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Welcome to the Fishing Report from Townsend, Tennessee in the Great Smoky Mountains. At 5:37 am, the temperature outside is 68.0 degrees.

Today will be somewhat cooler, with a low chance for scattered thunderstorms. The chance for rain increases tonight. The predicted chance for rain tomorrow is 50%, Saturday 40% and Sunday 60%.

NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE PREDICTED HIGHS AND LOWS TODAY

Thunderstorms dropped rain, and in some cases heavy rain yesterday. Townsend received .55 inches while the Knoxville Airport reported .24”. All streams in the Smokies, that have USGS gauges, reported sharp but brief increases in flows. They have been receding overnight.

Little River is flowing at 411 cubic feet per second (cfs) or 2.48 feet on the flow gauge. Median flow for this date is 118 cfs. The water temperature is 65.7 degrees this morning.

You may find high to fairly high flows in the Smokies this morning, depending on where you are fishing.

Little Pigeon River is flowing at 687 cfs or 2.41 feet on the flow gauge. Median flow is 278 cfs.
Oconaluftee River is flowing at 720 cfs or 2.19 feet, compared to median flow of 278 cfs.
Cataloochee Creek’s gauge is reporting 162 cfs and 2.83 feet, compared to median flow of 55 cfs.

The combination of flows on all three prongs of Little River is on the high side of good. One prong may be flowing high, while others are not. Or, they all may be flowing high but fishable.

I would fish in a smaller stream today, probably one of the prongs of Little River, and hike upstream. My choices would be the East Prong above Elkmont or Lynn Camp Prong. There are many other small streams to choose from. You may also do well on the larger rivers. Your chances for catching brown trout are good today, due to the high flows. Your chances will probably be better tomorrow, thanks to cloud cover.

Nymphs will probably work best, depending on where you are. Use split shot to get your flies down. If you like using strike indicators, by all means, use them. You will need to vary the depth as needed.

I would use a Prince Nymph, Green or Pink Weenie or a Bead Head Pheasant Tail.

If you want to try dry flies, tie on a large black foam beetle or a Yellow Sally Stonefly imitation. A bushy Yellow Stimulator is a good choice. Drop a Green Weenie or other nymph off your dry fly.

You may find stained water in the lowland rivers this morning. I don’t know for sure, just guessing. They may be fine. Try poppers, streamers or nymphs for smallmouth bass or rock bass.

The lakes are probably fishing well too, for smallmouth bass, largemouth bass, bluegill and shellcrackers. Fishing will be best when using flies or poppers, early or late when the sun is off the water. It is supposed to be partly sunny today, but mostly cloudy tomorrow. Tomorrow may be the best lake fishing day for anglers using fly rods.

I am building a new display, in the workshop downstairs for our fly tying department. It will hold fly tying vises and tools. I hope to deliver it to the shop Saturday or Sunday. The fly tying department is looking good. It is busy too. In fact, for August, so far, the shop has been very busy.

This does not seem like August to me. This is starting out to be a very good fishing month. My experience has been, August is not a good fishing month. The streams are usually flowing very low. August is normally dry. It can be hot too. Not this year, so far!

Have a great day and thank you for being here with us.

Byron Begley
August 9, 2018

Respond to: byron@littleriveroutfitters.com