Weekly Fishing Report – Central South Island - 14-01-2021

After a short hiatus, thanks to an upgrade of our email delivery system, I thought we would kick off the weekly reports for 2021 with a success story.

Rob Gonzales got in touch just prior to Christmas to share his photo and story with you lot.

Right: Rob and Gerald sharing a successful moment at Lake Ruataniwha-Credit Rob Gonzales.

Rob says “We were fishing along Lake Ruataniwha where we observed numerous rises and after trying many different lures, boom, this fish took my hex wobbler with a red shade!”

“It took around 20 minutes to land and with Gerald’s help netting we successfully landed this 22lb rainbow! I was using a trout rod with a 12lb line!”

“I have been fishing for at least 18 years, mostly within the Central South Island Region, and always dreamed of catching a “big” one!  I guess dreams really do come true.”

Thanks for sharing that Rob, it is great to be able to share report-readers stories.

If you have any good pics and a brief story to share, then why not email it to me so I can consider it for the report – radams@fishandgame.org.nz.

Have any report readers caught a sea-run salmon in CSI rivers this January?

I’d love to share a picture of one of those elusive treasures.

The latest new from the south side Rangitata Huts is that there have been four salmon caught in January, making it a total of 14 for the south side mouth area this season.

There has been at least four caught at the mouth area on the north side of the Rangitata.

I have no intel from what has been caught in the entire rest of the Rangitata River this season. 

The Tekapo Canal has been a hive of activity this holiday period with some impressive catches of salmon and rainbow trout. 

Surprisingly, we have had very few reports of catches of the 250 tagged trout we released into the Tekapo Canal just above the salmon farms in December. 

If you did catch a tagged fish recently, we would love to hear from you, phone 03 6158400 or email csi@fishandgame.org.nz    

If you want to learn more about the tagged fish project click here and check out this video. 

The outlook for the fishing this weekend is reasonable. 

Saturday looks to be fine and warm with some wind in the high country. 

On Sunday, there is a windy looking nor-wester hitting the Southern Alps, meaning rain deep in the high country and fine but windy elsewhere.

It's hard to say if that norwest rain will increase the flows of main divide rivers like the Rangitata and Ahuriri, so it would pay to keep an eye on the ECan flow website.

Most waterways will be good for fishing this weekend, especially after all the recent rain has given many a good clean-out. 

However, our observations from Tuesday this week are that Lake Aviemore, Lake Waitaki and the Waitaki River remain discoloured after the recent floods. 

Rod giveaway for Junior anglers (under 18) 

Do you know a young person who loves fishing but doesn’t own their own rod?

We have a number of rod/reel sets to give away to junior anglers that don't yet have their own gear.

These rods have been in our lock-up for a while and have not been collected, so out the door they go. 

They are in average/good used condition.

Please ring ahead, 03 6158400 and organise a time for the young angler to come and pick up a rod from our Temuka Office.

Tight Lines

Rhys Adams, Central South Island Fish & Game Officer