Food for thought...

From 1957 to 1977 Lake Eucumbene filled,covering highly fertile superphosated meadows where trout growth was phenomenal as they gorged on a diet of mainly drowned terrestrials,aquatic insects and larvae aswell worms,this happened again in the late 80s early 90s..inbetween the high water of '77 and the early 90's the lake flucuated a lot similar to today exposing vast areas of mudflats which did major damage to weed beds and valuable aquatic insect life.

During this period NSW fisheries biologist Bob Farragher and cooma biologist Fred Dunford studies showed the change in trout diets.

1966/67 whilst the lake filled and flooded these high nutrient grass lands food was abundant, yabbies only made up 2.4% of the brown trout's diet and a mere 0.6% of the rainbows.

1974/75 a full and steady lake and a boom in yabby population saw the terrestrial diet change dramatically towards the crustaceans with browns yabby intake shoot to 40.9% and 13.4% for bows!!!

By 1977 the yabby made up 50% for the browns and 15% for the rainbows..

Fast forward to the present with the lake never really getting a chance to flood into the high water areas where all sorts of food would be abundant and the trout have little but yabbies to dine on and its not rocket science to work out that the yabby would be close to 90% of Eucs food source right up untill the lake fills again..

Lately the fishing has been sensational around the lakes muddy edges particularly after or during strong winds.These winds push the waves on to the exposed yabby beds and destroy them leaving the hibernating residents homeless and at the mercy of the gods.Fishing baits lure or fly directly after or during strong winds in this dirty water margin has been the best tactic for shorebased anglers or trolling where the dirty water meets clean the best for boat anglers...for more info drop in,message on Facebook or call on 02 6452 5538