Yesterday Charity and I were able to get out on a “Guides’ Day Off” and so some fishing for ourselves. Sometimes we like to go some place we haven’t been in a while and get away from the same water we’ve guided for so long. It probably seems like a foreign concept to talk about fishing like this, but we usually like to get away from the “office”.

That wasn’t the case yesterday. Between the two of us we’ve seen a good number of big fish moving on Little River over the last couple of weeks and didn’t see the point in going anywhere else.

Suffice it to say, we have no regrets…

Great Smoky Mountains National Park isn’t known for big fish. You can catch fish for months and have a tough time cracking the 12″ mark, but this is the time of year the big brown trout come out from under the rocks they’ve hidden under all year long.

The browns are starting to spawn, although we’re seeing more fish out feeding than sitting on redds. This is a good thing because they’re not typically eating when they spawn and that’s not really the best way to catch them anyway.

Water and weather conditions look great into next week. We’ll be floating the Clinch over the next few days, but expect to get back in the mountains while the great conditions persist.

Here’s another look at those fish.

Click here to view the embedded video.

We’ve heard excellent reports from the Clinch River. Generation schedules are great and the fish are eating. Bring your best midge patterns.

Don’t our buddy Andy Sonner that the good dry fly fishing hasn’t arrived in the Smokies. Andy caught this brown in the national park on Monday… wait for it… on a dry fly!

We really can’t stand admire Andy’s knack for pulling this off every couple of years. A wild fish like this in the Smokies is a big deal and catching it on a dry fly is somewhat akin to finding the Holy Grail. This isn’t the first time he’s done it either. He landed one bigger than this on a dry fly about three or four years ago.

Andy is one of those disgusting guys with that “fish sense” that must be integrated into his DNA. A few years ago he joined us on our Hazel Creek camp and rubbed our noses in it thrilled us when he caught this behemoth. At least he caught this one on a nymph!

Yes, that is a full size rod

We’ve done all kinds of things since the last post. While we’ve done some fishing we also traveled up to Indianapolis to speak at a meeting of the Indianapolis Fly Casters. There was a large and enthusiastic turnout and I’m pretty sure we made a few former Tennesseans homesick for the trout fishing they left behind.

Fishing in the Smokies has improved dramatically, but it took a little longer than we initially expected. There was so much snow and ice in the mountains it took quite a while for the water to warm up. In fact, after two days of 50 degree weather there was still an appreciable amount of ice in Little River. Even after the ice was clear the water temperature remained in the high 30′s for a couple more days.

I met local fishing buddies Doug Sanders and Mark Douglas on Little River yesterday. I’ve spent a lot of time fishing with these guys including an ill-fated winter camping trip to Hazel Creek in an ice storm. The fishing started off a little slow around 11:00 AM. We picked up a few fish on nymphs but on a spotty basis.

By 1:00 the nymphing was excellent and we picked up multiple fish in most runs we fished. I fished a double rig of a Pat’s Nymph and Prince Nymph. I eventually switched traded the Prince Nymph for a Z-lon Nymph since the Pat’s Nymph accounted for most of the fish I hooked.

Doug had a far less creative rig, two George Nymphs, but continued to hook fish in most runs and pockets. He hoped to catch at least one brown trout and his wish came true. I’m still kicking myself for deferring the pool to him. Just as he approached the water I spotted a large brown feeding in the deepest part of the hole. Doug didn’t see it at first, but cast where I directed him. Just before the nymphs got to the fish Doug announced he saw it.

The fish turned and cruised back about two feet, turn around, and ate something. Doug’s indicator didn’t do anything but he set the hook based on the fish’s actions. That was a good decision on his part because the fish ate his #14 George Nymph.

Regrettably I didn’t have a camera handy. Because of the rainy conditions I just decided to leave it in the car. Doug was thrilled to land the fish, but crushed we didn’t have a camera or even a cell phone between us to capture an image. The brown was 18″ long and as colorful as they come. The back was olive, the belly was orange, and most of the spots were a rusty orange color. Beautiful!

The tailwater situation has improved, but not by much. Those who have kept a close eye on TVA generation schedules have probably been able to get on the Clinch and Holston Rivers. The South Holston and Watauga have had very favorable schudules. The Hiwassee hasn’t had any good fishing for waders.

That's my size 11 foot in the photo for scale

It’s been a couple of weeks ago now, but I came across the the biggest brown trout I’ve ever seen on the Clinch River. I had taken Gary Newton from Berea, Kentucky on a float trip. It was a pretty good day of fishing with most trout taking midge patterns in the #20 range. A few of the trout were in the 14″ – 17″ range with most in the 10″ range.

Clouds built throughout the day and around 4:00 the rain started to fall. That wasn’t too bad, but the thunder and lightning drove us off the river to safety. There was no real place to stay dry, but we sat it out in rain gear. It was a downpour to say the least and water was standing about ankle deep at the rowers seat in the drift boat.

The rain started to let up and we decided to go ahead and pull out into the current. The water had started to rise so I didn’t have to worry about zig-zagging my way down the river through a maze of ledges. The water had just gotten high enough so there was a few inches clearance to float over them.

The fog had come on pretty thick over the river and visibility was only about 75 yards. There were still some rumbles of thunder in the distance so I was pushing the boat on down the river to avoid round two in the storms.

I was just upstream of Lewellyn Island when I noticed something off to my left in the river. I initially thought it was some flotsam picked up by the rising water, but it had a little bit of motion that made it look more alive than a piece of trash.

As I rowed over to it I could see that it was a big fish. It was drifting with the current but so big that I had difficulty getting in the net. It took me four separate attempts to finally get it in the net and in the boat. Gary made the comment that the fish was easily over 24″ long.

I have a 20″ ruler decal in the drift boat and the fish dwarfed it, more than a head and tail longer than the sticker. I put the fish down in the water in bottom of the boat and it showed signs of life so I rowed over to a shallow spot in order to get out of the boat to revive the fish.

After about 10 minutes the fish didn’t seem to be any more alive, although it occasionally kicked or worked its mouth open and closed. I couldn’t see myself mounting a fish I didn’t catch and I don’t have a fly shop to put it on display so I simply decided to leave the fish in the water. As I started to leave I thought to measure the fish and get some photos.

I don’t carry a tape measure in the boat since I have the ruler decal. I grabbed a spool of tippet and pulled a length of line from the brown trout’s nose to tail and clipped it off. I did the same to get a girth just behind the pectoral fins.

I reviewed the photos I had taken of the fish and knew that even with a net and my foot in the picture and knew that the true size of the fish couldn’t be appreciated from those images. I asked Gary to pop a few pictures of me holding the fish.

In the back of my mind I was guessing that the brown was about 28″. We’ve hooked and landed some beasts from the Clinch over the years but all were 26″ or less. I’m aware of at least one fish that a fly fisher caught on a streamer that was 28″. We hear the 30″ number tossed around every so often, but that’s a bigger trout than most people realize. One of our regular customers has fished Tierra del Fuego for sea run browns and has assured us that 30″ is a lot of fish.

I measured the two pieces of tippet and was floored by the size. The brown trout was 34″ and had a 19″ girth. Truly an impressive trout anywhere you go. Even more when you consider this is a resident fish, not a lake or ocean run fish.

I ran into TWRA cold water fisheries biologist Jim Habera a few days later and showed him the pictures. Jim has handled some big trout while shocking tailwaters here in Tennessee and he laid down an educated guess that the brown trout weighed about 20 pounds. The current state record here in Tennessee is 28 pounds from the Clinch River.

The fish was in good shape and didn’t show any injuries so I asked Jim if he had an opinion as to why the fish was dying. His opinion mirrored mine. A fish has to die some time of something and it looks like this one died of old age. Jim told me that a fish of this size would almost have to be 8 years old but could easily be older.

Brown trout like this one are exceptionally rare, but there are certainly other fish out there in this size range. The Clinch and South Holston Rivers are the most likely suspects along with the Cumberland River in Kentucky, but the Caney Fork in Middle Tennessee is a dark horse that could produce a fish like this or will some time in the future. We know of one fly fisher who landed a 30″ brown trout on the Watauga a few years back so it’s not a stretch to consider that river either.

It’s been too long since I’ve posted a report and the reason is because we’ve been fishing so much. Fishing in the Smokies, fishing on the tailwaters, fishing for smallmouth. You name it, we’ve done it over the past two weeks.

The drift boat has seen plenty of use over the past few weeks when we haven't been fishing in the Smokies.

Smoky Mountains

Water levels have come down to where you’d expect them to be in late July. However, we have much more water than we did in 2007 or 2008 and things are where they’re supposed to be. In fact, cooler than average temperatures have kept things fishing well. Water temperature at Elkmont yesterday morning was 62 so things are picture perfect.

It’s terrestrial time! We have a thing for ant patterns so that’s what we’ve focused on most, but beetles are also pretty good. Use these patterns during sunny weather. They aren’t near so effective on cloudy or rainy days.

Backcountry streams are really fishing quite well. There are too many to mention, so just pick a blue line on the map and head for the water.

Tailwaters

We’ve been on three tailwaters in less than two weeks time. Generation schedules are really a day to day thing right now with very little in the way of consistency outside of the Watauga and Hiwassee.

The Clinch is fishing pretty good when the water’s right. As usual, bring your midges and small beadheads.

We fished the South Holston for several days when we went to the South Holston Fly Fishing Festival. Sulphurs were hatching, but there were more bugs than rising trout. We caught enough fish to have fun, but seriously, there were excellent hatches every day we fished and only a few fish were looking up.

This 19" brown ate a midge pupa on the Holston

The Holston is still fishing, but the schedules are far more challenging than the trout. Midges are the scene.

Smallmouth

Now is the time to try fly fishing for smallmouth bass if you haven’t done it. Fish are taking poppers or small streamers in most streams. Little River from Townsend on downstream towards Maryville is really fishing good.

Chunky smallmouth bass with take poppers are small streamers in a variety of East Tennessee rivers and streams

Another overlooked stream is Abrams Creek in Happy Valley. While Abrams is always thought of as a trout stream (it’s a damn good one) it’s also a great smallmouth stream on the lower end. It fished great a few days back.

The Pigeon and Holston Rivers are two more of our favorites and be sure to hit the Nolichucky if it’s not too far for you.

The big news is that the drought is officially over. In fact, we’re
currently running a rainfall surplus here in East Tennessee. This has not
only brought our stream levels back to normal, but also has implications for
fly fishing on the tailwaters.

Smoky Mountain Streams

Spring hatches started strong with Quill Gordon mayflies in the Smokies and
midges on the Holston, so the fishing was excellent. We’ve covered a lot of
water in the past three months. In the Smokies we’ve covered nearly every
inch of Little River from the Three Forks in the backcountry to the Townsend
Y. Greenbrier has fished well along with the West Prong of the Little Pigeon
River from the Sugarlands to the Chimneys.

Quill Gordon photographed by Julie Tallman on a North Carolina stream

Brook trout fishing started a little slow since we had a cool spring, but
that has come along nicely everywhere from Sam’s Creek to Road Prong.

Some of our best days have been on the Carolina side of the park. Our Hazel
Creek Creek camp was the best we’ve ever done. The weather was fantastic and
water levels were great. Dry fly fishing was a little slower than we
expected, but the nymph fishing was superb.

The Oconaluftee system has also fished well. We’ve seen some excellent dry
fly fishing on the the ‘Luftee as well as Bradley Fork.

Tailwater Rivers

Water levels were tough on many of the tailwaters this spring, but we didn’t
notice because the Holston was in such great shape. Fortunately our home
tailwater fished well and we didn’t realize most other rivers in the region
were blown out.

The Holston River was our primary float this spring

Recently our biggest problem has been trying to choose between the Clinch
and the Holston. Many anglers remember the glory days of the Clinch when
trout were abundant and big fish were common. We’re confident that those
days are back!

Trout have been everywhere in the Clinch since last fall. Most fish are in
the 9″-12″ range, but we’re hooking up good numbers of 14″-16″ trout as
well. We’ve even seen some good Sulphur hatches with rising trout. Perhaps
one of the most memorable moments of the season was when we saw a 18″ brown
trout’s tonsils as he slowly rose to a dry on the Clinch. Unfortunately that
fish broke off on the second jump, but what a sight!

Fish like this are starting to show up regularly on the Clinch once again

Summer Fly Fishing Forecast

Mountain Streams

We seem to have a good pattern of afternoon thunderstorms in the mountains
right now and long range forecasts seem to show us in a “normal” summer
weather pattern. Normal summer weather in the Smokies includes pop up
thunderstorms. This is the best weather to have in June, July, and August as
the stream levels should remain quite good. Be sure to keep a light rain
jacket handy.

This is the time year when we begin to frequent brook trout streams. Most of
these require some kind of hike, but the resulting solitude is worth it.
Keep a fly box full of #14 Parachute Adams, Stimulators, and Thunderheads.
They’re always a hit with the specks.

Head to the higher elevations in the Smokies for colorful specks

Lower elevation streams like Little River and Abrams Creek should fish
better this summer than they have in several years. Nymphs fished riffles
and pockets should produce quite well, but don’t neglect terrestrial
patterns. The Elkmont Ant is our favorite terrestrial but inch worm patterns
are a favorite with many local anglers.

Tailwaters

The increased rainfall may make favorable tailwater flows a bit tougher to
come by over the summer. All of TVA’s reservoirs are full or even slightly more than full. With the long term forecast pointing to a normal, wet season TVA will have to generate to keep the lakes from getting too high. The hot summer months are also the time when power generation from area dams is crucial to meet the power demands caused by all of our air conditioning units.

Wading anglers will certainly have to keep a close eye on the schedules, but the Clinch and Watauga Rivers both have scheduling that anglers can rely on. The Clinch has a “recreational” schedule on weekends that considers fishermen.

Those fishing from boats will have more opportunities. The Clinch is often fishable from a boat when it can’t be waded. The South Holston should also have some excellent float schedules over the summer. The Hiwassee is best fished from a boat in the summer, but only those with experience on the river should attempt to row it in a drift boat. Personal pontoons can provide some excellent access to wadeable spots on this swift river.

Only experienced oarsmen should attempt to float the Hiwassee

Smallmouth Bass

River smallies are the forgotten gamefish in the Southeast. Most river fishermen chase trout and the average bass fisherman heads to an area lake, so smallmouth bass in rivers and streams are rarely fished. This is a huge mistake in our opinion since East Tennessee has some of the finest smallmouth rivers and streams in the country.

Many fly fishers live closer to the fish than they do trout. Even better, they are often active in the hottest months when the action on many trout streams slows down.

This Pigeon River smallmouth ate a popper and put up a spectacular fight.

The Pigeon and Nolichucky Rivers in East Tennessee are both standouts with good access, excellent fishing, and plenty of opportunities for wading or floating. The Tuckaseegee, Little Tennessee, and French Broad in Western North Carolina also provide superb opportunities for these hard fighting game fish.

You probably already have the gear you need to fish for smallmouth in rivers and streams. While a 6 or 7 weight fly rod is ideal, you can easily get on some fish with a 5 weight. Poppers are our favorite, but streamers also attract bass.

The Scenery

Abrams Creek on a snowy day last January

Misty spring day on Newfound Gap Road

Daffodils at Elkmont in March

Rhododendron blooms on a remote brook trout stream

Rainbow over Rich Mountain, Townsend, TN

The Fish from 2008

A Little River brown trout fooled by a Haystack

A native brook trout miles from the trailhead

A rainbow trout feeds in the current in a Smokies stream

Charity with a 18″ Hazel Creek brown trout

John Switow shows a beautiful rainbow that he caught on a caddis emerger on the Holston

A nice Holston brown trout caught by Chad Plumly last May

A family float on the Holston

A smallmouth bass from the Pigeon River

A different view of a Smokies rainbow trout

Underwater view of a Smoky Mountain brook trout

The rare big brown trout landed on Little River

Another very nice Little River brown trout

A rainbow rises to an emerging caddis on the Holston River

The Wildlife

A bull elk along the Oconaluftee River near Cherokee, NC

 A bull elk in Cataloochee Valley

Ruffed Grouse along Little River

River otter in Little River

River otters on Calderwood Lake

Bear tracks at the mouth of Hazel Creek

Black bear eating cherries in Cades Cove

This timber rattler was sunning along the trail up Fish Camp Prong

It’s always the same every fall. September is a period of relatively light guiding as the kids are back in school, football starts up, summer’s heat hasn’t quite dissipated and fall color is still about a month away. That’s why we go to Yellowstone country in September. The weather’s still nice and we’re not missing much while we’re gone.

We come back to one of the busiest guide months of the year in Tennessee; October with colorful fall foliage, cool mornings, and trout rising to olives in the Smokies. It’s a great month to be on the water but we’re all worn out by the end of the month. This year I had a four day camping trip on Hazel Creek sandwiched on both sides by float trips on the Clinch River. October wears us out but we’re always ready to hit the water because the fishing is so good.

November is always different from one year to the next. Sometimes the fall color arrives a bit late and it’s a colorful month. Other years (like this one) winter arrives early and it’s cold. Regardless of the weather, anglers are eager to get one last trip in while the weather is still reasonably good.

Thanksgiving week is always a busy one and we’ve gotten into the habit of staying home for the holiday since we always seem to have trips the days before and after. This year was no different.

All the guides we regularly see on Little River were out as well. Saturday was a tough day in spite of mild weather conditions. It was the first morning in some time that was free of frost and temperatures were in the high 50′s. We all expected it to be a great day for fly fishing in the Smokies. Well… It was a good day for fishing, but not so hot for catching. That was the general consensus among all the guides. Fishing nymphs deep only yielded a modest number of strikes and there wasn’t much reason to fish a dry fly unless you just liked to watch it drift. I’m guessing that melting snow from the higher elevations knocked water temps down enough to put the fish off. The guage near the Townsend Y showed water in the high 40′s, but it was much cooler around Elkmont.

Nice way to round out the season!

Charity seemed to have to single bright spot from Saturday. One of her anglers caught a beautiful brown that taped out at 14″.  Whenever asked what the fish ate Charity will sigh, “Prince Nymph…” like you should know all good autumn fish caught in the Smokies eat nothing else.

The tailwaters have been really fishing quite well. In fact, I’ve been quite impressed with the Holston lately. Good hatches of midges along with a smattering of olives and caddis have kept fish looking up. The Clinch is still fishing good, but maybe not quite as good as it was a month ago. We’re thrilled to see the Clinch coming back around. The past few years were tough so it’s nice to see our old friend fishing good again.

We’ve got plenty of things to keep us busy. We’re rounding out a couple of new books we’ve been working on. One is a guide to the previously closed brook trout streams in the Smokies. Think of it as an addition to Angler’s Companion since those streams were closed to fishing when that book came out. The second book covers fly fishing with streamers. This is one of our favorite ways to fish and we’re aware that the methods for fishing with streamers are poorly understood.

We plan on doing some fishing for ourselves plus we’ll do some more guided trips as well. The park should have some good fishing in the afternoons as the winter progresses. The Tuckaseegee, Clinch, and Holston Rivers always fish pretty good in the winter and we even float them through the winter.

Stay warm and fish when you can!

We’ve had some good fishing though. Charity and I spent a day fishing on Little River a few days back. We agreed that we would spend the day headhunting, moving from spot to spot and looking for big brown trout to cast at. Early November is a great time for this as post-spawn browns are extremely active and can be found feeding in the tails of pools or shallow riffles. This can be a tough program to stick with if you see plenty of other feeding fish, but we stayed true and didn’t fish as much as we looked and lurked about the stream.

This is an extremely slow method of fishing for anyone accustomed to constantly casting. We’ll spend far more time moving and looking than actually fishing. Often one of us has to watch from another vantage point and direct the angler since their view might not be clear because of glare. I caught this 16″ brown trout from the tail of a pool on Little River. The fish was moving about quite a bit in about 18″ of water so I changed from a big nymph to a #16 Pheasant Tail. The fly landed about two feet up and to the right of the fish and he ate it like a champ. Charity yelled down that he ate but I was already bringing the rod tight. This wasn’t the largest fish we cast to, but the only one we got a hook in.

Charity spotted this hellbender. She initially thought it was a brown trout wedged in a crack in the rocks, but quickly recognized it for what it was. Most folks are unaware of hellbenders and very few ever see one. I’ve often told anglers about them, but usually get skeptical looks in response. You can learn more about hellbenders here. I’ve included this like since I’m sure many think I’m pulling their leg. I get that all the time with fishing spiders too, but they’re real.  Fact is stranger than fiction as my grandmother used to say.

Hellbenders are the largest species of salamander in the world and actually common in the Smokies. However, their camouflaged appearance, slow moving nature, and propensity for hiding in dark spots along streams make them hard to find.

The hoop on this net is 18″ long so you can tell the salamander is a little bigger than that.  While this one was a pretty good one, they grow larger.