Sunrise over the world headquarter of R & R Fly Fishing in the Smokies. That's the silhouette of Mount Leconte in the distance.

We can sum up the fishing pretty quickly – It’s excellent where ever you go right now. We’re glad to report that because our guide season really cranked up. We’ll have multiple guides on the water several days this week. Our wading boots and drift boat oars will both get a work out.

The recent warm up has the trout in the Smokies feeding really well now. Over the past few days we’ve seen a little bit of a slump in the dry fly fishing. It really had no where to go but down after a couple of weeks of good Quill Gordon hatches, but fish will certainly eat a nymph if you can’t get them to rise.

Miles Duncan of Knoxville shows off his first trout in the Smoky Mountains

It’s gotten to the point where we would even recommend fishing the backcountry and higher elevation brook trout streams. In fact, it will be downright hot a few days this week. The leaves haven’t sprouted on most trees yet so there’s no shade from the warm 80 degree temperatures we’ll see this week.

If you’re more of a tailwater angler, TVA has the schedule for you! Conditions are perfect for wading on the Hiwassee, Clinch, Holston, and Watauga. South Holston Dam is sluicing about 500 cfs right now while the generator is undergoing maintenance, but locals should easily find a few places to wade and the increased flow should make the trout less picky.

Keep an eye on the schedule on the Clinch. While there will always be somewhere to wade, there might be a few spots too high to wade during short periods of generation. Midges are still the main attraction, but fish #16-18 Beadhead Pheasant Tail Nymphs to imitate Sulphur nymphs. The Sulphur hatch isn’t that far away.

The real sleeper could be the Hiwassee. We haven’t made it down there this season, but we’re hearing excellent reports of caddis hatches and good dry fly fishing. Fish #16-18 Elk Hair caddis patterns or similar size beadhead nymphs.

The Smokies

The bugs are really hatching now and the fishing are rising to meet them. I saw the first really good hatch of Quill Gordons on Little River yesterday. It was obviously one of the first days of strong hatches because there were no birds perched along the stream to grab mayflies the trout missed. We usually see crested fly catchers and cedar waxwings fluttering over the streams or even waiting in anticipation.

Ray and Connie Jones both caught their first trout on dry flies on Little River yesterday. They have caught fish on nymphs and streamers, but never on dry flies until yesterday. After seeing fish rise to Quill Gordons for better than an hour I thought Ray might just explode from the sheer excitement. I think I’ve converted another one to dry fly fishing!

Tailwaters

I floated the Holston last Sunday and the Clinch on Monday. The weather was wet and cold on the Holston, but a thick midge hatch kept the fish near the surface. In spite of this we brought the streamers out on both rivers.

This brown ate a Woolly Bugger but we brought out the big streamers late in the day. Tim Masincupp hooked and lost a true beast, but small midge pupa patterns won the prize for consistency. Cherokee Dam hasn’t had the best generation schedule this week, but expect that to improve soon.

Mike Sikes caught several very nice rainbows on the Clinch. This river fished very good last year and I think I’m prepared to say the Clinch is back! The average size of fish is excellent right now and all are very strong.

The best way to describe the fishing on the Clinch was “streaky”. There were long periods of non-activity throughout the day that were broken up by periods of several good hook ups. It seemed like the unsettled weather had an effect on the midge hatch. I’m sure it was no coincidence that the fish were the most active when midges were also the most active.

Great water levels are keeping the water cool and the trout happy

Water levels are well within fishable, but look much more like April than August. Here on the Tennessee side of the Smokies Tremont is fishing really well. I’ve been fishing nymphs about three feet under a yarn indicator, but dry flies will tempt plenty of fish. Just be sure to cast dries to spots that aren’t more than three feet deep for the best success.

Little River along the road is fishing much better than it usually does in August,  but it’s still the most difficult fishing to be found in the park right now. It’s unusual to shake me up, but I almost fell over yesterday when a brown trout in the 4-5 pound range appeared in a shallow riffle and nosed my indicator yarn. I continued to nymph the run with a rubber leg Tellico Nymph then followed that up with a streamer. No dice, but I know where that one lives.

The Clinch River continues to be the best bet for a tailwater in our neck of the state. Generation schedules have been great all week. Anglers can fish near the dam until well after lunch time or wade around Clinton all day long. The Sulphurs are long past gone so focus your efforts on nymphing. Small midge patterns like a Zebra Midge are the usual flies we rely on at this time of year. Some small black caddis could make an appearance, so a black Elk Caddis in #20 might come in handy, but it’s still a little early in the year.

A black bear returns to the berry patch near our house

We received a few comments about the bear we saw behind our house last weekend. He returned this morning for a second helping. So everyone knows, I’m using a 300 mm lens to take these photos which allows me to zoom in close without getting near the bear. We’re also observing him from the back deck on our house which is on the second floor and has no stairs down to the ground where the bear is.

Charity and I try to maintain this area over the winter by keeping pine sprouts down and keeping it open so blackberries, polk berries, and devil’s walking sticks will continue to grow. All of these produce berries that are eaten by a variety of birds, squirrels, deer, turkeys, and of course black bear.

The bear usually stays hidden in the brush. A long lens and a fast shutter speed allowed me to get this image.

We have been pleased to see that the bear remains somewhat skittish so we have to remain pretty quiet to watch him. It’s also a good sign that he’s in the berries. We never keep trash cans outside because of wildlife and this bear seems to prefer natural foods.

Our daughter Willow was thrilled to “eat breakfast with a bear” on the deck. The berries in her cereal were picked a while ago and came out of the freezer, but she giggled at the idea that she and a bear had the same thing for breakfast.

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.

It’s still raining here in East Tennessee, but don’t get me wrong. We’re not complaining. After two years of drought it’s great to see my home water looking like its old self. In fact, it looks like we’ll probably end up meeting the annual average rainfall total. The rain we’re getting is slow and soaking; just the thing to recharge the water table.

I drove up Little River yesterday. The river looked good, I haven’t gotten to go fishing in a little while, plus we’ve been working on books about – yes – fishing. I was getting shaky and there was only one thing to cure it. Charity was working on a side design project and grimaced as I headed out the door. She wanted to go at least as bad as I did, but… Well, let’s just say she acted more responsibly than I did and I ditched work to go fishing.

We’ve been getting our new book about streamers together and that had me itching to jerk some streamers through some select spots. High water conditions are excellent for fishing streamers in the Smokies. The fish react best when the water has a little bit of color, but Little River was crystal clear. The fish were all over it!

I had about 15 fish swat or slash at the fly in about 2 hours. I didn’t get any of them to hand, but you could say I was fishing a fly that showed an optimistic attitude. Only the most suicidal of trout less the 12″ would have been able to get the streamer in their mouth. I moved 2 browns that were better than that. One got nicked by the fly, the second charged it but stopped short. I feel positive it broke off the attack because it saw me.

This streak of wet weather has Norris Dam generating a good deal of water so fishing it pretty much out of the question on the Clinch. However, there are some windows of opportunity on the Holston and the South Holston has the best schedules for wading.

I caught this fish on Little River this week

The weather, fall colors, and fly fishing were absolutely spectacular this week. Charity and I each guided Lewis Raker from Michigan this week. He fishes all over the country but was impressed by the fly fishing here in east Tennessee. He caught a number of nice trout on Little River with Charity. The next day I floated him on the Clinch River and he caught plenty really nice fish. In fact, he caught fish on dry flies which is extremely rare. We’re seeing some tiny black caddis on the Clinch and they’re bringing fish up to the surface. Pam and Buddy Leach also caught some nice trout on caddis dry flies on the Clinch last week.

I guided Lew Raker on Little River on his third day of fishing here and it was a good one. Fish were rising to dries all day. At one point we saw a large brown trout of at least 18″ rise but didn’t get a fly on it. Later in the afternoon I spotted a huge fish in shallow riffle water. I re-rigged Lew’s rod but he insisted I cast to the trout. I refused but Lew said that my excitement over the big fish that morning made him realize that we don’t see many in the Smokies. True, but he still should cast to the fish. Again he refused and said he’d like see how I’d handle the situation.

I cast a lightly weighted Woolly Bugger to the fish and it ate immediately. It was as long as my arm, fingertips to my shoulder, approximately 24″. Lew was as happy as I was, and believe me, that’s pretty happy!

The very next day I took Andy Cross of South Carolina on a walk-in trip up Little River upstream of Elkmont. Andy had a great day hooking rainbow and brown trout on dry flies. After lunch I spotted a nice brown in shallow water and tied on another Bugger based on the experience from the previous day. I gave Andy a quick pep talk about where to cast the fly and what to expect if the fish ate. He made one cast that was a bit too far right and the fly hung up in shallow water. I advised him to tighten up slowly to free the fly and hopefully not spook the fish. Some tension on the line freed the fly and it was pulled into the current. The brown streaked across the riffle and inhaled the fly. Andy got a good hook set and the fish went ballistic!

There was about 60 seconds of absolute chaos but Andy hung on and I was able to tail the fish and land it for him. It had a nice hook jaw and measured from my fingertips to the bend of my elbow, right at 18″. It was a beautiful fish, bright orange with radiant red spots. I had a telephoto lens in my bag but no camera. Andy left his camera in the car. Oh well… Neither of us will forget it.

For the past two days we guided Alex Skallon Sr. and Jr. on Little River. I put them over a massive brown late in the day. Alex Jr. cast to the fish for about 15 minutes, but didn’t get a take. Charity put them over three good fish today and young Alex had one give his fly a close inspection but didn’t eat. Whew! Talk about sweating bullets.

We’ve got a few free days to fish this week and plan to try to get on some of the fish. The weather is forecast to be cool and rainy this week; perfect brown trout weather. We’ll keep you posted if we hook up!

Dry fly fishing has been nothing short of excellent over the past few days. Midges, Blue Wing Olives, and a variety of small caddis have kept the trout looking to the surface. The best fishing has been in the middle of the day, but we’re still getting fish up in the morning and late afternoon.

Late afternoon on the Clinch

While Tim and Charity have spent most of their time in the Smokies I spent most of the week floating the Clinch River. The Clinch has been surprisingly consistent. Most of the trout we’re catching have been less than a foot long, but we’re still getting a few to the net in the range of 14 – 18″.

There has been a pretty even distribution of rainbows, browns, and brook trout. Most of the sizeable trout have been rainbows, but Ben Shawler landed a 18″ brown this week. I’d like to take this opportunity to openly taunt Tom Chandler of Trout Underground. Tom is a brook trout fanatic and often wonders if I’m taunting him when I post photos of brookies. Most of the brook trout have been in the 10″ range, but a few are a little better. They aren’t the biggest fish in the river, but they’re cooperative and it’s fun to catch them on a big river from a drift boat.

A standard issue brook trout from the Clinch

We’ve also seen a little bit of dry fly fishing on the Clinch. Most of the fish are coming on midge pupa or small beadhead nymphs fished under a strike indicator. Some small black caddis are hatching late in the afternoon and we’ve been able to pick up some fish on #18 emerger patterns.

The weather forecast looks good for the next few weeks and the fishing usually holds up through the end of the month. After that it’s anyone’s guess when the cold weather will set in, so get out on the water while the getting is good.

A chunky rainbow from the Clinch

A colorful Clinch River rainbow trout caught last week

The Clinch has been fishing quite well this fall. I hate to act surprised, but this once remarkable tailwater has been on the slide for the past several years. While most of the trout we’ve been hooking have been less than 12″ long, each and every one is colorful and strong. There have also been a number of fish hooked up to around 16″ or so. We’re hoping that the slot limit imposed by TWRA earlier this year will continue to help bring this fishery back to its former glory days. We’ve also seen some of the huge brown trout that contributed to the river’s reputation for big fish. A couple of those browns were easily in the 8 -10 pound range.

We’ve been sticking with small beadhead nymphs in #16 – 20. Trout have been rising to midges and a small pupa pattern fished about 12″ – 18″ under an indicator or dry fly will hook far more fish than a dry fly.

Both turbines were down on Norris Dam for a couple of weeks. The constant flow of 420 cfs was superb for floats or wade fishing. One of the generators is now back on line so you can expect the typical day to day variation in flows, but expect good flows for wading. Those who want to float will need to keep an eye on the schedule to be sure the river isn’t too low.

Hazel Creek

Last weekend I was on Hazel Creek for our semi-annual fly fishing camp out. We had a fun group of folks and had a great time. I’m considering changing the name of this trip to “Smoky Mountain Drought Busters” since we always get some rain whenever we’ve done this trip. Fortunately the rain was short lived and seemed to bring on a decent hatch of Blue Wing Olives.

Bear tracks along the banks of Fontana Lake at the mouth of Hazel Creek

Wildlife on Hazel Creek was quite active. Members of the group saw about every large mammal in the Smokies. For bears were seen as well of tracks of a couple more. Deer, turkeys, and wild boar were also seen along the stream.  Both rainbow trout and brown trout were caught by our party. Water levels were low and fishing was a bit more difficult than we like to see it in the fall, but the fishing was still good enough for everyone to hook up with some fish. We’re looking forward to our next trip in the spring.