Issue #12

This spectacular eastern cod was taken while bass fishing a remote pool on the Clarence River in Northern NSW. The species is fully protected and was released immediately upon capture. See Coen Amon’s feature The Captivating Clarence on page 72 for the full story.

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Hooked up to a big salmon from the reef at Almonta Beach, with Golden Island in the background.

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The author rates big black bream as one of the trickiest, most challenging and, ultimately, most rewarding targets he’s ever chased on the fly‌ anywhere in the world.

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The rocky points at Rushy Plains are great places for trout to cruise for food during the day. Cast along, not out!

Eucumbene is old school. All the veterans have stories about the halcyon days and the hundreds of giant fish they would pull up the bank. Those times are long gone now, but it still produces some of the best trout fishing on mainland Australia. Walking the bank and tossing a lure is one of the most enjoyable ways to get amongst the action, as Adam Royter elaborates.

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iant granite boulders, unearthed by time and water, stand proudly. They sit perched precariously above head height. Cracks, as if cut by a cleaver, run right the way through. A grayscale stand of trees lines the way to where the water washed the life from them, leaving nothing but their sun bleached skeletons — only homes for birds, and firewood to keep the cold at bay now. This land holds a particular beauty, a wonder, and a simple life of its own — clear air, big sky, and a feeling of endlessness. Most see rocks, trees and water.

Others see magnificence; feel excitement, and the hunger to catch trout.

What do I see? I see a living planetarium at night when fishing the mudeye migration. I see a

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hard land worked by hard people, and I see a trout fishery balancing on a seesaw of water levels and daytime temperatures. The largest of the Snowy Hydro Scheme, Eucumbene is a hydro power dam and the water that once flowed between its banks is now held back to help boil the kettle every morning for hundreds of thousands of homes.

Since the 1960s, this lake has had a reputation for growing great trout, and good numbers of them. This, to a degree, is still the case. The Monaro Acclimatisation Society and NSW DPI have been instrumental in keeping the historic strain of trout swimming in the local lakes and rivers, and now is as good a time as any to go catch them.

Bottom East Side This area includes Buckenderra, Middlingbank, Rushy Plains, Frying Pan and Seven Gates. The fishing within this stretch of land covers most of what Eucumbene has to offer as far as structure, landscape and water types. This is my favourite part of the world. It allows for a sudden change of mind and not have to drive too far — or even drive at all — to fish something different to what was around the corner. That's the beauty of man-made lakes; the water was never meant to be there to start with, so the diversity of the land it uncovers is so very irregular — shale, mudflats, tree stands, steep banks — it’s all there. This is also why the two dominant fish species — brown and rainbow trout — can coexist in the one

The shallow bays at Seven Gates can, at times, produce quality fish that can’t help but hang around and eat tadpoles until mid morning.

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Granite boulders, deep edges, large snags and a beautiful backdrop; simply fishing paradise.

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Park Beach Bommie, we shot off to the Moonee mackerel grounds north of Coffs Harbour.

Nose-rigged on single strand stainless 15kg wire with a treble stinger hook in the tail for good measure, our two baits were set at staggered distances behind the boat. Baits rigged this way need be trolled at under 2kts or they spin and die quickly. Thankfully, with the Evinrude just in gear and ticking over silently at 500rpm, we poked along at about 1.3-1.8kts — just perfect.

With the baits set and a methodical troll pattern established to cover the reef, we had time to get a good feel for the layout of the cockpit. A set of Springfield helm seats allowed for locking rotation — just what is required when navigating

and watching baits or lures at the same time.

And I must say that the copiously wide (30cm) gunwales made for gloriously comfortable positions to rest your backside on while rigging or watching the baits — certainly superior to what’s found on most boats, which are not even half that width!

Our first strike took a while in coming, but 90 minutes later the ratchet finally rattled and the rod tip pulled down to a nice arc. Coen took the rod and after a few speedy runs and a bit of dancing around the big cockpit, we gaffed and then deposited a nice spotty mackerel in the EvaKool fish box. Another spotty hit an hour or so later, and we called it a morning.

The swim platform/duck board and walk-through-transom allowed great access to the water for underwater shots — this time a spotty.

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We followed up the following week with another morning mackerel session. Bait was difficult to find in close this time around, so we shot out a little wider to North East Trag, as we’d heard reports that slimies were there.

Navico had supplied us with a Simrad NSS-12 Sonar/GPS chart plotter, whereas I’d only previously run Lowrance units. I’d downloaded all of my waypoints onto an SD card and transferred them across to the Simrad and hoped it would all work. It certainly did, because our waypoints put us straight onto the main reef and the first two bait jig drops produced full strings of slimy mackerel. I must add here that this touch screen Simrad is a step up on any marine electronics

that I have used before (more on the unit in an upcoming issue).

To cut to the chase, we fished a few shallow reefs to the south this time and scored two nice spotties around the 6kg mark, and then a Spanish mackerel of 10kg. All of these fish fought well on 10kg braid overhead outfits and gave us somewhat of a run-around the cockpit.

As hoped, the swim platform/marlin board with walk-through transom access proved perfect for getting underwater shots. The EvaKool B125 fitted neatly across the middle of the boat hard up against the transom, while still allowing room for an angler either side. This was important, as we like to swing mackerel straight over the transom

The evil eye of a Spanish mackerel; great sportfish and great on the plate.

Those dentures are just a part of why we like to get mackerel straight into an ice box! The other being the sharp single and treble stinger hooks used on our mackerel traces.

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by Ian Miller

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