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Welcome to the Fishing Report from Townsend, Tennessee in the Great Smoky Mountains. At 5:39 am, the temperature outside is 58.5 degrees.
Today will be another beautiful one. Expect a high temperature in the low 80’s with only a 20% chance for thunderstorms. Tomorrow looks better, mostly sunny with a high in the mid-80’s and no chance for rain. I was hoping for a cloudy day tomorrow. I’m going fishing with a couple of my close friends. I prefer fishing on cloudy days.
Little River is flowing at 225 cubic feet per second (cfs) or 2.06 feet on the gauge. Median flow for this date is 167 cfs. The water temperature is 62.4 degrees this morning.
Fishing is good in the Smokies, everywhere you go. Stream flows are a little higher than normal. At most elevations, the water temperature is good.
You may want to move to a mid or high elevations stream later in the day, as the water warms. Yesterday, the water peaked at 65 degrees at the Townsend gauge, which is at a low elevation. I think we’ll see warmer, daily peak water temperatures in the low elevations tomorrow and maybe today. Just go upstream a little, where the water is cooler as the water warms during the day.
Bugs are hatching. Evening hatches are best. You can catch trout on dry flies all day long. The trout are looking for food and they are active. I would use a Yellow Sally Stonefly or Light Cahill imitation. It’s hard to be a Yellow Neversink Caddis, in size #16. The trout think it is a yellow stonefly, or that’s what we think.
Most reasonable nymphs will work.
TVA is releasing water in quantity at Norris, Cherokee and Douglas Dams today. All three impoundments are at high levels, higher than they want to see right now. TVA is attempting to bring the lake levels down using sluicing and heavy generation. That is making it tough for wading anglers to fish the tailwaters below. Hopefully that will change soon. This has been going on for a while.
This has been a good Spring for smallmouth bass fishing, when the water levels have been angler friendly. I saw Gary Troutman at the shop yesterday. He showed me some photos of nice to huge smallmouth bass he has caught this Spring. One was 22 ½” long. I’ve never caught one that large.
Gary is a smallmouth bass stream fishing expert. Josh Pfeiffer is another. Josh guides those seeking these bass in rivers and he is good at it. Josh and Gary compare notes. You can visit Josh’s website by CLICKING HERE.
My buddy Frank and I are fishing with Josh in early July. We are hoping for top-water fishing all day.
I saw an article on the Daily Times website that caught my eye this morning. It featured my buddy, Joe Swann. What also caught my eye is the hat Joe is wearing. It’s a LRO Brookie cap.
Joe serves on the Maryville City Council and served as Mayor at one time. Joe is a historian as well as a fly fisherman. He is writing a book about Davy Crockett. Joe owns Davy’s first rifle, which is on display at a museum in Knoxville.
The story is about Joe’s latest project, restoring the headstone of Davy Crockett’s father in law, who died almost 200 years ago. Many local people in our County know Joe. He’s a great guy who spends much of his time making our lives better. You can read the story by CLICKING HERE.
Good job Joe!
Daniel will be writing the Fishing Report tomorrow. I’ll be back on the job Sunday.
Have a great day and thank you for being here with us.
Byron Begley
June 2, 2017
Respond to: byron@littleriveroutfitters.com |