JD today with a good brown on a PMX against a background cacophony of cicadas.
‘Twas the day before the night before Christmas, and I wondered… Are cicadas the yuletide sound? Well possibly if you’re a trout fisher on the Goulburn and surrounds.
The ground is pocked with cicada holes, the trees are covered in their shells, and the air is filled with their chirrups. From the huge black ones to the smaller orange and black ones, they are buzzing around everywhere, periodically crash-landing on the water. And the fish know it.
While the smaller cicadas (roughly a size 8-10) are the obvious choice for a trout mouthful, incredibly, the thumb-sized models are sometimes eaten too.
Quite a mouthful!
Decades ago on the Mitta Mitta tailwater, I watched whirling cicadas spinning down a large pool, and being picked off by four different 2 kilo browns. Then yesterday, for the first time since, I watched as a confused big black cicada failed to cross the Goulburn, and crashed right onto a nice-looking seam. Seconds later, a very large trout clomped it down plain as day.
That particular fish was beyond range on a 3000 ML/d river, although when today’s 2000 ML/d flows settled, maybe we could have waded close enough for cast? Not that it really mattered. At least some trout JD and I could comfortably reach responded to either cicada imitations, or big dries that it’s fair to assume the fish took for the real thing.
If that failed, an olive caddis grub beneath provided handy backup.
The natural streams were steadily dropping and clearing after 30 to 100mm of rain on Sunday.
All up, it was a great way to celebrate an early Christmas with a good mate. Oh, and some of the natural streams have had a good flush from Sunday’s deluge, and are settling (and fishing) well.
Another cicada feeder. Merry Christmas to us!
The final Christmas gift is grasshoppers. In places, the ground is literally moving with them, and all different shapes and sizes.
So, if your holiday plans include the mid Goulburn streams (including the main river), conditions are promising.
Wishing all our FlyStreamers happy holidays, and we look forward to bringing you plenty more reading over the coming weeks.
