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Hope's Silvery |
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Early season searun brown trout taken on a Hope's Silvery that was fished on light spinning gear. |
The first day of October signals the start of another fishing season. With it comes excellent searun trout fishing in our lowland rivers during the months of October, November and December. Some years they seem to arrive early season in the Rakaia and Waimakariri Rivers while other years the best fishing may not be until mid to late November.
Searun browns come into the tidal reaches chasing the huge abundance of silveries which also arrive at this time of year. Trout caught often disgorge silveries when lifted from the water - their stomachs being packed to overflowing.
An old and still useful method of fishing for searuns is to use a live lip-hooked silvery as bait. You don't need to cast. Just use your leader, and perhaps a very small sinker, to let the bait drift down the current. Often searun brown trout will be caught at your feet in the discoloured water caused by melting snow in the distant Southern Alps . I have even felt trout touch the leg of my waders while fishing and they are frequently taken right at the rod tip as the fly is retrieved. So be sure to “fish your feet” first! The searuns will often chase the silveries into the bank. I have also seen anglers catch them between the bank and a line of anglers standing waist deep 20 metres further out!
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The Hope's Silvery is tyed in the typical Matuku style. The original tie would have been quite bulky having a round torpedo shape.
Tail: Grizzle tips. Body: White Chenille. Rib: Flat or round silver tinsel. Wing: 4 x Pale grizzle, or pale buff hackles, with light blue floss trapped under the ribbing.Topping: Peacock sword. I prefer the B175 Kamasan - Heavy Traditional Trout hooks which have been chemically sharpened. |
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As any angler who has fished for searun brown trout will know it is not unusual to fowl-hook a silvery on your streamer fly as you retrieve across and down the current. An old timer, whom I would occasional fish with in the Waimakariri River, showed me how he would take the fowl-hooked silvery off, and then rub it on his Hopes or Yellow Rabbit to impart the distinctive cucumber smell of the silvery to his fly! Whether this helped or not I can't say but this old bloke sure seemed to catch a lot of fish with very little apparent effort.
This sort of lure fishing for searun brown trout is usually done in Canterbury with an outfit similar to the following: 8 or 9 weight rod about nine feet in length, a medium to fast sinking fly line - I have used a Scientific anglers Deep Water Express fly line for searun trout. This line is great for taking the lures down in the faster water near the mouth of the Rakaia River but it sinks too fast in the slower flowing Waimakariri.
Typically most anglers use a half ounce lead a metre or so above the lures to get them down near the bottom quickly. I say lures because most anglers use a two fly outfit where this is permitted. The lures typically used during the day and early evening are Hope's Silvery, Taupo Tiger, Parsons Glory, and Yellow Rabbit. As nightfall closes in a darker lure is the better option. This creates a better silhouette for the trout to spot in the dark – or at least that's the theory. How they can see, chase, and catch a small fleeing fish in the dark is truly a miracle of nature! Anyway, in the gloom following sunset, change to Black Rabbits, Hope's Dark and Bob Bragg's Red Shadow. His is by no means an exhaustive list of the lures used but is quite typical.
It is also possible to fish this outfit on light spinning gear. Many anglers use their salmon rod and baitcaster reel for this but an eggbeater reel will help avoid many of the inevitable tangles particularly if the wind is blowing. Tie on a #8 black swivel, then a half once D lead, then a second #8 black swivel. Then tie either one or two leaders about a metre in length to the bottom swivel and a lure to the end of each. If you fish two lures stagger them so they are about 15cm apart. With two lures you can try two different patterns to see which is the more effective.
Lost lures will be inevitable when fishing for searuns because debris like half buried logs, gorse bushes, tree roots, and sticks of all shapes and sizes will be littering the bottom. You get to know where the obstructions are and so avoid them. However, a fresh through the river will leave you back at square one. I note that with regard to these lure losses some anglers, my self included, seem to be “unluckier” than others. While one bloke will loose his gear regularly throughout the evening, the bloke fishing next to him will go home with the same lures he started with hours earlier! If you are getting fowled in the same spot my advice is move up or down river away from it. As an aside, when ever the river had dropped following a dry spell, an old mate of mine would always head over to these snags and take a look. It was amazing just how much gear he would pick up doing this! In popular spots one snag alone could yield him 20 spinners and assorted flies!
In any event it is an added bonus if you can tie your own lures. That way a few lost here and there won't bother you in the least. Another old rule of fishing seems to be that if you go down to the river with just a couple of lures in your box you'll end up getting them caught in the willows on the opposite bank on your first cast. Whereas if you have plenty; you won't loose any!
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Top: The Smelt - Retropinna retropinna - is abundant at this time of year and is prey for searun trout. Below is the Hopes Silvery which is a pretty good imitation. It is attributed to Dave Hope, of Christchurch. |
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The Hope's Silvery trout streamer fly pattern is a long time favourite of mine. As you can see from a quick glance at the photograph the Hopes and the real silvery look almost identical. The white body combined with the pale blue floss down the side, combined with the darkening of the “upper body” really brings the fly to life.
The original pattern calls for a wing of pale honey grizzle but the lure is just as effective with a plain pale honey coloured or slightly darker feather. I tend to use what I have available. You don't have to be a slave to the exact pattern. I have even tied the Hope's Silvery using a much cheaper strip of rabbit pelt for the wing instead of hackle feathers. I have fished these for many years and shared them with a couple of mates - they work just as well. The rational here being that I can get the rabbit pelts for free!
Don't be afraid to give your Hope's a fat round body which perhaps better imitates the real thing. The early Canterbury lures tended to be tied with broader hen hackles and fat torpedo-shaped bodies. After all, as mentioned earlier, the rivers will likely be coloured so you want the big searuns to see your offering.
The Hopes is a typical Canterbury lure tied in the Matuku style with the added blue floss making the job slightly fiddler. After you have tied a few trapping the floss beneath the winds of oval tinsel becomes second nature.
I tie my Hope's Silveries on a Kamasan B175 in a size #2. This is quite a heavy weight hook but a double figure searun brown in fast water could take some stopping. Plus there is always the chance you might hook a salmon or kahawai as well. When the rivers clear around Christmas time I would go smaller – down to a #8 if necessary to fool the fish. Also go down to a smaller hook if you find the trout are tugging your lure without being caught.
You might also be interested in these New Zealand trout lure patterns: Mrs Simpson and Hamills Killer, the Yellow Rabbit Lure, Silicon Rubber Trout Flies, Beetle Trout Flies, Luminous Trout Flies, Muddler Minnow, Canterbury Searun Trout Lures.
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