Evening Rise - Trout

The farm Evening Rise is a jewel situated in the Kwena Basin between Machadadorp and Dullstroom on the foot of the Steenkampberg Mountains. 

The Crocodile River runs through this farm and, no there are no crocodiles in this part of the river, I think. 

The accommodation on the farm is an old farmhouse with no electricity, but with sufficient luxuries such as a piece of ice, or two, for the well-deserved Scottish liquid after a challenging session on the river. 

The ambiance created by the smell of the thatched roof, fireplace etc. adds to the experience. 







This part of the Crocodile River has a wild population of rainbow trout and provides some of the best river trout fishing in Mpumalanga. 

This is not fly fishing for the beginner and low water levels contributed to the difficulty level. But, bigger the challenge, the sweeter the moment you actually manage to land one of these perfect samples of a rainbow trout. This style of fishing teaches the youngsters a lot about fly fishing. During our stay we encountered heavy thunderstorms and to our amazement the river clears from a muddy torrent to a clear stream in a few hours. 

The entomology in this river is evidence of its healthy state. We fished predominantly black mayfly imitations and GRHE’s to imitate the “hatch”.

 

An unforgettable experience. 

Forelwater Belfast South Arica

I recently visited one of the best trout waters in South Africa - Forelwater. Afrikaans for "Trout Water". We fished a 12 ha dam and other smaller dams. We focused on the big dam and landed a total of 28 fish over the week-end. The smallest being 2 kg and the largest 3,1 kg. It was my dads first time at this venue and he caught some beautiful fish. The preferred flies were large brown dragonfly nymphs, blood worms and olive buzzers. 

Early Season Yellowfish

This year’s yellow fish season opened with a bang. We fished slow glides and got broken up a couple of times by big smallmouth yellowfish. The biggest I caught was 3.9 kg – currently my personal best.

Winter Muddies

During the winter in Gauteng, South Africa, the Vaal river temperature drops to between 6°C and 11°C. During this period the smallmouth yellowfish and most other fish species resident in the river, moves into deeper glides and pools. By deeper I mean between 2 and 3 meter deep. We target these fish with #18 mayfly nymphs and blood worm (midge larvae) imitations, fished slowly under an indicator. Long leaders and 6X tippet setup (longer than 18 foot) are used to get these flies into the feeding zone which is normally close to the bottom. Although we predominantly fish for smallmouth yellowfish in this fashion we sometimes catch monster mudfish weighing more than 3 kg.