Welcome to Trout in the Karri

My name is Bruce Williamson and I live in Perth, Western Australia. My interest in fly fishing for trout started in the 80s and since ceasing full-time work in 2014, I have been able to pursue this wonderful piscatorial pastime with much greater frequency. This is particularly true of my fly fishing in the Karri country of Pemberton, an inland town located 330 kilometres south of Perth.

During a trip to Pemberton in early November 2018, I went down to the Pemberton swimming pool, which on that day had been drained of water for its annual cleanout. I started chatting to a well-known  Pemberton local who was performing his yearly task of cleaning the pool and removing the accumulated debris and leaves. During that conversation, he made mention of old trout ponds upstream of the pool. To say I was surprised by his comment was an understatement, as I'd never heard of any such ponds in all my years of fishing in Pemberton or in discussion with any other trout fishers. 

His offer to show me what he was referring to was too good to pass up.  We walked upstream following some of the mountain bike tracks in their deviant paths above the swimming pool surrounds. On a gravel path marked 'Old Trout Hatchery Bridge' we descended into a small glade that led to a wooden and steel bridge across what seemed to be a watercourse. It never was a hatchery and wasn't intended to be one by either design or function, but rather holding ponds for the growth of fingerlings to yearlings, more mature trout and to hold the breeding fish. Trout ponds, however, I did not see, only a mass of blackberries and dense vegetation that obscured anything that might lie beneath. Upon my return to Perth, I started my research into the history of the 'old trout ponds' and this is where the journey begins.

The veil of secrecy about the ponds was partially lifted later in November 2018, when I obtained a copy of the original Public Works Department line drawings for the Pemberton Trout Ponds (circa 1939-40) from the State Records Office. Commencing in March 2019 and then over the next two years, on every fishing trip to Pemberton, I spent at least one day of 4-6 hours working on the ponds.  The Public Works plans documented the site to be 225 feet in length from the datum point in the dam at the head of the ponds down to the outflow at the bottom of pond 3. There were two sets of raceways shown and each had 3 ponds in series. The plans showed the site was 40 feet wide when the stream bypass was included and the ponds exit, to lie 325 feet above the highwater mark of the Pemberton Swimming Pool as documented in the 1939 survey of the site prior to the building of the ponds.

Although there was an engineered bridge and a gravel path imposed across the top of the ponds as part of the mountain bike paths created, all the locals and trout fishers that I spoke to were unaware of the ponds' existence let alone their name and history. As their use declined in late 1950s, the McCallum Smith Memorial Trout Ponds had dropped from the collective consciousness of the town of Pemberton.

Even before I knew that much about these ponds, I had made the conscious decision that they should be relieved of their cloak of greenery and once again be a visible feature in Pemberton. 

This website was originally proposed to help tell the story of the McCallum Smith Memorial Trout Ponds and their restoration. But after delving down many a rabbit hole while researching the ponds' origins, it became apparent to me that this story is bigger than the ponds themselves. It is a story of determination and community spirit. A story about the residents of a small milling town who, despite their geographical isolation, persevered over two decades to help make their vision a reality by introducing trout into Pemberton and other parts of Western Australia between 1931 and 1952.

The information on this website is contemporary and about the restoration of the ponds. But at the same time, it presents a historical narrative about the parts played by these holding ponds in the Acclimatisation of Trout in Pemberton and in a broader context it seeks to inform the visitor about some of the important people and many unique aspects of the Acclimatisation of Trout in the Karri Country around Pemberton in the period 1931-1952. This website is going to try and give you digital access to a world many of you will have no concept of, or experience in, and I hope you may enjoy some if not all of that journey.

Fly fishing for trout continues to give me great enjoyment in an environment that itself, although often challenging is also very rewarding for the locations and surroundings that it takes me to. The physical work of uncovering the MacCallum Smith Memorial Trout Ponds site and highlighting its existence to the local community is my attempt to give something back to the town of Pemberton when fly fishing for trout has given me so much to enjoy. 

Thank you for visiting.