It’s been a tough weather pattern lately. For the better part of a month the water has been fishable but the weather has been brutally cold or the weather has been mild and the water has been pretty high or outright unfishable. We’ll just say it… It’s pretty damn frustrating! In a move only the […]
More Water Than We Expected
We really did expect the water to be high today but what we anticipated would be decent for stripping streamers in selected spots. As it turns out there was much more water than that! There was up to 2″ of rain on the tops of the mountains that fell on top of several inches of […]
A Good Thing: It’s Warming Up
After this last week’s Arctic blast it’s good to see that it’s warming up. The forecast is calling for some rain and that will only help to warm stream temperatures even further and melt any remaining snow on the slopes and peaks of the Smokies and surrounding mountain ranges. Don’t get over excited. This doesn’t […]
Video Clip: Bald River Falls Frozen
Anyone familiar with the Smoky Mountain region and Cherokee National Forest around the Tellico River basin is probably familiar with Bald River Falls. It’s easily one of the most impressive sights in East Tennessee and even better, it’s solidly in trout country. This past week there was a rare sight, the falls iced up and […]
Snow and Ice in the Smoky Mountains
Just like many other areas of the country we’ve seen freezing weather and some snow in the Smoky Mountains this week. We didn’t get all that much snow but the cold hit immediately after some rain that created a sheet of ice over all the roads that later became covered with snow. I know folks […]
Fly Fishing in the Bitter Cold
Here in East Tennessee we’re in the middle of what is the coldest weather we’ve seen since 1996. We’ve had plenty of cold weather since then, just haven’t hit the lowest point on the thermometer since then. The winter of early 2010 was pretty cold and we can remember snow staying on the mountains for […]
A milestone in Smoky Mountain trout fisheries
This week marks a milestone in Smoky Mountain trout fisheries. Steve Moore, the head fisheries biologist at Great Smoky Mountains National Park, will be retiring from his post. His impact on the fishery, relations with anglers, and regulations shouldn’t be underestimated. Steve’s biggest impact was to bring hard science to the fisheries management. Previous management […]
2014 Starts Out Wet & Cold Across East Tennessee & the Smoky Mountains
As I sit down to write this Townsend, TN is under a winter storm warning through tomorrow morning. Right now it’s raining but we awoke this morning to the gentle tap of sleet outside. The Smokies are forecast to receive several inches of snow as temperatures fall late this afternoon through the night. All I […]
We Take a Look Back at 2013
We’ll always remember 2013, but probably won’t look back at it so fondly as we do other years. We’ll always remember the severe drought of 2007 and the way it stretched a bit into 2008, but those years weren’t so tough as 2013. Without a doubt 2013 was the toughest we’ve seen in our eleven […]
Video Retrospective of Great Smoky Mountains National Park in 2013
Here’s another great video from the Great Smoky Mountains Association filled with stunning time lapse images from the Smokies coupled with local events from 2013. Flooding rains, tornadoes, the government shutdown, brilliant fall colors, and snowfalls are all covered. [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MTsZwRkZbgM&feature=sharecontrol&list=UUGgSN2xOftPusuRNvpnVLaA[/youtube]