Graeme, father on the right, and sons, from left, Nick, Chris and James had a great two day introductory fly fishing adventure.

Unbeknown to Graeme the boys had put together a combined fathers day/birthday gift for him — he had no idea what was in store ’till he met the guide at the Hobart airport arrivals.

Although it is unusual for Red Tag to take a group of four, as a family this turned out to be a most enjoyable experience for not only the clients but also for myself.

All were beginners and each sighted fish to cast to, had fish on and both Nick and James got fish to hand.

James got more than a taste of success on day one. This top conditioned wild brown was a delicious entree for dinner that night.

His first ever trout, taken on the darchutek brown para emerger, sighted, stalked and caught in an afternoon mayfly hatch. Doesn’t get much better than that!

Next morning, at Currawong Lakes, Nick was into this fish — a 3lb+ rainbow, took him darn near to the backing three times and gave him the top fish for the trip.

Here are just two stills from an action-packed video from the Bentleigh Pro-Angler team.

Click here to view the YouTube video.

Gavin & Eddie, from Pro Angler, Bentleigh, had been ‘talking’ about coming over to film and fish in Tasmania for our wild trout, ever since Tourism Tasmania and Red Tag Trout Tours have been presenting our Pro Angler/’Tasmania’ nights for some five years or more.

Well, they finally made it along with assistant Stuart, and Wow!

After 60 fish to hand over four days, four different waters and more than 75% return on the dry fly. They can’t stop talking about it! Three days on a wide variety of rivers, and one day at Currawong Lakes, in total probably 120+ fish to the fly, they have video show footage par excellence.

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Sheltered grass areas to start casting layouts …

On to the (new) still water and the rainbow trout challenge …

Then the best action of the day – first wild brown trout on the dry! All this and we haven’t left the workshop property!

With the addition of our new Red Tag registered teaching/introductory stocked water at our heritage cottage accommodation, Somercotes, we can now offer the complete range of introductory packages as well as our traditional experienced angler option.

The still water had young rainbows introduced in mid 2011 and by March this year they were between 250-350g and by the next season should be around the 500-650g mark … a good sized fish to target for anyone looking to learn the art and skills of fly fishing.

Having more than 16 years experience guiding and tuition behind us, we understand the range of expectations beginners to fly fishing may have, some learn better with the practical hands on and learn as they go approach, whereas others like more theory and explanations before picking up the fly rod.

With the diversity of waters at Red Tag’s disposal, we can now cater for the whole range of our client’s requirements using this base facility.

From under cover theory session, to on-lawn casting instruction, stillwater casting and fishing skills and finally wild trout waters – all at the one location: and this is only day 1.

For extended workshops of two or more days, we can add on a variety of rivers and streams from our base location, include Currawong Lakes for those extra big fish, which means covering the range of fly fishing techniques and water variety.

As to numbers, one on one and two-angler packages are great as these maximise the teaching opportunity for the learner.

However, single full day workshops can be up to four people ex-Hobart with Red Tag transport and we can accommodate larger groups by arrangement.

Client and fish wise, January turned into our best ever, with the ‘hoppers coming on strong, fish in top nick and the early season forecasts by the Inland Fisheries Service as ‘best in 40 years’ living up to expectations.

New teaching water ‘christened’

Louise with the first fish on the Red Tag teaching water, a plump little rainbow taken on an unweighted brown nymph. Not huge yet, but good to get one to hand to check out quality (good) and feeding (yes).

Then it was onto the river that afternoon for her first ever wild brown to hand. Day two was all on the rivers and saw many more to both fly and net. Well done Louise.

Warwick ‘ticked all the boxes’

Next up was Warwick, a relative newcomer to fly fishing who had a rivers & streams ‘preference’.

After two separate days and 19 to hand, progressing from 7 on day one to 12 on day two, it was his most fish ever in a day, largest wild brown, also a rainbow to hand, day 2 was all on the dry!

He certainly christened all the gear that had not seen action till then.

From southern stream success to ‘hopper stream net result’ Warwick’s time on the water had it all.

Jim, and son Brantley, had a top time ‘catching up’ on their recent tour. Jim has fly fished for quite a while and was keen to see if Brantley would enjoy the experience as well.

While Jim (bringing it to hand, above) took the honours on day 1 with a nice 4lb wild brown trout at Currawong Lakes, Brantley soon picked up the importance of presentation and was top rod on the rivers both day 2 & 3.

Brantley is justifiably happy with this very nice Tassie wild brown for his first trout on the fly – dry (‘hopper pattern) at that!

He then topped that off by outfishing Dad on the second river day with fish like this one, catching them on a 2 to 1 ratio!

Finally showing a mastery of all aspects of the art, Brantley helps Dad out by netting one of Jim’s feisty browns.

Paul’s dad Ron, in action above, was visiting from overseas and they were looking for a multi-day tour with Paul’s wife Sue joining us for the last two days.

The first four days varied between good to great with something like 50+ fish to hand and real quality and size.

Many anglers think our Tasmanian fly fishing drops off after February. However, on the rivers and streams (where Red Tag works and weather permitting) this is far from the fact. March and even April can produce top draw fly fishing with dries to the fore.

This was certainly the case in the 2nd week of March when Paul set a new one-day ‘to hand & release’ bench mark for this season at 23 fish.

Paul bringing 1st for the day to hand on the dry — Paul is a dry fly-only fisher — and to put the fishing in perspective, he outfished all on every day except day 2 when, with a little prompting from the guide, Ron popped a small bead-head under the dry and ended up ‘top rod’ for that day.

Some more action by the party:

Ron ‘high-sticking’ a nice wild brown on the nymph on day 2.

Day 3 was clear water polaroiding and precise presentation. Paul has some real weight here on his #2wt.

Paul’s delighted with this fish, again on the #2wt — one of a number of exquisite wild browns on day 3.

Sue wasn’t to be left out after joining us to try the Currawong Lakes. This nice rainbow was taken on a Red Spinner pattern.

During his recent visit to Tasmania, Billy Connolly took a few days out to get acquainted with some of our wild brown trout.

This he did with a high degree of skill and great enthusiasm which resulted in a very successful and rewarding trip over two days at Currawong Lakes and a third day on a ‘river somewhere’. All fish were taken on the dry and the vast majority sighted feeding fish.

His double-take came on day 2 at Currawong Lakes when Billy hooked the same fish twice on the same day, but bringing it to hand the second time.

Thats Billy holding that wild brown in hand, above, and note the pink emerger in lower lip, which was the first fly actually bitten off when hooked, it still had 2cm of tippet attached.

In all our combined years of fly fishing, including those guiding, this had not happened to either of us. So another first for the records.

Meanwhile, gentle hands bring another river brown to net.

Phil and his long time mate Paul won the Pro Angler/Red Tag 5-day/4-night package tour promotion for the 2010-11 season.

As both were fairly new to fly fishing Currawong Lakes was a great intro day which proved most successful, with Phil getting this nice brown to hand.

Then Paul lands this quality rainbow, below. Top action then followed on the river/stream work during the remainder of the workshop.