The golden perch at Blowering Dam over the past couple of months have been sensational.

This is mostly due to the large volumes of water that have been pumped into Blowering over the Winter, which meant there is lots of weed-filled, flooded ground. It’s not only in the backs of the bays but along entire foreshores that haven’t been submerged for years.

So fish have been caught all over the lake and no one bay or bank seems to be better than any other.

We are now smack in the middle of Spring and the goldens will be at their peak this month and rightly will be at the top of most anglers’ target lists.

It seems that as long as you’re fishing somewhere around the shallow margins, you’ll be rewarded.

The bait fishos have got into some good goldens with one lucky angler using small yabbies landing 12 in a four-hour session. Bait fishos don’t normally get the numbers that lure chuckers do but this just goes to show if you’re in the right place at the right time, anything is possible.

Lure casters have fared best, with double-figure scores of yellas almost the norm.

Best lures have been lipless crankbaits and small-profile spinnerbaits.

To give them something different, I have been trying small to medium soft plastics to good effect and when the water is slightly dirty, I have been rigging these on Beetle Spins to get their attention.

Trolling with shallow-running hardbodies, lipless crankbaits, spinnerbaits and soft plastics has also accounted for many goldens.

The Saturday of the long weekend marks the opening of the trout season in rivers and creeks. Although dedicated fly fishos will have got their trout fix in the lakes over the Winter, the few who have waited throughout the closed season will be bouncing off the walls now.

I feel sorry for those who fish only the rivers and streams as they miss out on some of the best fly-fishing of the year. Many trophy trout are caught in the lakes in Winter and those who don’t bother to get in on this action have only themselves to blame.

The Tumut River always fishes well at the beginning of the season, particularly if the river is at a low flow, which it almost always is at this time.

A nymph under a big dry fly or an indicator is the best way to get good numbers of fish but for those addicted to the surface, it is always possible to land a few on the dry on the Tumut River, even at the beginning of the season.

For best results with the dry it pays to fish the last light of the afternoon. Indicator nymphing will get you consistent results throughout the entire day.

Lure fishos generally have a ball in the first few weeks of the season, as most trout are spent from spawning and are super-keen to get as much food into them as they can. They will hit anything within easy chasing-down range.

Cover a lot of water by repeat casting while walking upstream and you should be rewarded with plenty of powerful strikes and hook-ups.

Bait fishos also do well and those that actively fish their bait will be the most rewarded.

The best bait fishing technique in any river is to rig your bait so that it gets to the bottom but is not fixed there. You want your bait to slowly trickle along with the current, a very natural presentation will bring many a trout unstuck.

Burrinjuck Dam will host a round of the Australian Yellowbelly Championships on October 23 and 24. There is still time to be part of it and you can even register on the day.

Teams of two anglers fish these tournaments and I have been assured that if this round is well supported then it will be held next year and there’s the possibility of another round down this way, more than likely at Blowering.

So if you’d like to see more events like this around here, support this year’s Burrinjuck round. You might just win $3000 by doing so. For more info visit www.australianyellowbelly.com.au