Finally the Murray cod season is upon us and if Blowering Dam’s cod continue to fish as well as they have over the last couple of months, it should be a cracker of an opening.

There have been some amazing incidental catch rates of Murray cod during the closed season with plenty of reports of people catching half a dozen or more a session. Until this Spring that was almost unheard of at Blowering.

There have been some beauties well over a metre released but there seem to be almost plague proportions of 50cm to 60cm cod around, which is very reassuring when thinking of the future.

Looks like the long-awaited legal size increase to 60cm for Murray cod is already starting to work in everyone’s favour.

We can only hope that the Murray cod stay on the chew now that anglers can legally target them and let’s also hope that most anglers continue to do the right thing in practising catch and release of these magnificent fish, closed season or not.

A lot of the Murray cod caught during the closed season took small to medium hardbody lures on the troll. Now that the season is open, one can use much bigger lures to try to really annoy the very territorial cod.

Best big hardbodies on the troll are the 90mm and 150mm AC Invaders, whose large profile and amazing diving ability is very hard to match.

Other large-profile divers worth a troll include big StumpJumpers, Mudeye Mohawks and Custom Crafted Extractors, to name a few.

There have also been plenty of Murray cod caught on the cast lately as well, mostly on small lipless crankbaits or on spinnerbaits aimed at golden perch.

Most anglers will now upsize to large lipless crankbaits such as the #2 Prism Murrin or the Jackall Doozer and anglers in the know will upsize spinnerbaits to those such as the ‘big cod’ version from Murray River Spinnerbaits. These are massively oversized and have deep-cut double Colorado blades and upgraded hardware to be able to land really big cod.

Golden perch fishing during Spring was nowhere near as good as previous years but there were still quite a few big fish caught. The lack of yellas did not worry anglers too much because the Murray cod went off their nuts.

The goldens are still about but you will have to work even harder then you did during Spring to get good results.

Trolling with smallish lures such as #3 Prism Murrins, TN50 or TN60 Jackalls, Stuckeys, Storm Hot’n’Tots, Trollcraft Double Downers or small StumpJumpers is a good way to target goldens at this time of year.

The other productive technique during Summer is bait fishing around shaly banks, rocky points and submerged trees. Arguably the best baits for Blowering’s goldens are yabbies, preferably on a paternoster rig to keep them from burying themselves into the bottom.

Redfin start to move towards the shallows this month, hunting their own offspring as well as anything else that will fit into their mouths. These fish are a reasonable proposition for all anglers and can be caught trolling or casting with small lures or by fishing with worms, maggots or small yabbies.

The Tumut River fished really well during the opening of the trout season, which was pleasing for everyone who converged on the river. Most anglers I spoke to or observed were catching good numbers of fish.

Bait anglers did well but it was the lure and fly fishos who landed the really good numbers.

Unfortunately, the river started to gradually rise just after the opening and the fishing became increasingly difficult as the season progressed.

There are still plenty of fish being caught but they by fewer anglers, due to the difficulties involved. Fishing in fast flow seems to deter most anglers.

However, if you know how to fish in the high flows you can still be consistently rewarded. The key to success is to keep moving and cover as much water as possible.

Also fish every bit of water that you can get a cast into because in the high flows the fish will sit almost anywhere in the river because it’s all pretty much the same, fast-flowing, well-oxygenated water.