Places I have tried to far are as follows (carp excluded from suspected species lists because they are basically everywhere):
Albert Park:
Aiming for Golden Perch and Trout.
Bait Used: (Scrub worms, live yabbies, cooked shrimp), Spinner lures (Super Vibrax / Celtas), Soft Plastics (Z man grub, Squidgie wrigglers, both using s-factor)
Visits: 5, Catches: None, Lost lures to large carp in the divided shallows. No other bites.
Taylors Lakes (Main lake and another a short walk away)
Used to be stocked with redfin and trout but not in the last decade, water quality is recovering so stocking can begin again for trout, still heaps of huge carp, small perch (silver in colour) caught on bread by an asian fisherman beside me one time.
Bait used: Scrub worms, Corn, Cooked Shrimp, Spinner lures (Super Vibrax / Celtas), Soft Plastics (Z man grub, Squidgie wrigglers, both using s-factor)
Visits 5, Catches: 1 australian eel from fresh scrubworm on sinker. No other bites.
Niddrie Lake (New lake, 3 years old, unfortunately already packed with carp)
Stocked with rainbow trout twice yearly.
Bait Used: Dead Scrub worms (refrigerated), corn, powerbait chartreuse (never using this again), cooked shrimp, Spinner lures (Super Vibrax / Celtas), Soft Plastics (Z man grub, Squidgie wrigglers, yabbie imitation with crawfish spray on scent).
Visits: 5, Catches: 1 carp on a dead scrub worm. Single previous bite suspected by a carp under the jetty, no hook up.
Rowville Lakes:
Stocked with rainbow trout yearly, redfin rumoured to be around.
Bait Used: Corn, Cheese / bread mix, powerbait (I'll repeat, never again), soft plastic yabbie imitation with crawfish spray scent, Spinner lures (Super Vibrax)
Visits: 3, Catches 0, No bites.
Lake Auravale:
Rumored to be a redfin hotspot, no idea on other species here at the moment.
Bait used: Live scrub worms, Spinner lures (Super Vibrax).
Visits: 1 (Short visit, 2 hours at sunset), Catches: 0, No bites.
Karkarook Park:
Rumored to be a redfin hotspot, also trout stocked.
Bait used: Powerbait (finally ran out of the horrible stuff here), corn with home made burley (flour / breadcrumbs / water / strawberry essence), Spinner lures (Super Vibrax).
Visits: 2, Catches: 0, No bites.
Brimbank Park (Maribyrnong River, freshwater):
Rumoured to be the odd redfin and trout around.
Bait used: Soft Plastics (Z man grub, Squidgie wrigglers) with megastrike original scent.
Visits: 2, Catches: 0, No bites.
This is basically all the lake / stream fishing I have done so far, the above is accurate for the last 2 months, before this I was estuary fishing. So far all to no avail in terms of landing a redfin or trout as I am hoping to catch. Based on this is there anything people would recommend for these places that may lead to something a bit more promising? Or any information on other lakes / public accessible dams with redfin / trout would be much appreciated. At the moment I am thinking about visiting a local trout farm to try out different gear and see if I can find which ones work better, but seems there is nowhere as plentiful to try out the same thing with redfin.
Rods I am using are a 7 foot heavy rod with 6lb straight flurocarbon, along with a 6ft light spin rod with 6lbs monofilament.
Could the recent heat waves over the last few weeks be contributing to the trout / redfin seeking deeper waters at present?
Any advice / tips / assistance is much appreciated, feel free to reply or PM
