Mersey River Tasmania Archives - RiverFly 1864 - river and wilderness fly fishing Tasmania

Mersey River after the floods

Mersey River after the floods This time last year, the Mersey River was experiencing the most destructive flood in history. Houses were washed away, more than 300 cattle were lost, and the river set many new courses. So how did this affect the fishing this year? Our first inspection post-flood, in August 2016, revealed an…

The Vanishing River

This season has seen further waters opened for fishing in May (for the first time), with designated ‘rainbow waters’ now including the upper Mersey River, the two Weld rivers and parts of the Leven River. Finally, some destinations for river-fishers.

The giant stonefly and Max Christensen’s Bloody Mary

In Flylife Magazine Spring 2008, I wrote an article on the Mersey River in Northern Tasmania. Within this article I spoke of hatches of giant stoneflies, and the large bouyant dry flies used to imitate the adult insect – flies such as our WMD Hopper, or the slightly more crass Chernobyl Ant. Well, it appears that this is a hatch that hasn’t passed through time completely un-noticed.

Caddis grubs

Here is a new ‘go-to’ pattern for the freestone rivers of Tasmania. While I have a preference for fishing the dry-fly, this isn’t always the best approach. This is when I opt to fish a nymph in tandem with a larger, bouyant dry fly, or upstream nymph with the single fly. A nymph that has…