Eucumbene Fishing Trip
October 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th 2010
Day 1
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| Sunrise on the Dam |
Finally after waiting for months our Eucumbene trip had arrived. Previously I have had great success at this place so to say I was excited would have been an understatement. I headed off Tuesday morning at about 7am, with a plan of having a stop and spinning the Eucumbene river at Kiandra and Providence Portal. Now that the rivers are open again I thought it would a nice start to the trip.
Water was clear in the Eucumbene River and I probably spent 30mins there, but a lot of this was watching a fly fishing guide help a client onto a fish.... what a job. No success for me, but then again I didn't try very hard.
Arrived at Providence to find a huge amount of cars spread out across the plain, probably about 30 cars, but its a big plain and there is plenty of room to fish. Before I started fishing I was having a chat to a couple of Canadians who live in Melbourne. They had been fishing the rivers in the area all week with great success. I fished and chatted with these guys for quite a while, they were casting Rapala's into the most turbulent water, I was surprised that the lure even swan correctly in the current. But my eyes were really opened when one of them pulled out a 4 pound brown. Very nice looking fish. I was really happy that I saw that, because normally I would focus my efforts on the starts and ends of rapids, however in future I will fish the 'run' a little as well. There was about twice as much water coming out of the portal compared to this time last year.
I met up with Pete, Preso, Guru and Stan at Adaminiby and after a couple of beers we headed off to find our Accommodation. A couple of hours later and we were unpacking our stuff at our cabin and getting ready for a quick fish. Because Kanck was bringing up my Hobie later that night, I jumped in Pete's boat with him and Preso (Quintrex 385, 25 Yamaha). I ended up with two fish for that afternoon, but was disappointed that Pete or Preso didn't get any, probably a couple of reasons for this, the 25 Yamaha probably pushes the boat a bit to fast for a good trolling speed, and Pete and Preso both had a pretty heavy leader tied on and a very large snap swivel.
While on the boat with the two old fellas I realised that this fishing trip was probably going to be a little more relaxed than my usual fishing adventures. I normally fish non-stop from sun up to sun down and by the end of each day I am wrecked! So a more relaxed approach would be taken for this trip.
Baitfished that night after Kanck turned up and landed two fish on powerbait. Not a bad start!
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| A nice 50cm Rainbow Trout |
Weather
- 22*C
- Unknown Barometric Pressure
- Sunny - Very little cloud
- Slight wind
- Water Temp - 11*C
Results
- A couple of Rainbow Trout
Day 2
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| Morning on the second day |
Up early to discover the dam had 'glassed off' and we couldn't get down and into the Hobie's quick enough. I was using a 'Canberra Killer' Tassie on one rod and a Diawa Shiner (Rainbow Trout) on the other, within minutes I had picked up fish on both and the day had started well. An interesting point to make was that I picked up a lot of fish in the same area as I did at Easter time, the difference was therer were a lot of smaller ones and most were in poorer condition... I put this down to the fish being post-spawn and were still feeding heavily to put on condition. The morning session was a great trolling session, and I think I ended up with about 8 fish and dropped a couple as well... I was satisfied to say the least. A point worth noting was at one stage I was spinning from the bank into some deep rocky water for a good 30mins and got nothing, I then jumped in the yak and trolled through the exact zone I was casting to and picked up a fish with a lure that was of a very similar colour to the one I was casting.
Once I returned to the boat ramp I was very tired, I had just had an 8 hour session in the Hobie and was ready for some lunch, a shower and an afternoon siesta. Kancky, Guru and Stan had all managed to pick up fish. Pete and Preso were still on struggle street. After some discussion over lunch I thought I would help out Pete and Preso, so I tied on a 6lb fluorocarbon leader and gave them a couple of lures that had worked for me! I think fishing trips where everyone catches fish are a lot more enjoyable than those when a few struggle. With this in mind I was very happy to help out!
After my siesta I went down to the water and played around with some baitfishing on the bank and a little Hobie action. I also met a man who had been coming here for 35 odd years and it was very interesting to listen to some of his stories of how the dam fished and looked in the past. That might be me one day, ha ha!
With a massive storm front coming across in the distance we started to worry a little, but the fish went mad, Kanck landed 11 fish that afternoon all on powerbait. I am certain that the approaching storm had something to do with this!
Pete managed to get onto a couple of fish with his new rig but Preso was still on a doughnut.
This was a good day but when I was lying in bed that night I was totally buggered so I made a very conscious decision to take it easy the following day. This decision was made easier by the thunderstorm that had finally rolled in and it was doing its best to blow the cabin over!
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| The fog of the first morning |
Weather
- 22*C
- Unknown Barometric pressure
- No wind, until the afternoon
- Water temp 11*C
Results
- Quite a few Rainbow Trout
Day 3
Another early start on day 3 greeted us with blue skies and a gusty wind.... baitfishing and a few beers it was! We managed to catch trout all morning on powerbait and worms. Preso finally got a few fish and Pete got a few more as well. Bait fishing seemed to be much more productive than lures and I assume that this is because we were fishing post-spawn and the trout would have been gorging themselves to help get some weight back on after their spawn run!
After lunch we headed over to another bay in Pete's boat with intentions of doing a bit of lure casting and baitfishing. I cast some stiffy minnows and a pegron spoon around for a little while for no result so I resorted to baitfishing and picked up a couple more fish, and lost a few as well.
On the way back we stopped for a baitfish at a nice rocky point with a few trees around, I spotted a nice brown in a shallow bay just down from the bait rods and threw a few lures and a soft plastic to it, with no success.
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| Pete's boat in the distance |
It was dark when we returned to the boat ramp so we cleaned the fish and headed back to the cabin for dinner.
I thoroughly enjoyed this day, although I don't enjoy baitfishing nearly as much as I enjoy fishing with lures, it was great to sit back and have a few chats with the fellas that went, and quite a few beers as well.
Great days fishing!
Weather
- 18*C
- Unknown Barometric Pressure
- Very windy/Gusty
- Water Temp Unknown
Results
- Quite a few Rainbow Trout
Day 4
We were greeted with great weather on Friday morning and the plan was to have a quick troll for a couple of hours and then pack up.
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| A fog covering the lake. |
I had a 'Canberra Killer' Tassie and Diawa Shiner 'Yellow Spot' on my rods and ended up getting 3 rainbows on the Daiwa Shiner for the morning, I also lost 3 or 4 at the boat and had a good 15 or so hits. As I was taking the lure off I realised that one of the hooks on the rear treble was straight, I'll put my lost fish down to that! After about 2 hours of trolling around I decided to call it a day and headed back to the cabin to pack up. It had been a great couple of days, although very different to how I normally approach my fishing trips, it was just as enjoyable. I was very happy that all who attended were able to catch some fish and go home with a smile on their faces. The standout style of fishing was by far baitfishing and the best bait being powerbait, it didn't really matter if you used the powerbait and floated it off the bottom on its own or if you used it on the same hook as a worm as an attractant. Either way the stuff is very effective. Standout lure for me and probably everyone else was the 'Canberra Killer' Tassie Devil. I was also impressed with the Diawa Shiner. Last time (Easter) the Rapala F3's were a standout but not anywhere near as effective this time! The fish were also a lot poorer, condition wise, this trip and there were a lot of smaller "30cm" fish.
Overall I would say that this was a successful trip and a very enjoyable one at that! I didn't get onto a Brown while I was there, in fact knowone did, but our tactics weren't suited to them. Powerbait is a known Rainbow bait with Browns only rarely take it and I believe that the Rainbows were so prolific in the area we fished that they didn't give us a chance to get onto a Brown because they were onto the baits to early. In the next 3 months I am going to do a couple of overnight trips back up that way, one to providence to fish the river their and one to Jindabyne to fish the mouths of the Thredbo and Snowy Rivers I think by targeting these areas from shore with lures I will put myself in good stead to tangle with a nice Brown.
Weather
Results
It was a real confidence booster to have a guide tell you that your doing things right, I think fishing is all about confidence and in future I will fish with much more confidence in different techniques that previously I had questioned a little. 
