Imagery: Esri, Vantor, Earthstar Geographics

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Merri River

River

43.7 km

Main stem

Reaches

Species recorded

Forty-four kilometres of south-west Victorian river running into Warrnambool — a wild brown trout stream through the Grassmere and Woodford farm country above Bromfield Street Weir, and an estuary of perch and bream below it, with the Woodford gauge on the upper stretch.

The Merri is the river Warrnambool grew up beside, and it is worth a day because it is two different trips in one small town: a wild brown trout stream an hour from anywhere in the south-west, and an estuary you can fish from a walking track when the trout water is too warm.

The line between them is a weir that no longer exists. Bromfield Street Weir sat near Wollaston Bridge, about nine kilometres above the sea. It was taken out in 2024, but Victoria still classifies the river by that named site, so above the old weir is the freshwater river and its rules, and below it is the estuary and a different rulebook.

The trout river is the trip to plan around. For thirty-odd kilometres it winds down through the dairy and grazing country of Grassmere and Woodford as a slow, willow-edged stream: deep pools between short riffles, banks cut into the volcanic soil, and a brown under every undercut that has watched the paddock for a week. The fish are wild. The survey record has browns electrofished from the river in every decade since the 1980s and more in the 2020s than any decade before, which is not what a put-and-take fishery looks like. Spring is the season, September to December, while the pools are full and the water is cool. Come then, walk the bank slowly, and give the first cast to the shade. The road bridges are the ways in, and a gate and a fence are the answer beyond them.

The estuary is the second trip, and on a summer evening it is the better one. Below the old weir the river runs through the town and out to Lake Pertobe, and the trout give way to estuary perch, bream and the fish of the coast. A six weight and a dark streamer along the snags in the last hour of light, November to April, fished to the tide.

The Woodford gauge reads the upper river, and its readings sit on that stretch page. After rain the Merri colours and rises. Give it a few dry days, and check the current Victorian guide for the rules on whichever side of the weir you fish.

Target species

No live gauge

There’s no gauge on this water. Check recent trip reports.

Season

Driving directions

Reaches

2 stretches

Above Bromfield Street Weir

34.4 km

The freshwater river. Grassmere to Wollaston country, and the gauge.

Below Bromfield Street Weir

9.3 km

The lower river through Warrnambool into the estuary. The weir is gone; the cut is still the weir.

Water and habitat

Forty-four kilometres of mainstem running through farm country to the coast. The freshwater river above the weir is thirty-four kilometres of slow, deep-pooled stream through Grassmere and Woodford country, with the Woodford gauge reading flow and height. The lower river below the weir is the last nine kilometres through Warrnambool and Dennington into the estuary. Lake Pertobe is the end of the map, not a third page.

Volcanic-plains country: dark soils, cut banks, willows and reeds, and pools that hold depth through a dry summer when the riffles between them run thin. There is little shade you did not bring, and the wind off the Southern Ocean is a fact of life.

Fish and forage

Brown trout above the weir, wild and breeding. The survey record carries them from gill nets and electrofishing in the 1980s through to boat electrofishing in the 2000s, 2010s and 2020s, with the 2020s the strongest decade in the record. Rainbows appear only as a 1950s release and a single 1980s record. Redfin share the pools. Below the weir the cast changes to estuary perch, strong in the 2020s record, congolli in numbers, eels, smelt and gudgeon: an estuary being honest about itself. The Victorian Fisheries Authority’s guide notes stocking on both stretches over the years, and estuary perch in some years below the weir; what is there now is what the surveys found.

The trout eat caddis in the riffles at dusk, small mayfly on the slow pools, and from Christmas the grasshoppers off the paddocks. The estuary perch eat whatever moves along the snags in the last light.

Observed

Black Bream

Acanthopagrus butcheri

Australian Grayling

Prototroctes maraena

Australian Smelt

Retropinna semoni

Bluespot Goby

Pseudogobius olorum

Climbing Galaxias

Galaxias brevipinnis

Common Galaxias

Galaxias maculatus

Congolli

Pseudaphritis urvillii

Dwarf Galaxias

Galaxiella pusilla

Eastern Gambusia

Gambusia holbrooki

Flathead Gudgeon

Philypnodon grandiceps

River Blackfish

Gadopsis marmorata

Sea Mullet

Mugil cephalus

Smallmouth Hardyhead

Atherinosoma microstoma

Smooth Toadfish

Tetractenos glaber

Southern Pygmy Perch

Nannoperca australis

Southern Shortfin Eel

Anguilla australis

Spotted Galaxias

Galaxias truttaceus

Tamar Goby

Afurcagobius tamarensis

Tench

Tinca tinca

Western Carp Gudgeon

Hypseleotris klunzingeri

Yarra Pygmy Perch

Nannoperca obscura

Yelloweye Mullet

Aldrichetta forsteri

When to fish it

Spring is the trip above the weir. From September to December the pools are full from winter, the water is cool, and the browns are feeding after a lean season. Read the Woodford gauge on the upper stretch page before you drive: after rain the river comes up and colours, and a few dry days bring it back. Summer runs the riffles thin and warms the pools; fish the first and last hours, keep fish wet, and let the estuary have the middle of the day. Autumn is quietly good until the trout season closes on classified waters, and the current Victorian guide says which those are.

Below the weir the estuary fishes to the tide and the warm months, and the perch come on at dusk from November to April.

THE YEAR ON THIS WATER

Spring on the trout water

Fly · Sep–Dec

The pools are full from winter and the water is cool. The best of the year above the weir, with the Woodford gauge to tell you when it has settled.

Caddis and mayfly

Food · Oct–Apr

Evening caddis in the riffles between the pools, small mayfly on the slow water. The last hour is the hour.

Hoppers off the paddocks

Food · Dec–Mar

Dairy and grazing country to the bank. A hopper tight to the grass in the afternoon, and fish early in the heat.

Estuary perch below the weir

Fly · Nov–Apr

The lower river through town and into the estuary. A small dark streamer along the snags at dusk.

How to fish it

Above the weir, slow water and wary fish. A four or five weight, a long leader to keep the fly line off the glassy pools, and an upstream approach that puts your shadow behind you. A parachute Adams or a Klinkhammer for the fish that show, a hopper tight to the grass in summer, and a slim Pheasant Tail under a small dry as a dry-dropper along the undercut when nothing is showing. An Elk Hair Caddis in the evening riffles. When the river is carrying colour, a small Woolly Bugger or a worm pattern.

Below the weir, a six weight and a dark streamer along the snags and the rock walls at dusk for the perch, with an intermediate line as the water deepens toward the estuary.

Access and safety

South-west Victoria, mixed banks into a regional city. Above the weir the river runs through dairy and grazing country with road bridges at Grassmere, Woodford and Wollaston as the natural ways in; a gate and a fence are the answer, and a bridge is not a right to walk the paddock beyond it. Below the weir the banks are town reserve, walking tracks and estuary edge. The Victorian Fisheries Authority’s angling guide for this basin is the authority listing for access; a pin on it is not a right of entry.

The hazards are a farm river’s and an estuary’s: soft cut banks, deep pools under the willows, and a tide and a wind that turn fast below the town.

Regulations

Victorian rules apply on both stretches, and Victoria classifies the river differently above and below Bromfield Street Weir. The two stretch pages state which side they are on. Take the trout season and the size and bag limits for the freshwater river, and the estuary rules for the water below the weir, from the current Victorian recreational fishing guide. The dates and numbers move. Do not take them from this page.