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TROUT FISHING WITH MAURICE RODWAY - Weekly Column: 30 October 1998
 Southland, New Zealand

WEATHER SCIENTISTS                                               For Don Wright

Weather scientists are reluctant prophets, and like all scientists, wary of being too definite about anything, even the subject they are undoubted experts in. Nevertheless some have predicted a La Nina summer, one in which easterly weather becomes more common. Last year the droughts of the east coast brought proof that westerly winds of  El Nino were ascendant. This year La Nina has had two bites at us so far. Her watery breath has submerged the folk of the upper West Coast and the Kapiti coast, who now  know now the weather soothsayers have got it right. East coast farmers will be relieved that the westerlies have died but those under the clouds of the La Nina depressions will not be so pleased.

In the south we have so far been treated relatively kindly and the trout streams here which rely so much on moderate weather, have been spared too. While October has been wet the rain has been no more than average, enough to make the rivers dirty and unfishable a fair bit of the time, but also fishable enough for most of us to have at least a cast or two.

Labour weekend was frustrating, fine on Saturday without too much wind, but with rivers still too high from rain the previous week, then Saturday and Sunday, warm and windy, perhaps a little too windy to be ideal for a pleasant afternoon's trout fishing. Many anglers must have thought so too as there were few of them along southern  river banks.

This weekend doesn't quite reach into November so anglers wanting to fish in the lake tributaries will have to wait another week to do so. That is if they are confined to their office or work site during the week days. The beginning of November is when the high country waters open, the famous Eglinton, the Upukerora and all the hidden rivers of Fiordland.

Most of these waters are home to rainbow trout, especially in their upper reaches. Numbers of trout might be low in them at this time of the year as high river flows could well have flushed them out to their respective lakes after spawning.  What they need is a period of steady flow and trout may take up residence again. The rainbow has a wanderlust that is poorly understood in southern rivers so if you don't find any trout where you have seen them in the past don't give up on that place, wait for a dryer spell of weather in the summer and then return.

With La Nina and her easterly tendencies it may be that western trout waters are likely to be stable and productive in the months to come.  

Maurice Rodway
Southland, New Zealand                           E-mail: fishgame@southnet.co.nz

Article ©1998 Maurice Rodway, All Rights Reserved.

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