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Welcome to the Fishing Report from Townsend, Tennessee in the Great Smoky Mountains. At 6:45 am, the temperature outside is 73 degrees.

We got another brief shower in Townsend early this morning. The chance for more rain continues today and through the weekend. The high temperature today is predicted to be 85 degrees, dipping to 70 degrees tonight. It will be mostly cloudy today.

Little River is flowing at 178 cubic feet per second (cfs) or 1.88 feet on the flow gauge. Median flow for this date is 117 cfs. The water temperature is 70.2 degrees.

All streams in the Smokies, that have USGS gauge sites, are flowing above median flow but none of them are flowing too high to wade and fish.

Fishing will be good today, due to the overcast skies and good stream flows. A stray thunderstorm could effect stream flows at some point today. I think today will be a very good fishing day unless that happens.

Nymphs or dry flies will work. It’s hard to beat a black foam beetle with a Green Weenie dropper, though many other dries and nymphs will work. Most important is stealth and presentation. Don’t spook the trout, get a good drift, and you will catch trout. They are hungry and looking for food.

Lowland river fishing should be good today. With the potential for being overcast, increases your odds substantially. If the sun pops out, cast to shaded areas. Use poppers for smallmouth bass. Or, use floating foam flies like a Stealth Bomber or Knucklehead. Smallmouth bass love the sound of a foam fly hitting the water. It sounds real.

This is probably going to be a good lake fishing day thanks to the predicted overcast sky. You may have to outrun a thunderstorm, but the chances are not high. Poppers, foam floating flies and streamers will work for smallies and largemouth bass, unless the area you are fishing is brightly lit by the sun. Use poppers and Dragons for bluegill and shellcrackers.

Generation schedules look promising on many of the trout and smallmouth bass tailwaters today. Check the TVA website from the links below to plan your day.

Smallmouth bass fishing on the tailwaters is really good. This is prime time for topwater action using poppers. I was talking to guide and Captain Gary Troutman yesterday. We talked about how so many fly anglers have not tried smallmouth bass fishing, and when they do, they are amazed. Smallmouth bass are hard fighters for their size. They never give up. Sometimes, fly fishing for them is easy and other times it is not.

If you want to try fly fishing for smallmouth bass, contact Frontier Anglers, a book a trip with Josh Pfeiffer or Gary. These guys are experts. They will float you down a river in the drift boats and they have the flies and techniques that work. I have fished with both of them. CLICK HERE to visit their website.

Seriously, you should consider learning to catch these bass using flies and poppers. You may have an excellent smallmouth fishery near your home and not even know it. We have a lot of them around here too, tailwaters, lakes and lowland rivers.

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

Byron Begley
July 18, 2019

Respond to: byron@littleriveroutfitters.com