Inland Fisheries Service director John Diggle said licence applications were up nine per cent on the 2016-17 season.

“That is good for us – and those fogures were up on the year before,” Mr Diggle said.

“The rains in the middle of 2016 improve conditions for fishing. We’ve had reasonable lake levels and reasonable flows in the rivers.”

Tasmania’s brown trout waters close at the end of April, but rainbow trout stay open through May.

“Some waters are open all year round, like Great Lake,” Mr Diggle said.

Woods Lake, Four Springs Lake and Penstock Lagoon have been popular all season.

“The feedback from the Western Lakes is that the fish have been really good. It’s been generally good across the season,” he said.

The outlook for next season looks positive, with good brown trout spawning expected as a resault of aumtun rains.

“If we get rain now there should be a good spawning season,” Mr Diggle said.

“Water is flowing to Great Lake and Arthurs Lake and we’re hoping the fish will start turning up soon.”

Inland Fisheries is gearing up for the 2019 World Fly Fishing Championships in Tasmania and have teamed up with Tourism Tasmania to put together images and video of Tasmania’s inland fisheries to promote at the London Fly Fishing Fair.

“There will be a lot of eyes on Tasmania in 2019. Hopefully for us this trend [of good seasons] we’ve seen recently will continue.”