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Angling Essentials
The most important item of equipment an angler needs to be successful in catching trout is of course a good fishing rod and the requisite equipment. But after this what else is required?
Is it like a winning cricketer, the right attitude, or a rugby player, brawn to spare. Attitude is important and the necessary physical attributes are helpful but not as much as local knowledge. Trout live in rivers and lakes, and each of these is a little different. So each trout population reflects these differences. To provide evidence for the local knowledge theory of successful trout fishing I recall a recent trip to Twizel and the return home to Invercargill, taking in the upper Mataura on the way.
Twizel is a great place for trout anglers. Its rivers spring from the mountains. Where large glacier waters once traversed the basin in fearsome torrents, clear rivulets now wander amongst vast outwash plains of gravel. The rivulets, as big as smaller Southland rivers hold large numbers of trout.
In the Tekapo River valley, the historic flow cast aside by concrete, a river gathers its water from springs that well up from the underworld, imagined by the superstious and only vaguely known by scientists. Just before rejoins its mother, in the aqua waters of lake Benmore, after being redirected through canals, turbines and a new lake, the Tekapo River is a lively flow, Aparima like.
Lively trout abound in it. Brown trout mostly. Fish that feed in shallow water and deep. That lie still like logs or school in their abundance, sending all into a state of tight lipped nervousness. A Southland fly, Adams, size 16, and others, drift over them, past them, through them. They show no response. A Twizel fly, cast by a Twizel fisher, lures three onto the bank in the time it takes for the trout in my sights to shoal and sneer.
Back in the Mataura, a river where many say trout are hard to catch. I drift a Southland fly to within a metre of a trout resting behind a willow. He moves. He's on. Another Mataura trout rising to mayflies looks at a little Adams then bites. He takes fright and flees into the middle of the pool. I wonder for some time whether or not I can rescue that little fly. Eventually I do. The trout should by now have been garnished with mint, steaming in butter, evidence to show the value of local knowledge, but it was better to pay tribute to trout that I can catch and watch it swim away.
While water flows downhill in every part of the world, the arrangement of the rocks they flow over, and the quality of that water contributes to the unique characteristics of every stream, every trout home. Learning about those homes takes time but that knowledge is more important than all but the most basic trout fishing essentials.
Maurice Rodway
Southland, New Zealand E-mail: fishgame@southnet.co.nz Article ©1997 Maurice Rodway, All Rights Reserved. |
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