RiverFly Tasmania guides

 Daniel Hackett 

Daniel started fishing for trout as a four-year-old, in the streams of the Snowy Mountains. A few years later and half a world away, now living in Ireland where he spent his formative teenage years, Daniel started fly fishing. His favourite location was poaching on the local Bishop’s Estate.

Daniel became a full-time professional guide in 2002, at the same time becoming the youngest full-time guide in Tasmania. Previous to this, Daniel was a fish-farm hand, raising and breeding rainbow trout and Atlantic salmon for Tassie’s clean & green aquaculture industry. You’ve probably ate his handywork!

Daniel served his first two seasons as a guide with a larger guiding group, where his main role was to raft-guide clients on the famous Brumbys Creek and Lower Macquarie River, as well as taking guests on boat-based guiding days on Arthurs Lake, Great Lake and Penstock Lagoon in the Central Highlands. Daniel enjoyed his first few seasons of guiding, and went on to start RiverFly Tasmania in 2005.

Since forming RiverFly Tasmania, Daniel has put Tasmania’s rivers back on the map, re-discovering famous streams such as the St Patricks, North Esk and South Esk Rivers. He pioneered fishing on forgotten rivers such as the Mersey River, and among the headwater creeks of north eastern Tasmania. His articles have been published in FlyLife Magazine, Australian Traveller Magazine, Tasmanian Fishing and Boating News and Tasmanian Sportsfisher Magazine. In 2007 Daniel co-authored the award winning coffee-table book ‘In Season Tasmania – A Year of Fly Fishing Highlights’ with FlyLife staff photographer Brad Harris, and in 2009 featured in the dvd ‘The Source-Tasmania’.

Daniel is now firmly rooted as Tasmania’s leading river-guide. Building on this reputation, he continues to work hard at discovering and promoting Tasmania’s hidden fisheries, and is busy finding, fishing and sustainably developing Tasmania’s under-utilised World Heritage listed wilderness fisheries. In 2009 Daniel Hackett and RiverFly Tasmania became the first fly fishing business to be licenced to operate in the Central Plateau World Heritage Area.

See the below links to some of the articles Daniel has featured in:

Australian Traveller Magazine, The Walls of Jerusalem

Brumby’s Creek article, FlyLife Magazine

The Walls to the Cliffs article, FlyLife Magazine

Tasmanian River Renaissance, FlyLife Magazine

Daniel is a past Tasmanian fly casting Champion and runner up, and a patient, relaxed and concise casting instructor.
Daniel’s academic qualifications are also impressive; he has an MBA in Marine Resource Management near completion to add to a Graduate Diploma in Fisheries Management, Graduate Certificate in Fisheries Management and a Diploma in Aquaculture. Daniel knows trout from the inside out and back again as both a scientist and as an angler.   

Patrick Horan

Patrick Horan

Patrick Horan begins his first full season as a professional guide in 2009, after being head-hunted for the job by RiverFly owner, Daniel Hackett. Daniel has known Pat for seven years, back to a time when Patrick was competing in and winning the junior Tasmanian Fly Fishing championships, while Daniel was winning the seniors. 

Patrick served an apprenticeship with RiverFly during 2008/2009, where he took to guiding as predicted – like a duck to water, providing the same excellent guiding service that Daniel Hackett and RiverFly Tasmania have become known for. For the past four years Patrick has taught fly fishing Adult Ed. classes with the Fly Fishers Club of Tasmania, and along with his younger brother, is very well known in the Tasmanian fly fishing scene.

Patrick is an awesome fly tyer, with innovative parachute flies and hoppers being a specialty. Daniel can be found pilfering Pat’s best flies at the start of many days.  As with the rest of the RiverFly team, Patrick is also an avid explorer and wilderness fisher, and as the son of an agronomist, Patrick has gained access to and explored many isolated stretches of river in the agricultural midlands that goes otherwise un-fished throughout the seasons. Some of these hidden jewels are now part of his guiding location reportoire.

Like Daniel, Patrick also knows trout from the inside and out after completing a Degree in Aquaculture in 2008. Patrick is also a wilderness bushwalking guide with Cradle Mountain Huts. Read more about Patrick joining the RiverFly Team here