South Holston River Fly Fishing 2.1.10
Feb 4th
February 1, 2010
The spawning areas that have been closed for several months are back open for fishing. We and put the hyde in the water around 9am. We had great expectations for the fishing. The fishing proved to be very good. The fish in the newly opened water were very hungry and acted as though they hadn’t seen a fly before. The morning was very cold in the 20’s with wind. We fished nymphs down to the cul da sac with good numbers. As the sun heated the water as expected the blue wing olives began to pop. Like clockwork the fish began to rise to the emerging duns. There is just nothing like dry fly fishing on the first of february with no one else around. This river is most definately one of the best trout fisheries in the South East. Where else can you think of can you go catch wild trout on a dry fly in the dead middle of winter. If you have not fished the South Holston River before you have got to get up here soon and take a trip. You just don’t know what you’re missing. As you’ll see in the video it’s the ones that you don’t catch that you know are trophy fish that just keep bringing you back.
Jan 23-24 Team Practice/ Tuckaseegee River
Feb 4th
January 23- Headed down to Bryson City, NC for a casting clinic with North Carolina Fly Fishing Team Member Mac Brown. Mac is not only a team member but a FFF Certified Casting Instructor. Mac showed us some techniques for target casting in windy conditions as well as did some refining in distance casting techniques as well. If you ever have they opportunity for a session with Mac, he comes highly recommended from all of us on the team. We had taken the hyde down with us in tow to hopefully get some fishing in during the weekend after practice. We had gone down with hopes of evading the rains that had pounded East Tennessee as well. After a great practice with Mac and the team we decided to get in an afternoon float on the lower Tuckaseegee. The lower tuck is more of a Warm Water fishery with many smallmouths and some trout. The coming storm had effect on the fishing, but it was still good to get out. We had some follows on streamers but the fish just were not cooperating.
January 24th
We woke up trying to decide weather to chance the float or not with flash flood warnings that the night rains brought. After checking the weather and having breakfast, we headed out to float the upper Tuck Delayed Harvest Water. We met up with a larger group of guys floating, a few North Carolina Team members. Paul Bourcq was taking some clients down the river for a fundraiser trip. Fishing started off somewhat slow, but we were fishing behind the team guys so fishing behind them is going to be tough on anyone. Once we got the rigs and the depth figured out we began catching fish with regularity. The fishing was steady for the next several hours. We caught quite a few fish just not the size of fish we were expecting to be fishing a D.H. water. The rig that proved to be the most effective was a dead drifted white wooly bugger with a nymph dropper. White just seemed to be the color of the day. When rains came in and the river started to rise and the water clarity became murky. At that point the fishing had slowed and we still had a long drive home so we rowed out and called it a day. This is definately a river we’ll be floating again. We’ll look forward to exploring more of the tuck as we come into the early summer.
New R.L. Winston Website
Jan 29th
We thought with the coming snow you might be poking around online.
Check out R.L. Winston Website with a new design. There is just no other rods that cast as nicely as a Winston Biix in my opinion.
Josh McFadden-Guide
423.367.8618
guide@hatchhunters.com
1.17.10 Dry Fly Fishing Watauga River Part.
Jan 21st
1.17.10 Watauga River Fly Fishing Report Part ii. This report had been in the works for a few days trying to get the video put together. You can see that we we’re dealing with some ice melt temperature water. A very larger chuck of ice fell down not 20 foot from the boat above the caddis riffle while we we’re there. Fish in the first part of the float were kind of slow going. We did pick up fish on some nymphs and streamers. The fish were for the most part hugging the bottom of the river. We did get into a hatch of smaller blue wing olives and some midges which you can see from the footage. We’ll be heading down to fish the Tuck this weekend with the North Carolina Fly Fishing Team and we’ll report back on that trip as well. We have updated several pages so take a look around. The fly tying page has some patterns. Maybe something to think about for your winter tying. We’re very pleased with the new hyde and look forward to taking you down the river in it soon. We’ve added twitter to the site so you can follow our posts here on twitter as well.
Josh McFadden- Guide
The new HYDE
Jan 11th
Ran across a great deal on a signature series Hyde drift boat. Thanks to a great friend its all mine! This is the cadillac of the river boat world, and after a coat of wax this thing is gorgeous! With its light weight, low sides and G4 bottom hunting hatches and sneaking up on fish anywhere on the river will not be problem!! There will be many more reports from this boat to come so stay tuned. For a wade or float trip on the South Holston or Watauga rivers, give us a call.
Upgrading for the New Year
Jan 9th
We’ll be going through some upgrades for the new year so this is our temporary home while we get everything set up and going.
The fishing on South Holston has been very good this past week. Very cold but very good. TVA has been giving us all kinds of water to float. Kevin and myself floated twice this week. And I was able to get out and do some wade fishing last weekend when they cut the wheels off. It’s been all about deep nymph rigs with the wheels on. Fish have been very receptive to nymphs and scuds. Matt tagged along with us the first afternoon and caught several good fish.
Matt's 21in Brown
Kevin's Brown
Pretty Rainbow
Healthy Brown
Kevin took out the thermometer when the temps started heading south and it was 17 degrees with the wind blowing. There was only two other boats out on the water in those two days. These fish are really strong and hungry now post spawn. When the sun manages to pop out just that quickly the blue wings pop out so. So layer up and let’s go do it.
Josh McFadden-Guide
423.367.8618
