new rifle should arrive today! Had to have a couple of things done to the rifle like lightening the trigger which was going to cost money so thought it was time for a new rifle.

Tongariro Report

Barometer: Falling

Cloud/Wind: A little wind today but fishable

Water Temperature:

River Conditions: Low and clear

Recommended Flies: Marcel at the new Riverway General Store and Outfitters accross the road has been recommending Green Stoneflies - a lot of his customers have been getting success on his custom tied Green Stonefly patterns.

Had a fantastic last day with Phil Norman and Darren Bell today thankfully as I was a little worried after the flooded rivers yesterday. The river was still up and dirty but the trout were on the feed. Phil started of by site fishing a nice brown before getting bust off big time by a good rainbow which we also new the location of before casting as it had come up to take nymphs a couple of times. Phil then get bust off by the trout version of an unstoppable train. The day finished with 21 hookups of which a majority were landed. Darren had a fantastic day landing 5 out of 7 and Phil took care of the rest which included a beatifully condition Rainbow hen pictured here

Tongariro Report

Barometer:

Cloud/Wind:

Water Temperature:

River Conditions: Low and clear

Recommended Flies:

After a heavy downpour of rain in the middle of the night we woke to the back country rivers in our area being flooded. Moving to plan B we went over to fish the Tongariro and other Taupo tributaries where Darren managed to land a Rainbow Trout of around 2.5 pounds and Phil lost one nice trout. Around lunch time the Tongariro suddenly got dirtier and was flowing very brown so we shifted our attention back to the back country where the high waters were receding. Darren managed to add a brown of around 2.5 pounds to make the final talley for the day 2 landed from 3 hooked. Very slow - but difficult conditions.

Tongariro Report

Barometer:

Cloud/Wind:

Water Temperature:

River Conditions: Low and clear

Recommended Flies:

Coming on winter the back country fishing is certainly a little slower than normal but the day went pretty well. Phil landed his best ever rainbow early in the morning of 7.5lbs and Darren managed a beauty brown of 6lbs after a fantastic fight that took him down river 100 metres. In the end the guys landed 5 out of 13 hooked. A lot of the trout were in the 2kg plus range.

Tongariro Report

Barometer: Falling

Cloud/Wind: A little wind and overcast with drizzly rain all day getting heavier toward evening

Water Temperature:

River Conditions: Low and clear

Recommended Flies: Burgin Sawyers Pheasant tail