Weather: Sunny and still today with highs of 22°C.
Tongariro River Flow: 24.1 cumecs (m³/s)
Autumn is well and truly upon us as the early mornings see fresh starts with the sun warming the water nicely by the afternoon to see rising fish and lace moth activity beginning to show up when the wind gusts blow the little guys onto the surface.
More browns continue to arrive as we've had reports of success along with the plenty who have got away! We are seeing occasional small pods of them here and there as they make their way upstream to begin spawning. Often seen hanging out resting on the edges, the fish of 100 casts if you can get them to eat! These sleepy guys tend to feed at night, so swinging big profiled dark woolly buggers and streamers at night close to where you have seen them during the day is a sure way to land these tricky fish.
Some of you might remember John Ooi one of our staff members for a number of years here in Sporting Life and it seems the apple hasn't fallen far from the tree as his son Raymond has been putting the work in to find feeding browns throughout the river system and it's great to see his hard work paying off with a good number to the net now this year. Well done Ray!
The wind has been relentless for the boaties and fly fishermen alike, but that being said, people jigging have reported good success around the 25m mark and the condition of the fish in the lake slowly improve on what has been a slimmer conditioned rainbow year for most.
Some good reports have been coming in from the lake edges and river mouths as better conditioned fish come in to the cool water on dusk to feed on smelt, of which we have plenty of patterns in store to choose from.
We have lacemoth patterns in store for the coming week along with plenty of cicadas and terrestrial patterns as the sunny weather continues for the late season large dry flies. The backcountry is still fishing well so get out there and enjoy it!
See you out there,
Rosie