Mickey Finn

Who is Mickey Finn and what does he do?

I am fly fishing guide who lives in Tumut works at Tom's Outdoors, my fishing now is very revolved around guiding. I really enjoy it. I really enjoy teaching people how to fish, fishing through them essentially. It's the classic kind of guide scenario in which I've reached the point where I can catch those fish and enjoy it, but it's more fun if I can help others to go and do it, so life is pretty cool.

“It’s the thrill of seeing the indicator going down that grabs me.”

When you miraculously get a day off what kind of fly fishing do you love? 

As for my personal fishing, I tend to do a lot in my ‘offseason’, closed season for trout rivers, winter time. For instance right now, I'm doing most of my fishing up at the lakes, which I love. I'm really enjoying hunting the lake edges the lake edges are fishing well right now, 20 fish days, all from 2 feet of water.

During season, if I can swindle a day it's either a streamer or dry fly fishing day. But when guiding, the Tumut river is big tailwater, so we do a lot of nymphing, because it is often the best way to catch there fish. It's the thrill of seeing the indicator going down that grabs me. I can throw streamers all day looking for a big trout, but once I get one or two I'm pretty happy and can then happily start back with an indicator or a Euro nymphing rod. I might only get one grab, but just to get in some really nice casts, I love that, there's absolutely zero pressure at all on my local fishery, I can just enjoy fishing for what it is.

 What is it about the fly fishing experience as a whole that is so rewarding to you? Not just the fish element but the whole experience?

 To me, the favourite part of all this is where I get to live and the lived experiences I get here in Tumut. I intentionally sought a similar place when I returned from the US where I would spend some Aussie winters. Tumut fit the bill. The program Chris and Gemma have built at Tom’s Outdoors, coupled with the river, is ideal.

West Yellowstone was epic though, you’re only 25 minutes, half an hour away from the nearest Madison River launch. The other direction you're right on a bunch of lakes or the Gallatin. You could also just turn right, drive into the Yellowstone national park, and fish so much stuff along the way. It is a proper fly fishing community over there.

Can you tell me about West Yellowstone? I've heard a lot about it from you,I am keen on hearing the similarities but also the differences between Tumut, and West Yellowstone. 

I love the States. I  love Montana and I love really West Yellowstone.  Iguess Montana more broadly is such a unique fishery. Plenty of really good quality brown trout over there.Our systems here in Australia are also very conducive to those kinds of fish. What is unique over there is the variety of species, including cutthroat, and types of water.You can fish the mass of the Maddison, or you can fish in these high altitude alpine lakes and springs, it is so diverse. Our fishing conditions here are more limited due to the amount of water we have.

But the fly fishing culture is one of the most exciting things.  It's similar to the Australian pub scene, where everyone gathers at the end of the day. In Montana, the fly fishing shop is the heart of the community. It's where everyone converges to talk about fishing and socialise. I’ve met some amazing people through the fly shop, which has been crucial to my journey. We need to get a keg in the Australian fly shop.  

 Who are some of those people you met that shaped that experience for you?

My friend Miles is the one. He is the coolest guy in the world, who will hopefully make it out to Australia this summer but he has always been a bit of a mystery man. This guy is an enigma wrapped in skateboard wrapped in a fly rod, wrapped in tattoos, wrapped in a bullet proof jacket - he's a man of many talents is old Miles. But he taught me so much. 

Did you ever run any epic fly fishing adventures with Miles?

 One memorable trip was to Northern Patagonia, South America. I joined him in San Martin, Argentina, and we fished various places, like spring creeks and rives that run through seemingly desolate desert. It was epic, catching hog rainbows and brook trout on big foam damsel flies. Fish hard in the morning, red wine and siesta during the day, back at it for the evening rise and then dinner at like midnight. Rinse and repeat everyday. I loved it. 

“ I was just getting ready to crack a beer, mind off in the clouds, and then BANG! a 5.5 nearly 6 pounder fish noses up and just smokes the dry fly. ”

But one significant trip was to Alumine River, where we ran a two-day, overnight drift. Miles really wanted to catch a good Patagonia brown trout on a big dry fly. Like a proper 5lb plus brown trout - the pinnacle. 

On the day I started on the front of the boat, Miles was rowing, and we pushed off from the boat ramp for the trip. I've tied on the biggest dry fly I had the box just to mess around as we pull out from the boat ramp.As Miles rows us mid river getting the boat set up i start bombing casts around, you know when you're just getting your arms in trying to get warmed up. I make this cast cross this giant shallow riffle and I am twitching the fly through drift and just pretending I was skating for sea trout, completely mucking around. I was just getting ready to crack a beer, mind off in the clouds, and then BANG! a 5.5 nearly 6 pounder fish noses up and just smokes the dry fly. Immediately I'm feeling guilty I’ve hooked the fish Miles was looking for, 100 meters from the boat ramp. Netting it I was laughing my head off. It was hilarious, after a week in Tierra Del Feugo catching massive sea trout a 5lb trout almost gets annoying and you eventually end up “yep get him in and get him off, send him home.” So it was pretty ironic that I bag the fish of the trip that Miles was after, straight away after having filled my boots with them the week before. 

Now I’m back on the oars, with Miles up front fishing, he is just smashing cutter cookie 12 inch rainbows and it's just again and again and again and again, but not finding that big trophy brown. After a solid morning we pull up on a pool for lunch, deep in this canyon smack bang in a national park. Having lunch, this massive dog bounds out of the bush, straight to us. Friendly, super nice dog. Clearly keen to see us. We were just thought where the hell has this thing come from? We thought we were in the middle of nowhere. He starts off by picking up a rock off the bottom, puts it at our feet begging for us to toss it. As soon as we toss it into the river the dog just dives down and picks it up off the bottom and then brings it back. Crazy weird stuff, but clearly happy and trained. So we nicknamed him skippy over lunch and decided to keep going, leaving skippy where we found him. 

“We were so shocked, but skippy had just become our new best friend. I don’t know about Miles, but I didn’t get much sleep swagging out on the river bank knowing the cougar was still out there though!”

We got to get back on the boat, skippy follows us, swimming out to us through the current. Once he reaches us he hauls himself onto the backseat of the boat. Perched up there he was so happy, not moving an inch. We pulled over trying to get him off but he wouldn’t move from the back of the boat. So nall of a sudden we've adopted this dog and skippy was with us for the rest of the drift. 

Continuing on Miles is throwing a massive streamer to entice the big brown. Coming up on a big rock wall, big strainer, he throws a cast and runs a heavy sculpin pattern down along its face and just gets whaled on. Something big has taken his fly and taken it deep. Struggling to get this thing under control we think it is a 10lb pound trout, the absolute trophy. Frantic, I’m trying to get the boat in a good place to land this thing we pull over this deepish hole, like waist deep water on the other side. In the deepish water the fish was behaving really weird, like really weird runs, and then surfacing we see it isn’t a trout, bit a massive South American perca. They look like a weird cross between like an estuary perch and like sort of a trout. Whilst not a trout, it was a pretty cool fish.  

Pulling over for the night to find camp we settled on a nice bank lined with cliffs, and condors circling up above us, it was pretty sweet. Skippy was happy as Larry just hanging out with us. After the sun had set, and we were hanging out by the campfire, eating dinner of left over empanadas – classic Patagonia fish bum feed –  we noticed this random shadow hunched over way downstream at the bottom of the bank. Immediately Skippy sat bolt up right, snapped his head liked he was keyed in on a scent and let out a massive bellowing bark. Miles and I were thinking what on earth is going on, and before we could really do anything Skippy bolted off in the direction of the shadow. Coming to life, turning on a dime away from the charging oncoming Skippy, we could now see it was a cougar that had been tracing our scent from downwind. Before we could even blink it had vanished into the night, never to be seem again, Skippy just trotted back like it was no big deal. We were so shocked, but skippy had just become our new best friend. I don’t know about Miles, but I didn’t get much sleep swagging out on the river bank knowing the cougar was still out there though!

Long story short, we finished the drift the next day with Miles unfortunately not getting the trophy brown. I felt a little guilty snapping the fish of the trip Miles was looking for almost by accident within the first 5 mins, but that’s fishing I guess, and that’s why those trophy browns are considered trophies. We also managed to return skippy to his owner once back in town and after some asking around. Miles was pretty upset to see him go but deep down we were glad to reunite Skippy with his owner. I think he was pretty relieved too. Turns out he was also a fly angler who drifts, hence why Skippy knew what was up around the drift boat. Our broken Spanish/English conversation couldn’t quite distinguish how Skippy was ‘lost’ in the first place, but we could see the guy was just so stoked to have Skippy back. Fair enough because that dog was a dude.  

Incredible. What other epic South American adventures have you taken on?

I have been lucky enough to fish Tierra Del Feugo out of Maria del Betty Lodge. It is an incredible place, and I'm definitely looking forward to going back. The lodge is right on the Rio Grande. The fishing is so epic, but it’s everything else about South America that makes it great. Asados and BBQs, red wine, incredibly happy people, combined with catching giant sea trout makes for an incredible experience.  I managed to bag my first sea trout, which clocked in at an epic 10-pounds. A crazy way to be introduced to frontier fly fishing. It was while swinging using an intermediate line, and as soon as it took the tiny fly, the fish just went crazy. Jumping out of the water like it was trying to walk on the surface. True acrobatics. You never forget the silver shine and freshness of the fish there. The whole week was filled with nonstop sea trout fishing, and then red wine and lamb asados. It was a good time. I capped the week off with a 17lb brown trout on my birthday. That fish blew my mind. The strength of the fish, the pull, I can’t even put into words. Trying to keep it under control was crazy. Get your self over there when you can, it’s a week you’ll never forget. 

There are also the tales of paying for 4am cabs from the bar to the boat ramp with Aussie dollars and lake dwelling brook trout chomping blue dragon flys, but they are stories for another time. 

What about big fish closer to home? Any experiences in Australia that stick out to memory? Tell me about the barramundi you got on fly in Queensland?

That was part of a broader trip. That whole trip was right before they shut down the borders due to  the first or second wave of COVID restrictions. I literally drove from Tumut to QLD. I don't recommend it, but I got over the Queensland border just in time, and it was like a military operation at the border. I've got my kayak on top, and the guys kind of knew what was going on, but I had my permit all ticked off so everything was fine.I managed to get over no dramas. I slept for like the whole day once I got up there, I was wrecked. 

But the fishing. So I was with a few other guys fishing out of a power boat for a few days, and as a group we had found some success chasing Barra, but I hadn’t caught one yet. On the last day, there were too many for all of us to be on the boat so I took my kayak out. It was great having the kayak up there because it meant I could be pretty self reliant with my fishing. One time on that trip though gave me the fright of my lift, saw a shadow pass under my kayak while out there and thought it was a croc! Turns out it was a dark coloured dugong!

But out on the kayak turned makeshift paddle board, I was polling around with a poling stick I had built, working my way along the edges of the weed beds in the shallows trying to polaroid and spot up there big Barra. It was a big day trying to find them. As we got the endthe others in the boat called in and said they are headed for home with a storm clearly brewing. There was some pretty hairy storm clouds boiling up, so I thought it was probably a good call. But I had to paddle back to the boat ramp and thought “Well, I might as well stop and fish this last little bit along the way”. Anyway the storm is fully stewing like Jurassic Park and I’m thinking I don’t really want to be caught out there when it rolls in. 

I'm pushing myselfover this weed bed pretty frantically, moving pretty quickly, when I see this big eye disappear out of a channel through the weeds. Tracking the direction of the movement I anticipate whatever it is going to pop out on the other side. I see a flash of tail so I know its a Barra. I put the fly in the next gap of weeds and then as soon as he came out, I woke the fly up with a strip and he put in a massive turn and burn, real slow, just slobbered it in.

He nearly jumped into the kayak, and then under it. And then I, of course, go from standing up, sitting down very quickly.I'm fighting him underneath the kayak andhe's spinning me around in 360s. It was crazy for a minute there. Eventually I got him in and it was 105 cm’s, incredible experience.

What about on your home waters, any epic adventures close to Tumut/Canberra?

 Absolutely, chasing massive impoundment Murray Cod in Googong Dam, near Canberra, is a crazy experience. I set my sights on cracking a meter length cod one winter a few years ago. It’s tough dude, tough fishing. Big days where you feel like you’re casting into a pond of water void of fish. You can go back-to-back to back days of constant casting to not evenseeing a fish. Anyway, 3 months or so in I finally cracked one. 

My good friend and Googong cod guru, Will Curtin, and I were out there on the dam slogging out another session, working the edges and came across a good-looking bank. Piffing a number of casts against ii initially resulted in nothing. As I worked my way back down the face of the cascading bank, I decided to make my fly stop sinking, it was crucial to halt at around 6 or 7 feet deep, allowing my fly to dangle at an enticing depth. Just as I uttered, "That's where they're going to grab it," it happened - the strike was so powerful and exhilarating. Those are the moments that make fishing truly memorable. This was my first metre Murray Cod, a personal milestone that left me ecstatic. 

However, this came after a gruelling three months of relentless fishing. The persistence paid off, but I paid the price and fell ill pretty bad and was bedridden for a week. The next weekend, the weather and conditions took an absolute turn for the better, resulting in prime cod fishing conditions. I was still so crook but knew I had to cash in. Will, was eager to get back out there.

After a big day back on the dam, with not much activity, despite the conditions, we drifted into a shallow bay, only about 3 feet deep. The water in Googong is pretty clear, and with a high sun, it was like an aquarium below the boat. We could see the bottom easily. Anyway, I boosted a cast right to the top of the bay, let it sink slowly, and then began stripping it back with short, purposeful strips. Tick, tick, tap. It was the slightest of eats. Presumably as the cod ate the fly while swimming towards the boat, and therefore not placing heaps of pressure on the line. Reading the cue, I strip struck hard. Really picking up all that slack, burying that fly in the cod’s mouth. You have to go pretty hard on these things, cod have tough mouths. From here though I was engaged in a tug-of-war with the fish. I had minimal control of the mass opposing me. It was incredible to see it power out to the middle of the dam, pass under the boat in clear water like a shark. As it passed under the boat Will and I lost our minds. This fish was huge. Like proper huge. Not just long, but broad across the shoulders and thick through the chest. A Ben Hur kind of fish. Getting the boat whipped around with the pull of this fish, we were in a position to tame it and bring it to the boat. Mate it was huge. We couldn’t even net it with Will’s cod net. That was the cod of a lifetime. One that I still cherish to this day. I love the irony that I spend a season of fishing chasing the goal, 3 months of work for nothing, then go back to back in consecutive weekends. Fly fishing is weird dude.

Incredible Mickey, some epic stories of some epic fish, thanks for sharing. 

No worries mate. Happy to share the fun.