Instant sports fishing - Just add water!
There has been some good fishing in the waterways flowing into Lake Ellesmere - Te Waihora, the shallow brackish coastal waterway which is the largest lake in Canterbury. The big rain event in May that closed off the road access to the Selwyn huts, topped up the ground water aquifers and the Selwyn River - Waikirikiri flowed strongly at State Highway 1 through last Winter, where it is usually dry. Coming into Spring the river continued to flow at around 2 cumecs, and looked a million bucks (here) at Coe’s Ford. With all that extra water underground, all the little streams that have been sucked dry this century to put grass on the paddocks through the Summer, are flowing too. The Hanmer Drain and even the Irwell River are looking great, with crystal clear water sparkling over algae covered stones.
With all of this extra fresh water flowing into the lake, it was opened to maintain the artificially low level that keeps the surrounding land paddocks dry enough for cows to graze, rather than wetlands full of waterfowl and fish. Sea trout migrated in from the ocean, perhaps following schools of whitebait, and there were pods of fresh run fish,
