It is very hard to predict what sort of weather we are going to receive this March. The past couple of years have been very mild and it is getting harder to distinguish exactly what season we are in – at least three are starting to feel much the same.

Most people’s attempts at trying to predict the weather have been evaporated by frosts in early Summer, snow in late Spring, industry-destroying hailstorms, near-heatwaves in the middle of Winter and abundant rain.

But the dams are close to full and most of the creeks and rivers have received regular flushes so even the worst weather is not going to affect the fishing too much.

Many anglers almost gave up on freshwater fishing during the drought years but they now are finding renewed passion for the sport.

Blowering Dam has been the focus of much attention and there have been consistent captures of big Murray cod and golden perch.

The biggest cod I’ve heard of was 121cm and the heaviest golden weighed in a genuine 10kg. It is worth noting that both of these fish were caught at night.

Golden perch will be worth targeting up in the shallows this month, particularly early and late in the day.

It is still a bit too warm for them to spend much time in the shallows in the middle of the hotter days but they do love to lie in thick pockets of grass or weed, waiting to ambush any easy meal that swims or crawls by.

So as soon as that sun starts to dip over the Snubba Range, they move into the shallows for a feed.

These fish can take lipless crankbaits, spinnerbaits, shaker blades like Chatterbaits, soft plastics, Beetle Spins or floating or suspending hardbodies. It just depends how weedy the area is.

The lures with only one hook point generally foul less on the weed but some days the fish just won’t take these lures.

Then a very slow, and I mean slow, retrieve with a hard lure often brings results. In extremely weedy areas they get fouled up far more often but sometimes persisting with removing the very annoying weed can be the difference between fish and no fish.

Another technique that can work really well on weed hugging golden perch is to cast a lipless crankbait into the weed and rip it back quite aggressively, freeing the lure from weed and attracting the fishes’ attention. This can sometimes turn on the most shut-down fish and is worth a shot if you’re not getting action any other way.

Redfin are almost in plague numbers at Blowering at the moment and with water up around 30° in recent months, it is not surprising.

Anglers have been catching these tasty critters all over the dam on bait and lures. Quite a few have been around 2kg and the odd exceptional one well over that.

Bait anglers are doing well off points and around drowned trees on small yabbies, maggots and worms. Bigger yabbies, around 8cm to 10cm, are sometimes a better option because those pesky little redfin have far more trouble stealing them.

Casting small lures like Rooster Tails, Celtas, soft plastics, hardbodies and compact lipless crankbaits from the bank around points and trees can also be productive.

Trolling with almost any small hard lure should also enable you to stumble across a patch of redfin. Position your boat within casting range and keep casting to them until they stop biting.

Jigging can be very rewarding. Try most soft plastics, particularly scented ones, lipless crankbaits, spoons, redfin bobbers, blades and ice-jigs.

I almost exclusively use ice jigs but if these aren’t working I try blades and if they don’t work I resort to plastics. Even on the worst days you’ll still catch you a few on plastics.