Prep for NZ

I haven't able to go fishing for nearly three weekends because of the end of year school stuff (which is always hectic) as well as all prep work for our trip to NZ.

I am still working on a spare tip for my bamboo rod which I will take to NZ, and it looks like I might be just able to finish it before we leave on Saturday.

There is still a lot of spaces in my fly boxes which should be filled with flies by now, and I do my best to tie some more. I can do the rest when I get there, I guess.






Got a new pair of shoes and a new mat for NZ

A camp fish and a camp gear

I went down to a camp site next to Murray River on last Wednesday to attend our school camp.

The camp was all being well looked after by other teachers and students were having fun playing basketball before the evening meal, so I took my rod and walked down to the river instead.

There are some trout in the river, but they are few and far between. It is more realistic to catch perch down there, and that was what I was doing to kill a hour or so before the dinner.

It wasn't that exciting in terms of fishing, but it was still nice to be there, watching the water flows, and getting fish at the end of the line from time to time.

先週の水曜日の放課後に学校のキャンプに行ってきました。夕飯の前に２時間程時間があったので、近くの川へちょこっと釣りに行って来ました。川にはマスも放流されているのですが、この川で釣れる魚の殆どは、ヨーロピアン・パーチです。

名前から分かる通りの外来種で（マスも同じですが）、日本で言う所のブラックバスの様に、色々な所で増殖してしまい、今ではリリースが御法度になるくらいです。「マスよりも美味しい」と言う人が多く、沢山釣れて、味が良いと、キャンプで釣るにはちょうど良い魚です。

Speaking on camping, I bought a new tent last week for our trip to NZ. My Macpac Eclipse is loosing its waterproof urethane coating, and I have contacted Macpac to get a fly sheet replaced. Unfortunately I was told that they don't make Eclipse anymore.

So I needed to look for a new tent, and after a long search on the net, I decided to get Macpac's Microlight tent (mainly because it was $150 cheaper than a normal price during their Chrissy sale).

The new tent looks good and solid although things look bit cheaper here and there compared to my old NZ made tent. Hopefully, the new tent will serve me good for a long time as my old tent did.

スクールキャンプから帰ると、オーダーしておいた新しいテントが届いていました。

僕の古いMacpacのテント（Eclipse) は、フライシートのウレタンの防水コーティングが剥げ始めてしまい、その事をMacpacに問い合わせると、「残念ながら、同じモデルはもう作っていない」と言われました。そこで、いろいろとインターネットで探してみた結果、同じMacpacのMicrolightというソロテントを買う事に決めました（クリスマスセールで＄１５０も値下げしていたのが一番の理由です）。

二人用の前のテントより比べると狭く天井も低いです。それと、前のテントはニュージーランド製でしたが、Macpacのテントは今ではベトナム製。細かい箇所が色々と安っぽくなっています。

それでも前のテントよりもずっと軽くて、パッキングも大分小さいです。これで、クリスマスホリデーのNZ旅行も安心です。

Microlight is lot lighter than Eclipse for being a solo tent.






Pegs from the older tent when the tents were still made in NZ


Cheap pegs for the new tent. The tents are now made in Vietnam


An old instruction with nice pictures. New one looks cheap and boring.

Get rid of wader

It was a very hot weekend, and for the fast time this summer, I went wet wading. Water was nice and cool.

Mike looking for the sign of fish






Canon D10

Breaking a shock tippet

I went to the river to cast a popper at those tailor again this evening.

For a half hour, I was casting the popper but I had no strike. The tide was much higher than our last session on the weekend, and I didn't see much of the surface activity today.

So, I switched the popper to a streamer thinking fish were staying deep. The hit then came suddenly but fish bit off 15lb shock tippet. It was a clean cut as if it was being snipped by a pair of sharp scissors. I was thinking 15 lb would be heavy enough, so I was surprised to loose the fish like that.



I tied another tippet. 15lb again as it was the heaviest that I had. I didn't want to loose a brand new fly again though, so I decided to recycle my deer hair popper as a streamer instead.

The fly had already lost its left eye and some hairs after being attacked by those choppers on the weekend, so I was happy to sacrifice that to the fish. To make sure the fly to go deep, I put a bit of tungsten putty on the tippet.

Anyway, I thought, having such a big head, the fly should push more water which might attract attention from the chopper. It was pain to cast with #4 rod, but the rig eventually worked. The fish was on, and the tippet held this time.

Chopper

Mike and I went out to chase some river tailor (bluefish) this afternoon.

Although the fish were rising to our poppers quite regularly for a hour or so, we were struggling to get a hook up for some reason.

For many occasions, the fish came up and make a swirl underneath of the fly, and then they went down without hitting the fly. We still got a couple of good hits with splash, but again they didn't produce a solid hook up.


Mike trying his new LOOP #5.



Only fish that we hooked up this afternoon was the one which came up to grab my deer hair popper, and I couldn't believe how quiet the hit was. It was almost like watching trout rising to mayfly emergers. It was a very interesting session, I thought.

They don't get called "chopper" for nothing.


Canon D10

Breaking a record

Well, I broke my fishing record of this year. 15 cm long bream, the smallest fish of the year so far.

We really struggled to find fish this weekend. Four of us went out late afternoon yesterday and only fish we caught were, my diminutive bonsai bream, and Mike's a marginally bigger one.

昨日の釣りで今年のレコード更新です。全長わずか１５cmのクロダイ、今年で一番小さい釣果です。夕方、４人で釣りをして、結果は、僕の盆栽クロダイとマイクのこれまた小さい魚の２匹のみ。

Today, fishing was even slower. We fished hours and only got one fish. Not quite a record breaker, but again it was another small fish that could fit in my fly box, if I squeeze it hard enough.

今日の釣りは、昨日以下。二人で数時間、魚を求めてキャストし続けたものの、釣果は、たったの一匹。記録更新にはなりませんでしたが、ギュッと押し込めばフライボックスに収まる位の小物。この数日、暑くなったり、涼しくなったりとどうも落ち着きがありません。水温の方にも影響しているのかもしれません。

Catching sea weed

I went to river today after work to see if fish were biting after some rain we had for the last couple of days.

When I got there, water was already quite high and wind was very cold. I didn't see any bait fish activity, and a river looked quiet. So I thought fish would be staying deep, and I put an intermediate line to see if that would help me to find fish hanging off the bottom.

At the end, I kept catching some weed after weed. I eventually hooked one fish, and the fish was probably a vegetarian chasing weed being caught around the hook. I strongly believe, a floating is a far better choice for bream fishing, at least you are more likely to hook up fish not weed.

Metro Field Day

I went out for our club's Perth metro field day today, and it was a big turn out of 11 people (as I remember, only 6 showed up for the last metro field day in July).

Mike and I decided to fish on a flat on Canning River around Rossmoyne in the morning. Fishing was slow at mid tide yesterday aftenoon, so we wanted to fish earlier while the tide was still low.

I quickly picked out 3 breams as soon as we got there, but they went quiet very quickly. Other members showed up then, and they told us that fishing was being slow elsewhere.

We then decided to go upstream to check the place where some small tailor were getting caught on soft plastics. I was already happy to get 3 breams, and I wanted to catch tailor for change. So, I cut off my bream flies, and put a bigger streamer, which I tied last night, at the end of 15lb bite tippet.

I guess I was being lucky to hook fish on the first cast, but wasn't being lucky enough as it threw a hook out when I was trying to scoop it with my landing net. Anyway, it wasn't a big fish but nice to hook something different, I thought.

Canon D10

Lazy sunday

I was meant to be doing some work today, but I was being lazy and didn't get to do much. I then went out to fish for a hour or so in the afternoon.

Fishing wasn't as good as yesterday, but I was happy to get a couple of fish on such a lazy Sunday afternoon.

Canon D10

At the right tide

My friend, Mike, told me that he has finally decided to upgrade his old Daiwa #5 fly rod. So we went to a fly shop to try a few different rods.

After having a lunch at a cafe, we stopped at East Perth to see if fish has came back there. The water was disappointingly dirty thanks to a heavy boat traffic and strong onshore wind, and we quickly decided to leave the place even though I got one fish within a few casts.

友達のマイクが、新しい竿を探していると言うので、今日は地元のフライショップに行って竿を何本か試し振りして来ました。ランチの後で、East Perthのポイントを釣りましたが、早々に一匹を釣ってからは当たりが全くありませんでした。週末なのでパワーボートが沢山出ていて、ボートの引き波と岸に向かって強い風が吹いていたせいで、水は完全に濁っていました。これでは、釣りにはならないと判断して、早々にボートの行き来が少ないCanning River に場所替えです。

While we were driving back, we were talking about where to fish. We eventually decided to fish on Canning River to avoid the weekend boat traffic.

The tide was very low when we got there in the late afternoon, and we drove along the river to find a possible fishing spot.

We stopped at a sand flat which we normally drive pass. This part of the river doesn't get our attention usually. I have fished there couple times before and I got nothing but broken flies being chewed up by schools of blowies.

The place however looked interesting today as we would be able to walk to the channel normally too deep to get to.

ポイント選びに車を走らせていると、普段はウェーディングでは行く事が出来ないポイントが、潮の引きが大きい今日は行けそうに見えました。砂州の先にある落ち込みがポイントですが、普段だと深すぎてアクセスできません。

We decided to check this place first before moving to our other usual spots which have been dependable. Our bet however paid off at the end as we were hooking up three or four fish each and getting a lot of hits in between. Mike even got his 6lb tippet broken off by a nice fish.

Fish were laying at the edge of the drop-off probably waiting bait fish passing by with the incoming flow. Fish were baiting for a hour or so, and when the tide slowed down, they were gone. It was another usual story of being at the right place on the right tide, we thought.

１０分位やって駄目だったら他のポイントへ移ろうと決めて釣りを始めましたが、いきなりマイクが６lbのティペットを良いサイズの魚に切られ、その後は、二人ともまあまあのサイズの魚を、３、４匹釣りました。

魚は、落ち込みの周りを潮目にそって移動していていて、流れに乗ってくるベイトを追っているようでした。それから、しばらくすると、潮の流れが遅くなり、当たりがパッタリ無くなりました。やっぱりこの釣り、潮の流れを読むのがポイントだと改めて感じました。

Canon D10

Full moon

The moon was stunningly beautiful tonight, and the river looked magical under the bright moon light.

今宵は、満月。月明かりに照らされて川は、なんとも神秘的でした。

EF 24mm f/2.8


I only had an hour to fish today, but I got one fine fish. Canon D10

Afternoon at Mandurah Estuary

I went down to the river mouth in Mandurah to catch some herring today. It has been 6 or 7 weeks since I fished there last time, and I was still catching some estuary salmon back then.

According to my friend, salmon has gone from the estuary since, but he told me he has been catching many herring in the river for the past few weeks.

I got down there in the late afternoon today, and soon realized that the tide has changed a lot while I was away. The tide was now reversed, and I couldn't find any fish where I was catching fish last time, and it took me while to figure out where fish were.

I eventually found schools around the deep water, and I started hooking up fish. I hooked up ten or so, I think, but I kept dropping them as they jumped out of water. It was frustrating watching fish throwing a hook away at a rod tip. I was still able to land some though, and I kept a few for our dinner plate tomorrow.

Canon D10

Bream and a blue summer sky

It turned out be a lovely weather today, and the blue sky reminded me of a nice summer day that we had in Japan a couple of weeks ago.

I got a couple of fish today, one small one, and one nice one just under 40cm mark.

It looks like summer is here, and it might be time to pack up my waders, I thought.

Canon D10