Fly fishing southern Tasmania

The Tyenna River runs down a valley between Maydena and Westerway, and most of the recognised access lies between those two towns. About 1.5 km of it passes through Mount Field National Park. Much of the river is overgrown, and its bed is large, slippery boulders. Heavy rain in the south-west catchment lifts and colours it, though IFS notes it can clear quickly.

The rest of the South region is varied. The Styx is a Derwent tributary that comes in downstream of the Tyenna, with a good head of browns, reached from Bushy Park or Maydena. The Plenty enters the Derwent at the town of Plenty, beside the Salmon Ponds. Inside Mount Field, Lake Dobson has a walking track around it, and IFS says you can see wild browns in its clear water. Further west, Lake Pedder and Lake Gordon were flooded in 1971 for hydro power, about two hours’ drive from Hobart. The Huon runs about 100 km from Lake Pedder to the D’Entrecasteaux Channel, and IFS says the biggest brown trout ever landed in Tasmania, a 13 kg fish in 1887, came out of it. None of these has a Castabout page yet.

On the Tyenna, IFS describes large numbers of small to medium browns and rainbows. Good hatches can come on warm afternoons, and when nothing is rising IFS says upstream nymphing is the preferred approach. That is how we would fish it most of the time. Start with a size 14 or 16 weighted Pheasant Tail or Hare’s Ear, give each pocket two clean drifts, and add weight before you change the fly. When fish show in one seam, take the nymph off and put up a size 12 or 14 Elk Hair Caddis or Adams.

The overgrown banks decide the casting. A clean back cast is rare, so a short roll cast or a compact upstream delivery does more than extra line. Look for the soft edge beside each tongue of current, the cushion in front of a boulder and the tail where one pocket spills into the next.

For contrast, IFS describes Lake Pedder as a wild trout fishery where the average fish settled at around 1 kg after the early years, and Lake Gordon as boat water where shore anglers do better on Pedder.

Start the Tyenna inside Mount Field National Park. The bank can be fished there, and you can judge the river’s colour and pace from dry ground before deciding whether to wade. Westerway and Maydena are the other bank starts outside the park. In each, nymph the pockets nearest you before stepping in.

Bring a four or five weight, studded boots, a wading belt and a staff. Do not wade if you cannot see the next foothold, or if the return crossing looks worse than the one you just made.

IFS rates summer and autumn as the best of the Tyenna, mainly because lower water makes wading practical. Warm afternoons in those months are when hatches are most likely, so keep the middle of the day rather than writing it off. Early in the season, or after rain, the river runs higher and often coloured, and a weighted nymph through the softer edges is the plan. Check the Newbury flow before you drive, and if it is rising or colouring, change the day rather than forcing it.

Seasons, methods, limits and licence requirements differ from water to water and change; check the current IFS Tyenna River listing and the Tasmanian Inland Fishing Code before you fish, and Parks Tasmania’s current alerts for Mount Field before you travel.

IFS says foot access along the Tyenna is by the goodwill of public and private landowners. A line on the map is not access permission: where access is not signed, ask first, or you may be trespassing. Leave gates as you find them and stay out of paddocks. Clean and dry boots, waders and net before you move to another water.

North of here are the plateau lakes of the Central Highlands and the Western Lakes, and the Midlands rivers of the Northern Rivers. The North West and West Coast page covers the Mersey and Lake Burbury.