November Turkey Week Update by Nicolay

The first half of the month has brought another round of stocking here in Western North Carolina and all of those DH waters have been fishing great!  Not seeing a ton of browns this time around but plenty of opportunistic brooks and hard fighting rainbows.  We’re largely finding most of our success subsurface on the Tuck, but when the water is off dry fly action definitely picks up.  An effective tactic to use in this situation would be to run a small unweighted soft hackle in the film behind a dry fly in hopes of tricking those picky fish and ones not fully committing to the dry.  The smaller DH waters such as the Upper Nantahala and West Fork of the Pigeon will see more consistent dry fly action with October Caddis still being productive along with small Black Stones, Midges, and BWOs.  Across all DH waters the normal post stocking diet of Eggs, Mops, Duracells, and Jig Streamers will still produce fish but that will only last a little longer.  Once those fish wise up to the gaudy flies it’ll be time to switch over to smaller and more imitative patterns.  I highly suggest making the effort to get out on the water over the next few weeks.  Smaller crowds, compared to October, and another round of stocking can be the recipe for a pretty amazing day out here.

In addition to our DH waters, wild and hatchery supported streams are also producing well overall.  Most low elevation water is seeing good fishing from sun up to sundown.  Dry dropper is still the way to go in most hatchery supported water.  My go to rig has been a dark bodied Caddis on top with a smaller dark Perdigon dropper below.  It’s been absolutely deadly.  Most of the wild stuff has been a little more inconsistent.  We have had some recent temperature swings which really affects those high elevation originating streams.  So best to keep an eye on water temps for places like the Smokies before planning a day out there.  Picking the morning after a really cold night might result in a whole lot of casting practice!

With how busy the DH waters can get I would like to talk a little bit about fishing etiquette.  We’ve all been there, you’re in your favorite run on the Tuck and just starting to get into fish when all of a sudden another angler hops in right above you and starts fishing the head of that run.  Heck maybe you’ve been that angler and done that yourself.  A good rule of thumb is to give people the space to work a feature or two.  It may not seem like it on the Saturday after stocking, but there’s a lot of fishable water, and ALOT of fish, for all of us to enjoy.   Plus, just because someone has pulled 5 or 6 fish out of a run doesn’t mean it wont still produce.  When that angler leaves simply slide into their spot and after a few minutes of letting it rest it’ll produce again.  Something else, especially on the Tuck, to be mindful of are boats.  These are multi use rivers and on any given day you can encounter rafts, drift boats, kayaks, and tubes.  The preferable thing to do when you see one coming your direction is to give them space to float through the obvious line.  That raft is not going to spook fish.  What will spook those fish is when you have an angler who refuses to move out of the way causing the boat driver to get out of the boat and drag it across the area adjacent to where you’re fishing.  

With Christmas quickly approaching it’s time to start shopping for presents.  And what better place to do that than “probably the best fly shop!”  Our wide selection of gear and apparel offers plenty options to choose from.  A great option for our logo apparel is to check out our online store at www.tuckflyshop.com.  Several of these items are printed to order and shipped directly to you or whoever you may be purchasing a present for.  Not sure what to get someone?  We do offer gift cards!  A popular option is purchasing a gift card for the amount of a guided trip. 

Until next time, get out and enjoy the mild temperatures and great fishing!