Ronan's Report

Since Dad left almost a week ago I’ve been staying with my good friend Kevin Alexander in Fairlie. I’ve been busy online with organising flights to, from and within Australia, writing my first ever CV, contacting recruitment companies, visa applications, Christmas shopping (unsuccessfully) as well as staying in touch with family and friends. I still made time to get out on the water though, mostly on the local reservoir.

The fishing has been hit and miss. Some days the river mouths have been fantastic and other days, for no reason I can deduct, they’ve been dead! That’s fishing though and it’s all good. On one evening of note I had 3 fish in about 3 hours. A salmon, a brown and a rainbow, The next day I blanked but Mark Adamson managed a couple. All of the lake fishing were doing is from our boat (mine and Kevins). She has a few small problems but without doubt it was the best 400 nzd (thats 200 each!) we’ve ever spent. I doubt an outing in her goes by without mentioning what a bargain we got.

When travelling around the south island catch and release is what I do 99% of the time. The main reason for this is conservation but I eat fish so sometimes I take one or 2 when I know the body of water I’m fishing wont suffer from the loss of a fish or 2. this is generally true on lakes and large rivers. I really enjoy fishing for the table. It’s different because its not about deceiving the fish, It’s about food. I still have hunter gatherer instincts. Yesterday Kevin and I went out on the lake in the evening. We got 2 fish; the first one we took, the second went back.

I’m spending Christmas with Kevin, His Partner Freddie and her family and their baby Macy in Te Anau. Thanks in advance for having me. I have bought you all exceptional gifts so I’ll be expecting the same!

In case I don’t get a blog up on Christmas day I’ll say Happy Christmas to you all now! I hope its a good one. I know Kevin and I will sneak away to the river for an hour or 3, tight lines if you do the same!

Enjoy the festivities! Stuntman Ronan..

After 5 internet free weeks travelling around the South Island with my Dad, I’m back.. Dad flies out today after 30 blank free days on river and lake. The fishing was great because we worked hard for it. New Zealand fishing rewards an angler for effort as much as having the fundamentals correct. Our day’s together were simple. We got up at 7 or 8 and had a quick breakfast. One of us (usually Dad) would make us a sandwich each for lunch. After 8-10 hours on the water we would return to our accommodation and one of us (usually Dad, but this was less one sided than the sandwich making!) would cook dinner. A few beers and then bed.

We changed the format of this trip a little. In the past we would spend a lot of time driving to many different waters. This time we tried to find good locations within easy striking distance of good water and stay put for a while. Mossburn for example, A great location but the holiday park was pretty average at best. I like basic but the cold concrete floor, uncomfortable old school chairs,tiny flickering  tv and a door that sounded worse that a cat being stepped on every time it was opened and closed eventually broke me down. The fishing was great though. Dad had his personal best brown not too far away. He was almost 8lbs. We had about 50 big browns that week.

Another place we spent some time was at Buscot Station Backpackers 9ks North of Omarama. This is one of the best Backpackers I have stayed in anywhere. Tony owns the place and Kev helps out. After a long day on one of many nearby rivers or lakes we would come “home” to Buscot. Dinner was never a problem in the well equipped kitchen. Steak, veg and roast potatoes every night, usually with a bottle of wine and, if we were lucky, Tony playing the Piano. The beds were comfortable and the rooms spotless. We had freshly laid eggs for breakfast every day. Take my advise and stay here! You will not want to leave..

Back to fishing talk.. Still water fishing has been teaching me lots lately. I have been successfully using many methods and developing new ones. Let me elaborate! All the usual methods have been working so I wont bore you with those but one of the new things for me is fishing at close quarters to the fish using spiders. Suddenly for no apparent reason I knew spiders would be deadly even though i never really used them before. I fished them around lake edges instead of my usual #16 unweighted nymph suspended under a dry. Now I had no dry as an indicator so I was watching the fish more closely than ever, sometimes striking only because the fish was in roughly the right place, or it changed direction and slowed down, or stopped, or something obvious like i could see it’s mouth open and close. Then I started to notice mannerisms like one kick of the tail to approach the fly usually ended in a take, Slow constant swimming movements were less sure and sometimes ended in a refusal. This close quarter fishing was fascinating and I wanted to get closer and thus the “Huckleberry Finn” method was born. In my head Huckleberry Finn is an adventurer with rough clothes and a cloth tied at 4 corners draped over a stick to carry his belongings. Sometimes he sits beside a lake under a tree with a bit of string tied to the stick trying to catch a fish. That’s what I found myself doing to get closer than ever to the fish! I used the willows which line many lake edges as cover. This heavy cover makes casting Impossible but it makes it easy to get very close to the fish. Once in position unhitch the fly, reel in until 2 or 3 foot of tippet is under the rod tip and then put the fly right in front of the fish or in his beat and wait for fireworks. The direction of the strike has be considered before the take to avoid smashing your rod off a willow limb. I learned lots from this method and on one great morning I had 11 on the HF while dad also had 11 while blind wolley buggering!

That same day another type of close quarter fishing presented itself to us. With 11 fish each and the wind getting up to about a force 6 we decided to go somewhere more sheltered. I was just about to put the rod in the car when I noticed a fish feeding in the swash of a breaking wave right beside me. I unhitched the fly and slammed it down beside him and he nailed it.. We walked on and realised this was not a once off. There were lots of fish doing this and we started catching them. We finished up with 18 each for the day on 3 completely different methods!

I have seen these “surfers” before but never to this extent, Partly because I didn’t look no doubt. I needed more and luckily this wind got up from the same direction every afternoon and the fish were there on cue. A lot of the fish were on the thin side and very opportunist but there were plenty cracking fish to keep us interested. On the days when the waves were not too big, dries provided great sport. Nymphs and spiders worked equally well but were not as much fun. On one insanely intense afternoon when the wind turned into a gale and one could dam near bodyboard on the swells breaking ashore, the fish were still there being pounded by the waves feeding away. No skinny fish though, All good ones with occasional Rainbows coming in from the back from time to time. It was unreal to see where the browns were effortlessly feeding. We could only see them every so often through the white water breaking onto shingle and large rocks. The fish were hard to spook and casts were short and aggressive into the gale with large weighted flies. The fish just needed to be able to get the fly into its mouth before the wave whipped it away.

I have never heard anybody talk about my Huckleberry Finn method or Surfing Browns so I’m learning those methods from scratch. I reckon the HF would be lethal for willow grubbers!

If you get a chance fish with your Father, Son, Mother, daughter whatever.. It’s Important!

Stuntman Ronan..

By the way, I filmed the HF method in action but my piece of shit laptop can barely play it let alone edit it. If there is a philanthropist flyfisherman among you please sponsor me a mac. It’s never easy being self sponsored!

It’s hard to find the time to write this now that full on fishing has commenced. I’m wrecked after a very tough gorge.. ready for bed wrecked and tomorrow will be all go once again. Dad arrived on Tuesday and we fished yesterday and today. Yesterday was on an easy river with lots of 2-3lb rainbows and browns. A good place to get the NZ fundamentals sharpened up. Dad did that successfully. Today was more like a military training exercise through a gorge. There was a lot more water in it than 5 weeks ago and that made it seriously hard going. Scrambling through dense bush, deep crossings and rock climbing was the order of the day. As the day progressed more emphases was put on getting out of the gorge than fishing and some opportunities were missed as a result. We had a couple hard earned fish.

Chris Dore, Greg Milo Elliot and myself spent a day chasing rainbows and browns. I did no good but the lads had a couple each. I lost a very big brown on a streamer and Chris missed a big fella on a dry… Twice!

I met up with Camo Guy a few days ago as planned. We fished on one of my favourite waters. Guy fished for half the day a took pictures for the other half, unfortunately I don’t have his photo’s! I do have my own though. I had a spectacular day! I made very few mistakes and caught lots of big fish.

I picked up John O Malley’s Nissan Terrano from Mossburn and drove it to Fairlie to meet Dad on Tuesday.  There seems to be a problem with fuel consumption. 400ks cost 130nzd. I might have solved the problem simply by putting the correct air pressure in the tires! I’ll know for sure when I take it for another decent drive in 5 weeks..

Kevin Alexander and Myself took our boat “Daltona” out for a spin last night. She is still going like a rocket and a pleasure to fish from.

Dad and I are going to fish a lake tomorrow before heading to Buscot Backpackers tomorrow night. Guy will be there too. We may drink some wine and eat crackers with fancy blue cheese.

Ronan.. (stuntman)

I’ve been tied up with some non fishing stuff lately but that’s over now! Fishing every day starts tomorrow. Chris and I are going to chase a few rainbows. Hopefully they’ll be well recovered after spawning. My Dad, Joe, arrives on Tuesday and I can tell you he’s not coming to see the sights. We will be on the water every day and a few nights too. I’ll be catching up with Camo Guy pretty soon. He’s been catching some big searun browns. I’ve caught very few searuns in NZ so it’s time I changed that. For the next 2 months I’ll be travelling the length and breadth of the South Island fishing both known and new waters. I’ll also be meeting old friends and hopefully making some new one’s. Exciting times!

On another note, If anyone is planning a trip to NZ this season and needs a 4×4 then contact me. I know of a proper NZ machine for rent at a very reasonable rate.

Tight lines all.. Stuntman Ronan..

Mark and I went to Te Anau as planned but chose the wrong river to fish for 3 reasons.

1. We fished Saturday and Sunday, The busiest days on any river. On Saturday we were too late to the river to get the best water even though Mark left Dunedin at 5am! On Sunday we were too late to the river because we drank too many pints in the Redcliff on Saturday night.. I think I had some whisky too… Bad idea!

2. The fish in the part of the river we fished hadn’t settled back into their normal routine after a flood a week or so ago. They seemed non existent but I’m pretty sure they were there. To compound it, sighting conditions were terrible on Sunday.

3. The Norwester.

We still managed a few fish but it was a frustrating weekend fishing.

More soon!

Ronan..

The weather has been shithouse as they say over here for the passed while. Some serious gales (blowing the roof off our neighbours house, over ours and landing on another neighbours house!) and torrential rain blowing out all the rivers. Perfect blue sky days were regular enough but most rivers were too high and coloured to fish. I had some great fishing  before the weather broke with Chris Dore (NZ’s #1 guide!!) and Fraser Hocks. We had many fish in the 2-4lb bracket on small nymphs not too far from Queenstown. It’s important not to give away exact locations. There’s plenty water for everyone so there’s no point putting undue pressure on the specific rivers. Explore. It’s more fun anyway!

I had some very enjoyable lake edge fishing near Glenorchy targeting cruising browns with woolly buggers in shallow water. Spot the fish, leave the fly lifeless on the bottom and strip it away when the fish is in attacking range. The result is a manic chase usually ending in a strike. Fun.

Tomorrow Mark Adamson and I are heading towards Te Anau where any amount of water awaits. The Redcliff also awaits… My joint number one bar in the world!

Happy Halloween!

Ronan..

NZ 2011 started in Fairlie at about 6pm on Tuesday the 11th of October. Kevin Alexander and I went to a nearby lake and fished into darkness. Kevin had a couple at a stream mouth in shallow water, no joy for me. The following day was lazy but effective fishing. We drove up mystery river X and jumped out and sight fished the more likely pools. We had some decent fish and fishing without exerting too much energy.

Day 3 I fished alone. I tackled a gorge that I was never through before in medium to low water, which is pretty much ideal. You never know what you may encounter going through a gorge for the first time. I have scaled rock walls to get around bluffs, Swam while carrying a 15kg pack (which quickly at least doubles in weight) to get around bluffs I couldn’t climb, Climbed out of and then back into gorges over cliffs where swimming was not an option, Fallen over on rocks where a broken leg would be inconvenience. Oddly enough I never really fell in! The truth is however, fishing through a gorge is the pinnacle of NZ fishing for me. All day long stumbling, stalking, scrambling, climbing, casting, falling, catching, loosing, cursing and talking to myself. I do that a lot.

I had a superb day fishing for very difficult fish through 8kms of gorge. By the end of it I was bruised, battered and wrecked. My feet hurt, My right nee and left elbow were cut and bruised from a fall, my legs were stiff and my back hurt. This is all good pain. I enjoy it. Every “full on” day from now on will get easier as fitness improves. It’s been nearly 2 years since I had a tough day like this one and I want more!

6 out of 7 fish took a size 16 lightly weighted nymph attached to a size 14 tungsten and lead nymph by a 14″ dropper. I can tell you without a doubt in my mind that this is the best general method for NZ river trout. Better fish usually take the 16. Fish them 4-5 foot under an indicator or a dry.

Thats all for now… Ronan..

I’m relaxing at a good friend’s house in Fairlie in New Zealand’s South Island where the season is just 2 weeks old. I had a good hard day on the river fishing through a tough gorge but before I talk about that I want to mention the season finale in Ireland..

John and I had an eventful day on Kylemore about a week before the end. I may have had a hat-trick of hat-tricks.. John is not sure! Here’s what I think..

1. I landed 3 trout together, all little ones but 3 none the less. It’s only the second time i ever did that. Pitty i didn’t have 4 flies on!! 🙂

2. I hooked what I believed to be a Grilse, Landed what I believed to be a large seatrout and released what john believed to be a brown trout!

3. I had the 3 salmonid species over the course of the day (assuming #2 was a seatrout!)

The most notable event of the day was when we were about 100m from the end of our drift, we saw a salmon jump. A short time later another. They were very quiet all morning so this was encouraging. They continued to move until we finished the drift. We went back up to drift over the more active water, John had seen 2 salmon/grilse move very close together so we tried to drift onto that very spot. We were successful as it turned out. A good fish rashly crashed through my flies, all fins and tails and madness but no hook up. A cast or 2 later a super fish came across the water with it’s back out like a rising submarine in what felt like slow motion, I waited for the line to go but it didn’t, and again, no hook up. 3 minutes later a solid subsurface take and after a scrappy battle and a couple of runs I landed a small grilse. Then it went dead.. totally dead. I often heard anglers talk about Fish turning on and off and I have witnessed it many times myself, but never as definative as this.

I don’t know why all the fish came my way on this day but it’s not uncommon when fly fishing from a drifting boat that one angler gets the majority of action even though both anglers are fishing similar flies and lines.

Lough Inagh had to be the choice for the last day of the season. Each year Colin, The fishery manager, Invites friends of the fishery to come and fish the final day on river and lake. We have a competition, then to the bar for a top class meal followed by the prize giving. The aftermath continues into the small hours…

I was going for 3 in a row in the competition but came last! Some days nothing works.. My boat partner Will had a superb grilse which was the 133rd and last of the 2011 season.

Sincere Thanks to Maire, Dominic, Thomas and Colin for an epic season! (And Brian Regan.. I owe you one!)

Ronan..

The last few weeks have been tough, even though Lough Inagh (my local fishery) and the river that leaves it have been producing all time record salmon catches, including 8 salmon in one day. I have had a few fish but unfortunately have not always been able to get on the part of the system I’d like to due to angling pressure, Massively high water, Gale force 10 winds or being otherwise tied up with something non fishing.  There are great prospects until the end of September once this front passes. If your thinking about some salmon fishing to end your season I recommend Inagh, Its fishing very well. Talk to Colin, He’ll set you straight. 003539534706.

The season is nearing its end and there are a number of things I didn’t get to do and probably wont at this stage. I wanted to spend a few days fishing the midland lakes around Mullingar, Travel North for salmon, South for bass, East for carp, the list goes on. It’s impossible to do everything. All in all I have no complaints. I had a very good season and thankfully its not over yet. The weather is shite at the moment… Wind, rain and very high and often slightly coloured water are the norm which makes things tough. Things will settle down soon and the fishing will fire again!

New Zealand 2011 is is rapidly approaching and I have prepared nothing yet. I haven’t even tied a fly. I’ll get myself into gear soon (I leave in less than a month). If anyone has any flies they would like me to try either here in Ireland or in NZ or Oz or anywhere for that matter just send them to me, I will be happy to oblige. This would of course be a selfless act! (Ronan Creane, Roundstone, Co. Galway, Ireland.)

Electric Picnic 2011 was an epic event. Free to roam between hundreds of random acts with random strangers and friends alike, all with the same purpose… Fun with a healthy dose of madness! I will never miss it again if I’m in Ireland when its on.. I might even fly home for it!

I’m serious about those flies. Send them and I’ll fish them for you! It will be like fishing vicariously through me 🙂

All the best for now… Ronan..

Right now I’m getting ready for the Electric Picnic Music Festival. Most of my preparation is listening to some of the multitude of bands that are playing to get an idea of who I want to listen to over the 3 days and nights. I also did some packing. Tent, clothes, poteen, camera, sleeping bag etc. I wont see water for the next 3 days unless it’s in a bottle and even that’s unlikely!

I’ve been busy with some non fishing projects lately but made some time to get out on the water. John and I targeted pike, trout, salmon (sort of!!) and pollack over the weekend with some success.

On Saturday evening I met John on the water with the family unit, Namely Bronwen and their daughter Georgia. This was one of Georgia’s first encounters with fly fishing. She is one.

I’ll be back next week (asuming I survive the next few days!).

Ronan..

These guys are in the Little Big Tent tomorrow night… Think I’ll check em out!