Fished Lake Aniwhenua and the Whirinaki river the past weekend, the spring fishing can only be described as fantastic. We (2 anglers) caught 22 fish on the lower Whirinaki on Friday ranging from 8 inches to 22 inches almost all taken on small Pheasent Tails. Most of Shaun's fish were taken on the swing downstream while most of mine were taken on the dead drift.
We fished the lake on Saturday and the wind made things difficult but once we found a sheltered bay and anchored the pontoon boats on a weed bed we could see at least 6 trout at any one time cruising the edges and smashing the damsel nymphs as they rose to hatch. The pontoon boat was soon covered in hatching Damsels, but those trout totaly ignored our damsel imitations! In the end after about a dozen fly changes I tried a size 16 parachute Adams out of sheer frustration and the trout loved it, I hooked six and landed 2, one Rainbow of about 23 inches and one 24 inch Brown. The rest dashed straight into the thick weed to escape, it was very exciting fishing and I can hardly wait to get back down there next spring.
All the best.
Mike.