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Welcome to the Fishing Report from Townsend, Tennessee in the Great Smoky Mountains. At 5:24 am, the temperature outside is 43.0 degrees.
Expected showers this afternoon with a high near 60 degrees. A breezy day is predicted. It will be cold tonight with a low around 32 degrees. Rain showers and possibly light snow is possible tonight, especially in the higher elevations. Tomorrow will clear but remain cool, in the mid to upper 50’s. Sunday will be sunny and warmer with a high in the upper 60’s.
Little River is flowing at 345 cubic feet per second (cfs) or 2.33 feet on the flow gauge. Median flow for this date is 241 cfs. The water temperature is 50.7 degrees.
Most streams in the mountains are flowing higher than normal today. Fishing is probably fair to good now. Water temperatures will fall tonight. Fishing may be slow in the morning but improve through the weekend as the water warms.
Nymphs will likely work best today. Water temperatures are falling right now.
The lowland rivers are flowing higher than normal. Some are still swift in areas so wading will be limited. Streamers and nymphs will work best for trout and smallmouth bass today.
TVA and the Corps of Engineers are definitely cutting back the flows at some dams. Check the flows on your favorite tailwater using the links below. We are all hopeful to see these dams shut down for longer periods. Maybe that will happen this weekend.
Great Smoky Mountains National Park will begin a phased re-opening tomorrow. Many of the primary roads will be open. Some picnic areas will be open, including Metcalf Bottoms and Cades Cove.
Other secondary roads will remain closed to motorists for now. They include Elkmont Road and Tremont Road. These roads will be open for hiking, biking and fishing. There is a story on the WBIR website detailing the what will be open or closed. You can read it by CLICKING HERE.
Hiking up a closed road to fish is a great experience. These streams have not been visited by anglers since March 24th. Of course, hiking on a backcountry trail to fish is another great option. I think there will be a lot of people visiting the Park this weekend. I would plan to fish away from the main roads if you can.
Some good examples near us are, Abrams Creek, upper Middle Prong and East Prong of Little River, Anthony Creek and West Prong of Little River. Cades Cove will probably be packed with people and vehicles. That would rule out Abrams Creek for me. The lack of parking may pose a problem for fishing the East Prong at Elkmont and above. My choice would be to hike up the Upper Middle Prong. You may have some better ideas. One thing for sure is, whatever we get this weekend is better than what we had.
It is Mothers Day Weekend. That has kept some anglers at home in the past. After the weekend has past, I think we’ll see less traffic and better fishing opportunities in the Smokies.
We are busy at the shop again, finally. I worked yesterday morning but I was off most of the day. I can view our sales live from home and I did. We had a very good day.
To allow for social distancing in the store, and to comply with our Governor’s Executive Order to re-open, we are limiting the number of customers to five at a time. That is usually not an issue on week days. Weekends are different. More people are visiting Townsend. More people come to the store to shop and many others show up with families to just look around.
We are keeping the total number of people in our building to ten, including us. There are usually 4 to 5 of us working at the shop on weekends. We will not just be taking care of the five customers in the store. We are also filling mail orders. We will be talking to people on the phone. We do a lot of that. We will be filling curbside pickup orders. We are ordering merchandise and receiving what arrives from our suppliers and manufacturers. There is a lot going on in the shop that many in-store visitors do not see.
We are all very happy to see customers and friends in our store again. Serving you personally is what we enjoy most. And, we are excited that you and us will be fishing in the Smokies. This is going to be a very interesting weekend. I can’t wait to get to work this morning.
Have a great day and thank you for being here with us.
Byron Begley
May 8, 2020
Respond to: byron@littleriveroutfitters.com |
