Poor fishing forecast

Press, 15 January 1986, Page 26

Poor fishing forecast

PA Hamilton The swelling of the Tongariro river, caused by recent heavy rains, will mean poor winter trout-fishing seasons in 1987 and 1988, the Wildlife Service said. The senior fisheries officer, Mr John Gibbs, said the rains had made the river unfishable while it was high. But the worst impact of the rains was to flush young fish in the river (from last winter’s spawning) into Lake Taupo. Their survival chances there were not good, Mr Gibbs said. Accordingly, when that agegroup returned upriver in two

years time as the main component of the adult spawning runs, the fishing would probably be poor, also in 1988. Mr Gibbs said the Wildlife Service would be sampling the river this'week to try to gain a more accurate idea of how the rains had affected fish numbers. The rains had also caused changes in the river channel, he said. “It means anglers will have to learn some new fishing places in the river, and they will have to be cautious wading in the river until they know it.”