Figuring Out Trout & Smallmouths

The trout in Dry Run Creek were tough customers today. With so many fish in such a s small stream, you'd think that catching them would be like shooting fish in a barrel. That's not the case, though. In fact, sometimes they get very finicky. That's especially true during the spring, when a lot of school groups visit this special "youth only" catch-and-release stream, and the fish get caught and released a lot!

Nathaniel had the stream to himself today, but the fish were wary, and he had to experiment with a variety of lures and presentations to figure out how to trigger strikes. Eventually, he figured out that a black Fuzz-E Grub was pretty tough for some fish to resist.

Tomorrow we'll be floating the Buffalo River with smallmouth bass as our primary targets, and we're already pondering what might work best. The river is notably higher than when I've fished it before, and it actually is on the rise and has a bit of color. The small baits and subtle colors that normally work well for me might go unnoticed by the bass.

 I sort of think that jerkbaits and crankbaits will produce better than soft-plastic offerings tomorrow, and that the best soft plastics will have opaque color pattens and lend themselves to fast presentations through ambush zones. I also think that picking the best locations will be critical as the smallmouths will be laying low but will be ready to ambush easy meals. The challenge, I think, will be making good presentations through key fish-holding areas.

Those are just guesses, though. I"ll have a much better idea once I'm on the section we will float, and hopefully the pattern will develop as the day progresses. Either way, I"ll pass along the report!

Low Water, High Expectations

My high hopes of finding the White River ripping died when I got to Gaston's today and found the river low and slow. However, they are running a couple of generators early each morning, so I'm hopeful that we'll have a couple of hours to throw Rogues in search of a big brown trout before switching to Watsit Grubs and Fuzz-E Grubs for a mix of rainbows and browns.
We'll talk to our guide in the morning, though, to see what will work best bases on current conditions. In truth, if I'm in a Gaston's johnboat on the White River I'm happy, no matter what the river and trout are doing.
Nathaniel and I aldo fished the pond and waded the river just a tiny bit upon arrival today and managed to catch a few bass and a rainbow. That was mostly for the sake of getting a little fishing out of our systems. Real fishing starts tomorrow. Reports will follow.

Trout Cooperated

Nathaniel and I spent a fun few hours knee deep in Amicalola Creek this afternoon. The trout were plentiful and cooperated well, with the bulk of them concentrated in deep runs with good current. The creek was low and clear so they didn't want anything too flashy. Nathaniel's best bait was a Rebel Teeny Wee Craw. I caught all my fish on Lindy Fuzz -E Grubs and Watsit Jigs. Back to writing fish stories tomorrow.

Smokies Rainbows -- Sort Of

While it's true that no trout have been stocked in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park for several decades, I have no doubt that the fish I caught in the park yesterday afternoon were products of a fish hatchery.

With the water low, the sun shining brightly and the fish in their mid-summer doldrums, we opted to fish lower Little River, where smallmouth bass and rock bass might also be options. No doubt the 11-inch rainbows that ate my Fuzz-E Grub were stockers that had moved upstream from Townsend, not that wild fish that better characterize trout fishing in the park. That was OK. They were fun to catch, and I did also manage one little smallmouth in a short afternoon outing.

We also fished higher in the hills, but I'll write more about that later.

Double Trouble

A double-up approach was the key to success for me during my last day of ice-fishing in South Dakota. More often than not, I wouldn't seeing anything when I first started fishing a hole, and if I used a silent approach, nothing would show up. I could call in the fish by working a Lindy Rattl'n Flyer Spoon pretty aggressively, but most fish weren't quite aggressive enough to take the spoon. Eventually I figured out that if I started with the spoon and could get some fish in the area, I could then pull it up and drop a Fuzz-E Grub in the same hole and usually catch the fish. Neither on it's own was quite doing the job. Together, they worked wonderfully.

Two Tremendous Days on the Niagara

I'm not sure how many hundreds of pounds of fish were caught and released in Frank Campbell's boat yesterday and today, but I do know that when we were not running from spot to spot or stopped to take pictures, at least one of us was usually battling a fish. Add the unseasonably mild weather and Campbell's great company, and you just can't ask for much better "work days."

Top techniques today included pulling Lindy River Rockers on three-ways and Shadlings on flat lines, hopping Fuzz-E Grubs off the bottom and dragging minnows on Lindy Jigs and on three-way rigs with Lindy Beads in front of our hooks. Yesterday we combined Lindy Beads with eggs for steelhead.

The Lower Niagara has become one of my favorite fishing destinations in the nation, in large part due to the tremendous variety of quality fish that you can catch any given day. We caught steelhead, brown trout and lake trout, but any given fish that grabbed a lure could have turned out to have been a coho or king salmon or even a big smallmouth bass.

Adding appeal is the delightful riverside town of Lewiston, with its shops and restaurants all walking distance from the Riverside Motel. Town seemed nicer than ever this week because of the Christmas lights and the open-air family skating rink, which is run by the town and free.

I've only been out of town for about seven hours, and I'm already looking forward to my next visit to the Niagara River -- whenever that might turn out to be.