About Dean

Though still in his thirties, Dean Butler is known worldwide for his angling achievements, his ingenuity in the development of tackle and techniques and for his tireless promotion of Australasian sport and fly fishing.

He is a renowned guide who has assisted in the capture of 13 billfish world records by anglers from around the globe. He is himself a multiple IGFA fly fishing world record holder and he fondly numbers among his friends many of the world's foremost fishing authorities.

Described more than a decade ago by US angling paragon Lefty Kreh as one of the world's finest young anglers, Butler's fishing career has taken him throughout Australia and the Pacific, North America, Argentina and the Bahamas. His photojournalism has appeared in all leading Australian angling publications and in noted US magazines including Marlin, Sportfishing, Gray's Sporting Journal and Flyfishing In Saltwater.

Dean Butler with one of the biggest black bass he caught on fly a fish around 40 pounds taken during a exploratory trip in the Gulf of PNG.

Born in Melbourne, Butler started fishing the Yarra before he was 10,. chasing redfin, roach and trout on bait. By his mid-teens, he was a fanatical spin fisherman, pestering his mum to take him to destinations throughout Victoria in his pursuit of trout. Family holidays took him to SE Queensland, where he happily recalls long summer days of fine fishing around Bribie Island and Deception Bay with his uncle George.

At age 14, he found his first fly rod in a phone booth, spent his pocket money on a cheap Bakelite reel and a flyline, and set about teaching himself to cast in the family backyard. While he mastered the casting, he says that the intervention of the usual lad's diversions in his late teen years meant that it was quite some time before he actually caught a fish on a fly.

Then, on a trip to Lord Howe Island in 1984 he met eminent Australian sportfisherman Rod Harrison, who was to become his great friend and mentor. Harrison guided the then 22-year-old Butler to his first fly-caught fish ­ an 8lb yellowtail kingfish ­ and set him on an angling career path.

Throughout the mid to late '80s Butler worked with Harrison and film-maker John Haenke in the video production company H & H Productions, resulting in 13 sportfishing titles encompassing the gamut of Australian sportfishing options.

The extensive travelling involved in the video production inspired Butler to establish a fishing adventure company that would allow anglers to safely and comfortably experience remote destinations. Throughout the late '80s and early '90s, Butler scouted and ran the first organized fishing trips into untrammeled regions of Papua New Guinea. He established two jungle camps on the island of New Britain and pioneered PNG mothershipping journeys into some of the most primitive and culturally astounding regions of the country.

All the while he worked at developing angling techniques and rugged tackle for the capture of PNG black and spottail bass, species that have been described as the fiercest on Earth. He also led angling expeditions to the Northern Territory, the Kimberley, the Solomon Islands, Fiji and Tonga.

During this time, more than 700 adventure minded anglers turned to Dean Butler's Sportfishing Adventures to experience some of the planet's wildest fishing. It was then also that Butler made his first forays into magazine photojournalism and he played a key consultancy role in the production of the acclaimed video series Clear Water, Big Fish, hosted by Greg Norman.

By 1994, escalating political tensions in PNG and the demands of year-round overseas travel saw Butler switch his focus back to Australian waters. Then based in Cairns, he began a mothershipping charter venture that took anglers through the then scantily fished Wessell Islands, stretching into the Arafura sea upwards of Arukun (Gove).

Also that year, while working in an advisory role with Queensland charter operator Sid Boshammer, Butler saw the potential for a classic sight casting fly fishery for golden trevally around Fraser Island. The following year, the Kingfisher Bay Golden Trevally Fly Fishing Classic was established and the fly fishery is now one of the best known in Australia.

In 1995, to be close to his growing family, (he and wife Corinne have two sons, Reid and Zane, born in '93 and '96), Butler took on the challenge of reestablishing the famed Erskine's Tackle Shop. Legendary in the early heyday of the Cairns heavy tackle marlin industry, the store had fallen into bankruptcy. Over two years' managing what became a once more thriving store, he developed a passion for catching billfish on fly, dreaming up methods and designing tackle that could make big marlin a realistic target for flyrodders.

Much of the technique and equipment that is now standard in the teasing and capture of billfish on fly was devised by Butler, and his fruitful collaboration with US fly tiers Bill and Kate Howe to design the acclaimed Flashy Profile Fly stems from this time.

In 1996, when a two-day trip to Port Stephens in NSW resulted in his capture on fly of an IGFA world record striped marlin, Butler began planning to relocate to the region to develop a marlin fly fishery. Long established as a conventional anglers' Mecca, the fly fishing potential of the Port Stephens waters was barely explored. In January 1998, he packed up the family and moved south.

Over three seasons, working with noted skipper Craig "Sparrow" Denham, Butler has spearheaded the emergence of Port Stephens as a flyrodding billfish hotspot of world renown. He has been on hand for 13 of the 15 world records that have been successfully claimed from the Port since 1996, and his campaign of international promotion continues to encourage leading anglers from around the globe to try their skills in this fertile Down Under fishery.

Butler currently divides his year between guiding in Port Stephens, the Kimberley, the Northern Territory and Vanuatu. His photojournalism is ongoing, as is his role as chief consultant designer and advisory administrator for the Australian owned Strudwick Rod Company.

Despite an often hectic and diverse schedule, Butler remains always approachable, keen to exchange views and to foster the development of sport, fly and game fishing knowledge and skills among anglers of all ages. He welcomes emails anytime, but warns that if it sometimes takes him a while to answer them, it's probably because he's gone fishin'.

Some angling achievements

• 1994 Champion Visiting Team fishing with Peter Pakula and Alan Philliskirk at the Northern Territory's famed Barra Classic. 5th over all in a field of 35
• 1995 Champion Winning Team at the inaugural Australian & International Broome Sailfishing Fly Rod Challenge.
• World record dogtooth tuna, a fish of 12kgs on 10-kg tippet, the first ever successfully claimed on saltwater fly fishing tackle under IGFA rules
  Champion Angler at the inaugural Fraser Island Golden Trevally Fly Fishing Classic.
• 1996 World record 90.5 kg striped marlin on 10 kg IGFA fly fishing tackle
• 1997 Champion Crew & Team member aboard Kestel, winner of the Cairns Masters Giant Black Marlin Tournament with a black marlin of 1086 lbs.
• 1999 Champion Angler and captain of the Champion Team at the inaugural Port Stephens Fly Rodders' Billfish Grand Prix Fly competition.
• World Record 52.5 kg Black Marlin on IGFA 8 kg tippet