Thanksgiving weekend has come and gone and the guide season left with it. It’s snowing pretty hard right now in Townsend, but nothing’s sticking. Regardless it’s a strong reminder that the guide season is essentially over. It’s always the same every fall. September is a period of relatively light guiding as the kids are back […]
Adventures on Guides’ Day Off; Rare Wildlife Sighting
We’ve had our usual slow down in guiding in mid-November. This has had us scrambling to get as much fishing in as possible while the weather is still pretty good. That may be up for debate as we’re looking at a week of weather that sure looks like it’s winter. Newfound Gap Road was closed […]
What a Week! You Should’ve Been There
It’s been an eventful week of fly fishing and guiding here in the Smokies and on the Clinch River in east Tennessee. Fall provides the best chances to put a fly on big brown trout and this was the week. I caught this fish on Little River this week The weather, fall colors, and fly […]
First Snow in the Smokies, Great Dry Fly Fishing, & Good Fishing Continues on the Clinch
We’ve been on the water almost every day which is why we haven’t posted a report in a while. East Tennessee and the Smoky Mountains have reached peak fall color and the fly fishing has been great for the most part. There was a lull in the fishing earlier this week after the first snowfall […]
Clinch River Continues to Fish; Report from Hazel Creek in the Smokies
We’re in the middle of our busy October guide season. The weather has been beautiful and the leaves have really started to change rapidly this week. Water conditions have remained low in the Smokies, but some rain early last Friday helped things out and more rain is in the forecast for this week. The fly […]
Clinch River Fishing Well; Trout Rising to Olives in the Smokies
We’ve floated the Clinch a few times this week and it has been fishing very well. Both generators are down at Norris Dam and TVA is sluicing a steady flow of 420 cfs. That is, they have a gate cracked to keep a steady flow. The result has been great for fishing. While water is […]
Rain will improve Smoky Mountain stream levels; Black bears on the move
Rain is currently falling in the Smokies and this will only improve the fly fishing in the mountains of East Tennessee and Western North Carolina. While water levels have been low, temperatures have been excellent and trout have been feeding quite well. In past week we’ve had guided trips on Little River and the Greenbrier […]
Fall fishing is here!
We’re back home from the Rockies, but the weather is virtually the same as what we left in Montana and Idaho. Overnight temperatures have been down in the 30’s up in the Smokies with the highest peaks falling into the 20’s. Daytime temperatures are in the high 60’s or low 70’s so it’s the perfect […]
Dry & Cool on the Stream plus Update from Yellowstone
Conditions are dry but relatively cool across the Smoky Mountain region of East Tennessee and Western North Carolina. Fly fishing will be best on the Tennessee side of the Smokies and on the tailwaters. Cataloochee is at or near record low flows right now. The Oconaluftee is a little better, but still quite low. Little […]
Fly Fishing in Cataloochee Valley and Upper Little River; Last Chance to Fish on Lynn Camp Prong
We’ve had a few personal days to do some fly fishing here in the Smoky Mountains of Tennessee and North Carolina. First, I took a hike well upstream of Elkmont to fish upper Little River well above Fish Camp Prong. This is the area where Meigs Post Prong enters the stream and brook trout start […]