Fishing report for the North Canterbury Region Friday 2nd March 2018

Hello and welcome to the North Canterbury region fishing report, the weather looks to be reasonable on the plains and coastal areas with warm temperatures and north easterlies. 

The high country looks as if it might be raining with some strong north westerlies.

Above right: Peter Bennett with a nine pound brown trout caught and released in Canterbury that had a bulging belly full of mice, a mouse tail hanging out of its vent, still took a #18 nymph and jumped seven times.

The main alpine rivers are currently too high and dirty to fish and it looks as if they may receive more rain tonight and tomorrow, so they are unlikely to be fishable on the weekend. 

So if you can’t get out on the weekend for a salmon fish I wouldn’t panic as you won’t be missing much.

Foot hill streams such as the Ashley and Selwyn are flowing high but should be sufficient clear for fishing. 

The Selwyn could be really interesting to have a look at as it is not usually flowing so well at this time of year. 

Left: The Selwyn River at Coes ford on Thursday.

The recent fresh should have cleared out any weed in the lower reaches by the huts. 

This should greatly improve fishing conditions. 

The cool water and extra volume will hopefully attract more fish into the river to make them available to anglers.

I would be making the most of fishing lowland streams this weekend. 

They have nice high flows and the weather forecast is more favourable for the plains and coastal areas. 

There are still a lot of streams to choose from with the lake Ellesmere tributaries and the streams just north of Christchurch.

There may also be some windows of calm weather on the high country lakes in the mornings. 

More likely to be Saturday morning at this stage. 

Some good fishing has been reported on the Waimakariri lakes lately with some really well conditioned trout being caught.

There are plenty of family orientated options this weekend. 

Over a thousand salmon have been put in the Groynes fishing lakes this week. 

This provides an ideal opportunity to introduce young children to fishing. 

There is also the Lake Lyndon Family fishing day on Sunday.  

Running from 9-12, about 500 rainbow trout will be released into the lake early on Sunday for anglers to catch.

There are spot prizes for junior anglers and a BBQ  will be going.

All in all it's a great day out for the family for more info click here:

Also Environment Canterbury is  clearing trees from the Otukaikino (Waimakariri South Branch).

They are removing trees from the water plus any tree about to fall.

Work will finish in approximately two weeks. 

Tight lines.

Tony Hawker, Fish and Game Officer North Canterbury Fish and Game Council.