The trout season opened on the first weekend of October, drawing many eager fishermen to the most popular spots. During the last few years, Lake Rotoiti has become one of the stand out lakes in the country reports Mike Davies.

Lake Rotoiti has an uncanny ability to produce huge average sized fish in the seven to eight pound class. On top of all this, fish that weigh in between 10 and 11 pounds are thought of as good fish and it takes a fish of about 15 pound to make the locals impressed such is the quality of the fishery.

As a generalisation, the fishing on Rotoiti has always been a little on the hard side, but during the last few years methods such as jigging have opened up massive opportunities to the boat fisherman. As the lake surface warms up it traps a layer of cold water in between the warmer surface layer and the deep water and this is called the thermocline.

Depending on different environmental conditions such as the weather and wind direction, the layer of water called the thermocline may vary in depth. In the middle of summer this may be somewhere around 25-30 metres in depth. This is naturally too deep for the fly fisherman and trollers to reach, but is no problem for the jig fisherman.

In Rotoiti the most popular method of jigging is to use a 1-1/2oz sinker with three flies above it at 1m intervals apart. The flies are attached to a 20cm dropper trace coming off at right angles to a swivel that separates the three metres of trace. The flies used are all various smelt patterns and all will work better than other patterns at different times of the season. The most popular patterns are the Grey Ghost, Parsons Glory, Jack Sprat, Green Orbit and Ginger Mick. The smelt tend to be darker in colour early in the season and lighten up considerably in the summer.

Most jigging outfits have a colour coded braid at 10m intervals to identify the depth of water which is invaluable when the fish are up off the bottom. The number one rule is to trust your fish finder fully, because that is where the fish are. When the fishing is red hot during the summer months the good jig fisherman can land 10-15 fish in a short session. Most reels are low mount free spool reels paired up with light 2-4kg graphite rods. The boat can be anchored or drifting with a drogue across and over the back of reef structure can produce very good fishing. The best spots to try jigging are around the drop offs in the lake especially as reef structure falls away into deeper water.