Nine kilometres from the old weir site at Wollaston down through Warrnambool and Dennington to Lake Pertobe and the sea. Estuary country starts here: tidal water, rock walls and snags along the town reaches, reed beds and sand toward the mouth. It does not fish like the freshwater river above the weir, and it does not carry the same fish or the same rules.

Estuary perch are the fish of this stretch, strong in the 2020s survey record, with congolli in numbers, eels, smelt and gudgeon around them, and bream and the fish of the coast as the water turns salt toward the mouth. The Victorian Fisheries Authority’s guide notes estuary perch stocked into the water below the weir in some years; the survey record says they are there now. Trout are the river above, not this one.

The perch and bream eat the smelt and the small fish of the estuary, moving with the tide along the edges and holding against the snags and walls.

The warm months, November to April, and the last hour of light. Estuary perch come to the edges and the structure at dusk and after dark, and the tide decides where they hold. There is no gauge bound to this stretch; the Woodford gauge above tells you what the river is sending down after rain, and a coloured, fresh-pushed estuary is a slow one. Read the water when you get there and do not borrow the freshwater gauge as if it described this water.

Fish it as an estuary edge, not as the inland stream. A six weight, a floating line for the shallow edges and an intermediate as the water deepens toward the mouth, and a leader you can pull a perch away from a snag with. A small dark Woolly Bugger or a baitfish streamer worked slowly along the rock walls and the snags at dusk, with long pauses; the take comes on the drop as often as on the strip. Keep the first cast honest. This water sees more people than the river above, and the fish know it.

Town and estuary banks: walking tracks, road bridges and reserve through Warrnambool and Dennington, with the estuary edge toward Lake Pertobe. A name on a map is not a right of entry, and a track along the bank is shared with everyone else in town. Lake Pertobe is the end of this stretch, not more of it.

The hazards are an estuary’s: soft mud, a tide that turns, and rock walls that are slick at night. Fish the town reaches with a light and a plan.

Victorian rules apply. Victoria classifies the Merri differently above and below Bromfield Street Weir, and this is the water below that named site, so the estuary rules govern it rather than the freshwater trout rules. Take the size and bag limits for estuary perch, bream and the rest from the current Victorian recreational fishing guide. The numbers move. Do not take them from this page.