A small creek feeding a brook. On water this size, cover decides most things. Where the banks are open, trout see you coming across the grass; where growth overhangs the water, fish have somewhere to sit and food drops in.

In our experience, rainbows in a creek like this hold in the deeper water: the head of a pool where the run tips in, the seam beside faster current, an undercut bank, the slack behind a log or boulder. Shallow, even-bottomed stretches hold fewer fish and spook them first.

NSW stocking records list rainbow trout released into the creek over recent seasons, and the stocking chart shows the pattern.

The rest of the fly box is a guide’s read. Small-creek trout feed mostly on nymphs drifting along the bottom and on whatever lands on the surface, and in warm weather that includes grasshoppers, beetles and ants off the bank. A few buoyant dries, a hopper and some bead-head nymphs in sizes 12 to 16 cover most of it.

Settle the rules first: take any season for the creek from the current NSW trout guide. Within whatever it allows, a small trout creek usually fishes best from late spring into autumn. Summer is the time for hoppers and terrestrials along the banks, fished early and late when the light is off the water. After heavy rain, give a small creek a day or two to drop and clear.

Travel light and fish upstream. A 3 or 4 weight rod of around 8 feet, a floating line and a 9 foot leader tapered to 5X is plenty. Keep low, stay back from the edge, and make short casts with as little line on the water as you can.

Start with a dry and dropper: a size 12 to 14 Royal Wulff with a size 14 to 16 bead-head Hare’s Ear or Pheasant Tail under it on a short tippet. Put it in the head of each pool and let it ride down the seam. Two or three good drifts tell you whether a fish is home; then move up. In summer, swap the dry for a hopper and land it close to the bank wherever grass meets the water. In the deeper, slower pools, a small Woolly Bugger stripped past cover can move a fish that will not come up.

The access card marks one access point. Treat it as a location, not a statement of permission, and respect any fence or sign you meet on the ground.

As on any bush creek, tell someone where you are going and when you expect to be back, carry water and a small first-aid kit, and watch your footing on wet rock and undercut banks. A small creek can rise quickly after rain, so keep an eye on the sky and never wade a crossing you are unsure of.

Before you fish, read the current NSW Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development trout guide, check its trout-water lists and closed-waters list for the creek, and take any season, bag and size limits and licence requirements from it.