Above Lake Dartmouth the Mitta Mitta is still a mountain river, and it fishes like one. This is
the alpine trip: wild trout, clear pocket water, and a river that answers to the weather rather
than to a dam.
The stretch runs fifty-nine kilometres from the headwaters south of Omeo down to where the lake
takes it. The top is timbered gorge. Around Hinnomunjie Bridge it opens into a grazing valley of
gravel riffles and pools between grassed banks and willows, gathers two tributaries, Big River
and the Gibbo, and then tightens again for the last twenty kilometres to the inflow. Nothing has
held the water yet, so it is whatever fell on the high country last week: cold and clear when it
has settled, coloured and pushing when it has not.
The fish are wild browns, in the survey record by the hundred, with rainbows among them, and no
trout has ever been stocked into the river. They live where mountain trout live, in the soft
water beside the current, behind the boulders, in the tail of every run.
The season runs from late spring, once the rain and melt have gone through, to the April frosts.
A four weight and a dry-dropper fished one cast per pocket. Along the valley flats in summer, a
hopper tight to the grassed bank in the afternoon. The winter closed season that applies to the
tailrace below the dam does not apply here, but the ordinary Victorian trout rules do, so check
the current guide.
Hinnomunjie Bridge on the Omeo Highway is the named way in, and the valley around it is mixed
road, grazing and public land, so a gate is the answer. The gauge at the bridge reads water
temperature as well as flow, and its readings sit under Conditions. After two days of rain it
will turn you back at the bridge. Read it before you drive, and expect to be alone.
Water and habitat
Fifty-nine kilometres of mainstem from the headwaters to the inflow. The upper river is confined and
timbered, dropping through gorge country; around Hinnomunjie it opens into a grazing valley where the
river runs in gravel riffles and pools between grassed banks and willows; below the bridge it tightens
again toward the lake. Big River and the Gibbo are the tributaries that matter, and they are other
waters, not extra pages of this one. The Hinnomunjie gauge sits in the valley and reads flow, height,
water temperature and conductivity.
You are in the Victorian high country, and the river has not yet been held in a storage. That
matters for how it fishes: the temperature follows the air, the flow follows the rain, and neither is
smoothed by a wall upstream.
Fish and forage
Brown trout are the fish of this river, and the survey record for the
whole Mitta Mitta is thick with them, hundreds electrofished through the 2000s and 2010s.
Rainbow trout are in the record in smaller numbers. Both are wild;
no trout has been stocked into the river. Twospine blackfish share the pools, and redfin have
reached even this far up. Treat it as wild trout country rather than a put-and-take beat, and let a
day on the water do the counting.
The trout eat caddis and mayfly in the runs, and through summer the
grasshoppers and beetles off the open valley flats around Hinnomunjie,
where a fish tight under a grassed bank in the afternoon is waiting for one.
When to fish it
Read the Conditions card on this page before you drive. The Hinnomunjie gauge tells you whether the
spring water has gone through and whether the river has settled after the last rain, and the
temperature line tells you whether a summer afternoon is one to fish early and keep fish wet.
This is alpine country. Spring rain and melt hold the river high and cold; from late spring to the
April frosts it drops into small, clear pocket water and is at its best. After rain or a dump in the
headwaters it comes up fast and coloured, and the confined upper river is dangerous while it does.
Give it a few dry days. A hot afternoon on the open valley banks is a reason to fish first light and
keep fish wet, not a reason to assume the water is cold.
If the forecast is wet, wait. If the river is up or dirty at the bridge, that is the answer for the
day.
How to fish it
Fish it as a mountain river. Seams along the current, the soft edge behind a boulder, the tail of a
run, and the first cast into a pocket is usually the only one that counts. Keep your approach low;
this water is clear when it is in order.
A four or five weight covers it. A dry-dropper with a
Royal Wulff or a Stimulator you can see in broken light
over a tungsten Pheasant Tail or Hare's Ear, so the
fish choose the level. A hopper tight to the grassed banks through the valley in
summer, an Elk Hair Caddis in the evening runs, and a small
Woolly Bugger when the water is carrying colour.
Wading is the real work. Bedrock is slick in the gorge sections, and a fall here is a long way from
a hospital. If you cannot see the next footing, do not take it.
Access and safety
Hinnomunjie Bridge, on the Omeo Highway, is the named way onto this stretch, and the valley around
it is mixed country: road, grazing and public land. A gate is the answer. Confirm who holds the bank
before you walk it. The Victorian Fisheries Authority's northern inland angling guide for the Mitta
Mitta basin lists access in this country; a pin is not a right of entry. Check current closures
before you go, and treat the upper gorge as the remote walk it is.
Lake Dartmouth is the downstream end of this stretch, not a carpark for it. Do not treat the storage
foreshore as this river.
Regulations
Victorian rules apply. The trout and salmon closed season on the river below the pondage does not
apply here; this stretch is the water above the lake, and the ordinary Victorian trout rules govern
it.
Check the current
Victorian recreational fishing guide
before you fish. The dates and numbers move. Do not take them from this page.