Fly Fishing the Upper Watauga River

It was an unseasonably cool morning for mid summer having reached the low 50's the previous evening and the water of the upper Watauga River was cool and clear. As the paddle swung around in completion of a stroke, I slid it gently out of the water and laid it across the gunwale of the canoe. The drips of water off of the wooden paddle blade were just audible over the muffled sounds of the rippling river that carried through the moist mountain air. The canoe gently turned ever so slowly in the placid current as the river expanded out in front of me. It got deeper within the gorge and the river became black and bottomless.

The gray stone walls that encased the river climbed endlessly on each side and the light of the rising sun would take another hour before kissing the surface of the crystal clear water. I lifted the paddle once again and guided the canoe towards a nearby island where I could beach the canoe, relax for a few minutes and study the water for signs of feeding trout.

As I stepped out of the canoe, the chilled fingers of water ran quickly through my boots and made me give a second thought to wet wading so far up the river this morning. I beached the canoe and removed my life jacket, replacing it with my tan fly fishing vest. I reached around to the large pocket on the back of the vest and removed my small metal thermos that I had filled with piping hot coffee before I left. From my left front pocket I removed a biscuit wrapped in paper towel that my wife had made for me the night before. I had already eaten breakfast at the house, but there was something about eating a fresh biscuit and drinking a cup of coffee on the river that seemed to set the stage for a relaxing round of fly fishing.

After I had finished, I rinsed the lid of the thermos in the river and placed it in the bottom of the canoe. I lifted my 5 weight sage flyrod from the front of the canoe and began scanning the river for likely trout hides.

I was at the head of a small island with the majority of the current running through a deep channel and shallow riffles on to the left and a small sand bottomed inlet and trickling current to the right. I decided to forego the tortures of wet wading at this early hour and cool temperature in the morning and opted to fish the small inlet to the right from the tip of the island.

I removed the dropper fly which was a bead head pheasant tail hung 12 inches below a blue winged olive dunn. It was late in the season and early in the day to be using this combination, but it always seemed to work and I didn't have the patients to untie and retie a beetle patter that I knew would be the preferred target of the day. I seemed to have pretty good luck with this combination throughout the entire year anyway. I dabbed some floatant onto the olive dunn and fed out a few feet of fly line before false casting three times and letting the flies glide down and dip into the water near a half submerged tree.

Content in the placement of my fly, I scanned the water upstream for any signs of feeding fish, but only saw what appeared to be an otter playing in the water. The sun was slowly climbing down into the depths of the gorge where I stood perched on my island and by around 9:30 the sun would be heating the water. I looked back at the vicinity of my fly, but only noticed the twitching of my line where it met the leader. I lifted the rod and set the hook into a 12 inch rainbow that jumped three times before my wetted hand met him to remove the hook and return him to the water. My wife had requested that I bring along the camera for some self portraits and the thought crossed my mind for a brief moment but decided against the notion of trying to gently wrangle a trout, set up the timer and pose for a picture. I was here to relax after all.

A smile came across my face as I realized that this was going to be an easier day than I had originally thought. I was concerned about the cold weather pushing the fish into a lazy feeding pattern, but it was evident that they were only subsurface feeding (I hooked the fish on the pheasant tail bead head dropper in almost no current or movement). I false casted a few times to dry my olive dunn before casting a few feet farther up the river to the head of the submerged tree.

This time I watched intently, however after about a minute, I began to twitch retrieve my fly. Now let me stop here and explain that for the uninitiated, fly fishing a trout stream is mostly about natural presentation. This is what every book and video that I have ever studied tells you. I, however like to actually catch fish just as much as I like the act of fishing so I have broken through the boarders of traditional fly fishing and have developed a few techniques of my own. Some fellow fly fishermen see these techniques and scoff or turn up an arrogant nose. Others simply laugh or question my sanity. But in the end, these techniques work for me and occasionally I get the satisfaction of outfishing some of the traditionalists that I share the river with.

Meanwhile, back to my bluegill fishing tactics for river trout, I started twitch retrieving my fly and after two pulls and a rest, a sizeable rainbow trout devoured my olive dunn (which was subsurface from my retrieve) and began to put a substantial bend in my rod. I fought this fish to shore and netted him so that I could carefully remove the hook. I again contemplated a photo, but decided that I was on the river to fish this morning, not to make scrap books. I continued my peculiar techniques for another 40 minutes in the small pool to the right of the island, catching a few more fish until I again looked up the river to see the sun starting to touch the water's edge.

I turned to my right to fish the shallow plane that dropped into a deeper, swifter channel on the far side. This was on the left side of the island and still in the shaded darkness of the shadows. Using my same flies, I cast directly across the current at a 90 degree angle, allowing my line to bow in the current and putting an unnatural drag into my floating olive dunn. When it had completed the majority of it's swing through the current and began to slow, it paused briefly before disappearing beneath the surface. I lifted the rod to set the hook and was surprised at the amount of resistance that I felt pulling back.

The line suddenly surged and the rod bowed to the strength of the fish as it turned sideways in the current. My mind suddenly raced with the series of knots that I had tied and the number of fish that had rubbed my tippet to a frayed fraction of strength that it once was. I saw my olive dunn suspended above the surface of the water as the trout's tail broke slightly above in it's fight for freedom. I had convinced myself that my line wouldn't hold and concluded that every second of fight that I was granted with this fish was an act of mercy. I knew the moment that I cast these flies that I should have retied.

To my amazement, the battered tippet on my dropper fly held for the duration of the eight plus minute fight and I was able to land the 17 inch rainbow trout although it was significantly farther (and wetter) down river past the island that I had intended to go that day.

I released the beautiful fish back into the water and as a reminder to retie my flies, he gave me a final splash in the face from his tail as he darted back down into the depths of the pool at the base of the island. I retrieved my line and hooked my dropper into the eyelet of the rod just above the cork handle. I reeled the reel to tighten the line as I waded back up to the head of the island where I had beached the canoe. It was only then that I noticed the ache in my feet and calves from the temperature of the water and walked up the bank of the island to dry land. When I reached the canoe, I laid the rod against the side of the canoe and retrieved my thermos. The coffee was a few degrees colder than I preferred, but it was pleasant just the same.

I stood at the head of the island watching the sun slowly dance down into the gorge, and watching three young boys as the noisily mused over the trout that they had caught on their hook and worm. I retied my flies and fished the rest of the morning until just before noon. I caught a number of fish from that spot before I packed up, donned my life jacket and paddled back up to the dam where I had left the car. As I was loading my canoe onto the car, a fellow fly fisherman approached me and kindled up a conversation saying that they weren't biting as well as they had been on beetles this morning and asked if I had any luck.

He had a look about him that said that he was a die hard conventionalist and I didn't want to rock his boat by telling him that I had a banner day using unconventional techniques so I said, I caught a few smaller ones down the river but there were a couple of boys down there that seemed to be doing pretty well on worms. The man let out a disgruntled sigh and like most conventionalist fly fishermen said some off comment about "bait fishermen" and continued on to his car.

I reflected on my morning as I drove home and as I entered the door, my wife smiled and greeted me with a hot lunch and a warm smile - both of which I enjoyed immensely. She asked me how my day was to which I answered, "It was fly fishing...how could it have been anything but a good day?"