Rotorua Fly Fishing Report - 8th December 2011

With so many great places to fish around the Bay of Plenty it is always good to hear of yet another place to fish, especially one that doesn’t get large amount of anglers fishing it. Tucked away near the end of the Rangitaiki River is a little known dam called Matahina. Fishing from the dam wall has been fairly productive over the past couple of weeks with brown trout seemingly in reasonable abundance. This lake also offers some of the more scenic views of any lake in the area as well when out on it in a boat. Trolling can be very productive as can casting a sinking line from a drifting boat. Once on the lake access is available to some fairly good river fishing as well.

The opening of the upper reaches of the Ngongotaha on December 1 saw large numbers of anglers converging on this stream. It didn’t take long for fish to become rather timid and bolt for the nearest hiding place. In saying that, there have been quite a few fish around and with many of them spawning the opportunities were there for some. Once the stream started to colour late on Sunday fresh browns started to move upstream.

The upper Waiteti was holding some very large brown trout in amongst quite a few rainbows but they too soon learnt that any movement in their field of vision spelt danger. For both of these streams those who were amongst the first on the stream did best. White glow bugs seemed to be flavour of the day for anglers fishing inside the mouth during the week. Most of these fish are moving into this stream for spawning rather than for the cooling effect.

There seems to be a lot of fish moving into the Hamurana Stream over the past couple of days. Unfortunately they are still not holding off the mouth of the stream in any great numbers and it often requires a few hours of casting to get a few fish there during the day. A trace of at least four metres will help with the catch rate, especially when coupled with a ginger mick or muddler minnow during the day. After dark the length of trace is not as important, especially if the surface of the lake is rippled by the wind. Unfortunately with the variable wind direction and strength over the past few days the cold water plume has spread out over a huge distance out from the mouth, keeping fish well outside the range of wading anglers.

A few boats have been harling off the Awahou mouth with mixed results. This stream mouth usually has fish coming in well before Hamurana due to deep water being close to the shore there so anytime now is a good time to start fishing there. Start fishing with larger flies such as a size 6 dragonfly nymph or ginger mick but be prepared to change flies every 20 minutes or so if nothing is happening. Try various speeds of retrieval as well, from a dead drift to a short sharp constant twitch. Trolling and harling between Kawaha Point and the Waiteti continues to produce both rainbows and browns, though casting a wet fly or nymph along the edge of the weed bed has probably been more successful. To get the right conditions for trout to move into Hamurana and the Awahou in large numbers, Lake Rotorua needs to be above 18 degrees C throughout the water column and this has not happened as yet. The surface water temperature has reached 19.5 degrees C at time over the past week but with the deeper water being at least one or two degrees cooler fish are able to stay in the lake. Those with access to a boat with the ability to find the interchange between the cooler water from the streams and the higher lake water temperature should target that area as there should be rainbows holding in that area.