Truly standout fishing days
are rare; if they were not, they simply would not stand out. Last
Saturday I struck a standout day.
Eddy, the no-longer lad, and me sneaked away for a
fishing weekend down at Lake Taupo, Central North Island, New Zealand. In fact this trip
was something of a standout in itself, these days Eddy and I get to fish alongside
each other far too infrequently.
We arrived on Friday night at Hatepe on the
eastern side of Lake Taupo, to be met by a river in mini-flood,
and all the nearby rivers in worse condition. Things did not look
good. But a couple of calls to local gurus suggested that a trek
round to the western bays of the lake might coincide with a flush
of smelt in
the shallows.
Given that our options were limited we decided to
drive around in the morning and see what we could produce – wise
decision.
Next morning Ed tied up some smelt flies – his own
concoction. A size ten hook with a pearl glass bead at the eye,
some blue sparkly-stuff as a body, and a tuft of white marabou
as a tail with a few strands of stiff fish-hair mixed in to stop
the tail wrapping around the hook bend. I was impatient to leave
and Ed was only able to complete three of four of Edd’s ‘Blue Dudes’
before we left – not a wise decision.
We arrived at one of the western bays to find the
shallows full of smelt, and fish regularly reducing their populations
in swirling rises along the beach. I decided in deference to my
being completely overcome with a bout of laziness to pursue the fish close at hand –
Eddy deciding to strike out along the beach to the south.
Over the next hour I caught two fish of average
quality, around 2.5 kg, but this was certainly not the smelt fishing I have grown
to know and love.
Usually when smelt fishing, I sneak along the beach
carefully scanning the water with my Polaroid enhanced eyesight
for fish. Once spotted I make a careful cast in front of the fish,
a twitch, or two and the fish either eats the fly or it does not.
Hunting and fishing at the same time – great stuff. But this morning
the sun was shining off the water and a small wind riffle conspired
to make spotting fish almost and mostly impossible. However by
watching the pattern of the rising fish I was able to guess, well
twice at least, where the fish might be and put in fly in the
right place.
By this time Ed had reached the southern end of
the beach and was fishing off some rocks. I noticed that regularly
he climbed off the rocks and was soon seeen bending down in the
shallows. Intrigued I wandered off in his direction to see what
he was up too.
Ten minutes later I climbed out onto the rocks at
my end of a small bay, but could not reach Eddy, (could have – if
I had worn waders), only some fifty metres away on an outcrop
of rocks at the other end of the small bay. Eddy called out that
he had a big school of smelt in around the rocks and trout were
constantly attacking them, he had already caught and released
three fish.
Looking down into the water off the rocks in front
of me I too could see the water was full of smelt and so too were
five or six trout. The game began – just like fishing in a goldfish
bowl.
I tried all my old favourite smelt flies – cast
them out – let them sink – retrieve with a jerking motion – not
a touch. Trouble was the fish were so damn close to the rocks
I was standing on, there was very little room to cast, and let the
fly sink and retrieve.
Meantime Ed was having a ball – the flies he tied
in the morning were killing them. I watched as he caught two more
fish – both fish taking the fly from under the rod tip.
Once while watching the lad landing a fish, I stopped
retrieving. Suddenly I felt the line tighten and a fish took off
with the fly. I landed the fish and let it go and returned to
the top of the rock – and returned to my previous method of fishing
– sometimes the time I take to learn lessons that are very self-evident
amazes me.
A few months ago I wrote an article in this magazine
called "Plucking Pluckers".
This article was about the fact that while trout predominantly
take food by opening their mouths and flaring their gills to suck
in food, very often they do bite at food, especially smelt. Hidden
away in this story was my observation that trout sometimes act
like large saltwater predator fish, charging into balls of smelt
flailing away with head, teeth and tail, then turning and to pick
up the stunned and damaged fish.
Here right in front of me was the very thing happening.
A trout would slash into the tightly packed schools of smelt and
then turn and pick up the stunned and bent.
Eddy with his fly, tied behind a heavy nymph being
used purely as a sinking weight, had got the action right. He
just flicked out the fly to the edge of the smelt, hardly more
than the leader away and let the fly sink. When a trout slashed
through the school he would lift the fly up and then let it sink.
Too often to be truly comfortable for my ego, a trout would grab
his sinking smelt.
Sooner or later I had to get the message – and I
did. I tied on a silicone smelt and waited. Soon a trout slashed
through the school and I dropped the fly into the swirl of water
left by the trout, and watched as it turned and almost leisurely
sucked in my fly. Magic when you finally work it out.
For two or so hours Ed and I enjoyed superb sport.
Catching and releasing fish – catching fish we could see not a
rod length in front of us. Stand out stuff.
There was another point of note. Ed s catch rate
was about double mine, but when Ed finally ran out of his Blue
Dudes his catch rate dropped back to about mine. Got to be a message
in there somewhere.
Then, for reasons that completely mystify me, the
trout simply disappeared. The smelt were still there, in fact
there may have been even more of them. All of a sudden the smelt
started to swim leisurely around the rocks, and spread out over
a wider area. The trout were gone.
We waited of course, hoping the magic was not yet
over, but it was. So we left – mystified, but happy. Ed had landed
and released nine fish – me just over half that. A magic few hours.
Some lessons learned too, some theories cemented into more solid
fact, that for me really makes a day stand out.