Friday, January 15, 2016

Smokies Trout Run


Asher and I made a run for the higher hills a couple of days ago to see if the trout wanted to play. To our delight, the wild fish in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park seem to be digging this winter's high water, and they were pretty active. We didn't catch oodles of fish, but be we had a nice amount of activity and caught some really pretty wild brown trout.

Naturally, the big one got away. I hooked a surprisingly big rainbow in park waters and had it on the surface and within a few inches of hand's reach when the hook came free. It was a rouge-banded, 15- or 16-inch, thick bodied male that even had somewhat of a hook jaw.

Because of a mix of photos I wanted to get, it was somewhat of a sampler day. We briefly hit a couple of sections of the Tuckasegee River, including a new delayed harvest stretch I hadn't looked at yet, and two different streams in the national park. That kept us from fishing anywhere as long as would have been ideal, but at least we were fishing.

I say "we" caught fish, but in truth Asher did most of the catching. I caught one fish, which took a Rebel Hellgrammite. Asher caught all his fish on a Rebel Tracdown Ghost Minnow. All our lures were rigged with single barbless hooks.



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