was there last week, got 9 beauties on my trusty 13cm Rapala

Any particular reason you opted to go straight for a dropper rig instead of having a go with hard bodies like last time? I was there a month or so ago and the water was much lower and the fishing was very tough. Glad to see it has improved.

That was 10years ago

When was this? Water was way lower last visit for me.

We caught 19 big browns last week at the portal on diawa presso lures(thought we'd at least try this spawn run thing), fish all handled properly and released. As it was so cold, they didn't have their normal fight. We were dragging them in on a 4lb leader. I recommend waiting until after spawning when their back feeding in the lake. We caught 110 fish in 3 days up to 9lb, in Dec 1 year, got spooled, double hookups and busted up by a double figure fish😊 and it was absolutely sporting knee shaking stuff....spawn runners look avg and fight like logs...we're pure sports fisho's, so we'll wait until the season opens, leave the spawning fish do their thing and recommend chasing big Murray cod at Blowering instead😮

You will have killed those trout by lifting them up by the tail. They will swim off but will die in the days ahead.

Sorry - skilless fishing , not for me thanks