Dartmouth Cup Fishing Classic returns on Queen's Birthday weekend after 2020 COVID wipeout

The Queen's Birthday weekend event took a predictable hit with the 270 entrants being well down on the 450-plus who competed pre-coronavirus after the competition became off-limits to Melbourne residents due to the latest lockdown and also entrants from regional areas outside the border bubble.

It culminated with Sunday night's presentation at the Dartmouth pub, but current restrictions led to a limit of 150 people after initial fears only 50 could attend.

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Event organising team member Lorrae Smyth said the community hall was opened to allow those unable to go to the pub to watch the presentation streamed via Facebook.

"We were still happy we had the event," she said.

"We shutdown early last year and everyone thought we jumped the gun.

"But there was just no way we could do it as it turned out."

Major prize winner, Brian Shannon, a first time competitor who weighed just one fish in, a 535 gram brown trout, was at the pub to hear his name called out.

Pete Paton from Tallangatta has been taking part in the event for nearly a decade and relished being back on the water.

"Even though it wasn't able to run at full capacity this year it was still good to be able to have it," he said.

"We were all happy to go fishing and camp on the lake, but the atmosphere at the pub (on Sunday) night wasn't as big as other years."

Dartmouth publican Aaron Scales said seated service and mask wearing rules were the biggest frustrations expressed by competitors across the weekend.

The biggest brown trout caught at the weekend weighed 1.805kg with all rainbow trouts being under one kilogram.

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