Paul, foreground, has some early success while John is working on another fish in the distance.

The action results in a nice rainbow for Paul.

John was not to be denied his moment in the sun when his first ever trout on the fly was this excellent conditioned rainbow. (IMGP1515)

Robert and son Peter came down for a return and soon got amongst them. Peter’s patience and calm presentations were rewarded with this early morning sipper, above, taken on the emerger.

Next it is Robert’s turn to get onto a nice wild brown, again on the dry, while Peter helps out with the netting.

This was a very well deserved, and worked for, brown by Peter. Double hauling on the #4wt to get a dry almost across the broadwater, then skilfully guiding the resultant trout through the reeds. I think many a wily trout will fall to Peter’s presentations for years to come!

To get seven mates into fly fishing and onto fish could have been a big call, however with Adam’s help at Currawong Lakes, enthusiaism plus some rapidly-gained skills helped all the boys get fish to hand with a total of 30+ to the fly and some 15 to hand.

Mind you at times some were more into it than others, then again, any vantage point may help the polaroiding!

This healthy rainbow is heading back after giving a good account of itself.

A nice bit of team work to get another rainbow to the net.

Long time friend and lapsed flyfisher Trevor (long time no fish, not his doing) makes a triumphant return to the water. This set of pics sums it up beautifully when Trevor sighted his first riser.

Above: He has fish sighted, stalked & fly presented.

Below: Fish rises, takes & lift.

It was a top day on the dry (emerger) and we both enjoyed it very much.

We are finally getting some stream and river action.

After the big wet winter and early spring, the rivers are starting to settle so you will see much more action on these types of waters from now on.

On reflection it was probably a month later than usual and certainly the latest since I started guiding in ’96.

Drought says Allan, what drought? As you can see by the flow in these ‘little’ streams, the Winter and Spring flows are still very strong and it made for some challenging, yet successful fly fishing over four days, even for an experienced angler like Allan.

To think this is now past mid-spring and we still have this amount of flow and no surface feeders.

Above: Here he is on day 1 with a lovely wild brown trout to the net after a real tussle in that rapid water. Fell to a brass bead-head dark brown nymph.

Day two and finally a Red Tagger gets ‘our’ first on the dry.

This one puts a good bend in the Stalker Pro Angler #4wt, Spotted rising around that tea-tree bush in front of him, Allan nicely dropped the dark brown emerger just his side of the bush and down it went!

Final day up on Currawong Lakes as the wind had driven us off the lowland streams and what a finish … this magnificent rainbow (est 8lb) taken on a copper-bead brown nymph took him to the backing twice and was so strong the attempted quick photograph in the hands prior to release was definitely not on this trout’s agenda.

One flick and it was out of the grasp and back in the water before I could even get the camera focused! Well that’s my story anyway!

Picked up Kate and Dale from the Priory at Bothwell and headed off to Currawong for their introduction to fly fishing.

A typical spring day in Tassie, ‘if you don’t like the weather … a hang on 30 minutes and we’ll change it’ type of day which couldn’t deter or dampen spirits as you can see.

For starters, above, despite the rain, Dale has a beaming smile with due cause with this beauty to the net. His first on the fly.

Then a little later, both the day (no wind or rain) and Kate are smiling warmly with her first to hand.

Now an established regular ‘Tagger’, Trevor always gets fish to hand and enjoys his trips.

On this ocassion he is releasing a very well-conditioned and good sized rainbow trout picked up feeding in the shallow margins.

He has already booked his ‘hopper day in March 2010.