Appalachian Angler : Fishing Report April 6 ~ Appalachian Angler

FLOAT TIME

Our guides have been busy floating and wading the rivers - and you should be too!! With the funkiest weather we have had in a while with winds, snow, sleet, rain, sunshine, you name it - we have had it the past week. Luckily, we had some great weather through the weekend with a great trip on Sunday on the trophy section with no generation. Even with no generation the river was running high with the Doe @ over 300 cubic feet per second! With all that extra water it did make for some perfect nymph fishing at times - lots of nymphs spotted swimming around in the river - mayfly nymphs in the 16-18 range and some caddis larvae found amongst the rocks. The mayflies were callibaetis and sulfur nymphs with those baetis nymphs having a real creamy look to their bodies in the nymphal stage. There was a showing of 20 black caddis mixed in with some 20 midges - but between the guides all of the fish were caught on mayfly imitations fished with lots of lead and deep.

...at the ready...

Some of the bigger attractor nymphs - soft hackle hares ears, prince nymphs, etc. fished on heavier tippet produced and acted as a beacon for fish to find the smaller flies trailing off the back. Get ready to have a lesson in landing fish because these guys are supercharged! Some of us floated all the way in to the evening and had no caddis to report just yet, but with that moon gaining size and the days becoming nicer and nicer our grannom hatch should be just around the corner! We have been to the South Holston as well - yesterday in all the wind there were a ton of 18-20 blue wings hatching but not much going on the surface...Nymphs prevailed again during the generation that will probably hold out all through the weekend. When the TVA does decide to finally cut them off it will make for some great falling water fishing and some visual aid to those spawning rainbows that are fired up right now. The Nolichucky has continued to be on the radar with a float a week for us so far - it is gaining steam and once that water falls out as well a little bit more - those beds will start to show themselves and the spawn will progress as it gets closer to May.