The mayfly with the funny name is one worth knowing when it comes to fishing in the late summer and early fall. Actually, all mayflies have funny names, but most, over the years, have become known by some common name such as Light Cahill, Sulfur, March Brown, or Quill Gordon. But the Isonychia still proudly boasts its Latin name. Sure, there are those who might refer to them as Mahogany Duns, Slate Drakes, or even Leadwing Coachman, but none of those names ever stuck.
Isonychia Nymph
Probably the main reason is that those common names refer more to this insect in its adult stage, but to the trout (and trout fisherman), the nymph is by far the most important stage of this insect’s life. Isonychias, or Iso’s as some call them, don’t behave like most other mayflies when they hatch. Most mayflies will emerge to the surface and hatch in the water near the surface film. After hatching, they are often on the surface for a small amount of time, allowing their wings to dry before they fly off. This leaves most mayfly adults vulnerable to hungry trout and is the stage of the lifecycle that many dry flies represent.
But Iso’s behave more like a stonefly. The nymphs swim to rocks or woody debris and hatch out of the water. The trout never get a shot at the adult until it later returns to lay eggs. Take a closer look at exposed rocks in or around the stream this time of year and you’ll likely see some of their empty shucks.
In the Smokies, they typically hatch from August through October with peak emergence in September. If you want to try your luck imitating them with dry flies, try a dark bodied parachute in size #14-12. The body color will typically be anything from a deep mahogany to dark grey or even black. A good ol’ Parachute Adams is probably as effective as anything. When they return to the water to lay eggs (known as the spinner stage), their body color is more orange or rusty.
George Nymph
However, as mentioned above, the nymph is what you should be most concerned with. Also in sizes #14-12, the nymph is slender with a dark brown to black body. It has a very distinct white stripe down the back. You will sometimes find specific Isonychia nymph patterns but they are imitated well with common patterns. Prince nymphs or Zug Bugs are a couple of favorites. The late Eddy George was a well-known and highly respected fisherman and fly tyer in this area. He is probably best known for the George Nymph, a fly that I regularly tie and fish in the Smokies. Many people speculate what this fly might represent. With its slender, dark body and white poly-yarn back, it’s incredibly effective during Isonychia time!
Dark soft-hackled wet flies are very productive, too, as Isonychias are active swimmers and tend to be most active in the mornings and evenings. Any time of day is a good time to drop one of the above fly patterns off a dry fly. Early and late in the day, try fishing with one or a pair of these nymphs. Vary your typical dead-drift presentation to offer the occasional twitch or even swing. Check out the Active Nymphing article in this newsletter for more on that presentation.
Learn more about Smoky Mountain hatches and flies in my hatch guide.
Colder months don’t allow for much in the way of dry fly fishing in East Tennessee. When the water temperatures are in the 30’s, it can be tough enough to catch fish on nymphs. But in early March, and during occasional warm stretches in January and February, water temperatures can climb just enough to produce a hatch.
Sometimes in these conditions, particularly on sunny days, bugs may start hatching but fish still opt not to expend the energy to feed on the surface. But there are often isolated areas, mostly slower pools, where they do feed rather methodically on the surface. I just can’t pass an opportunity to catch a fish up top!
There are a variety of insects that are likely to hatch at these times. The most common are black caddis, black stoneflies, black midges, grey midges, and Blue Wing Olive mayflies. There’s not a lot of rhyme or reason to what exactly might be hatching, or which bug the fish might be keying in on. And with the dry fly fishing being so sporadic and unreliable at that time of year, for most, it doesn’t make a lot of sense to buy/tie a bunch of these patterns and carry them on the stream. Most will likely just end up rusting in your box!
Adult Midge
However, what these insects all have in common is they’re dark in color and small in size. They’re mostly #18 and smaller. The Griffith’s Gnat is a small, dark dry fly generic enough to effectively imitate all of the above insects in most situations. So, rather than carrying four different sizes of six different fly patterns, I tend to carry Griffith’s Gnats in sizes #18 – #22 and am able to fool all but the most selective of trout (and a few of them, too). I once fished a heavy Blue Wing Olive hatch where the fish were actively feeding on the surface. Many were refusing the Blue Wing Olive imitations but eating the Griffith’s Gnat!
It’s just one of those “must-have” flies that I always have in my box, and not just in the winter. It makes for a pretty effective ant imitation during the summer. It’s also a great year round dry fly on tailwaters where midges hatch almost daily. If the fish are feeding on something small and dark, you’ve got more than a fighting chance with this fly.
There are always exceptions, but mostly I fish this fly on a dead drift. I typically use a longer leader and smaller tippet, usually 6X. For a small, dark fly, it’s pretty visible so I often fish it by itself. But in choppier water, in tougher light conditions, or when I just want to give fish options, I will tie it as a dropper off the back of a slightly larger and more visible dry fly. If I tie it 18” off the back of a Parachute Adams, and I see a rise anywhere within 2’ of that Adams, I set the hook.
If you tie your own, it’s a really easy fly to tie. It was always one of the first flies I’d teach when I was teaching beginner fly tying classes. Or if you buy your flies, you can find them almost anywhere. Give it a try!
Learn more about Smoky Mountain hatches and flies in my hatch guide.
In June, hatches start to thin out. We still see a fair number of Yellow Sallies and a smattering of caddis and mayflies, but the heavier, attention getting hatches of spring have mostly come to an end. But when summer eases its way into the mountains, trout turn their attention to terrestrials, and so should you. We’ll talk about several varieties of terrestrials over the coming months but we’ll start with the granddaddy of all mountain terrestrials: the Green Weenie.
If you’ve spent much time around Smoky Mountain fly shops or researched recommended fly patterns for the area, you’ve no doubt run across this fly. Chances are you’ve fished one at some point. While incredibly simplistic, this is one of the most popular and most productive fly patterns in the Smoky Mountains. My good friend Brian Courtney ties this fly for Little River Outfitters in Townsend. To date, he’s tied them 25,000!
InchwormCaddis Larva
There is a little bit of debate about what the fly actually imitates. Many claim it imitates a caddis pupa. Most believe it imitates a green inchworm. Since I am including it in a conversation about terrestrials (land based insects), you can guess which side of the debate I fall. A lot of those little green inchworms end up in the water and trout love them! But the truth is, many caddis pupae look very similar to green inchworms. The Green Weenie is a pretty effective imitation for both. However, one of the reasons I tend to put it more in the terrestrial family is that it works best in terrestrial season. While you can certainly catch fish on it other times of the year, it always seems to be at its best from mid May through early October.
The Green Weenie is different than most terrestrials like hoppers, beetles, and ants. You typically fish it like a nymph rather than on the surface. There are other floating fly patterns intended to imitate inchworms but I don’t find them nearly as effective. Inchworms are poor swimmers and once they hit the water, it’s not long before they are submerged. So mostly I tie my Green Weenies to sink, and fish them on a dead drift. But I do tie a number of variations for different water types and situations.
Beadhead Green Weenie
When the stream is running fuller or when I’m fishing deeper pools and runs, I tend to fish more heavily weighted patterns. These are sometimes tied with a bead head or with several turns of lead wire under the body. You can use an indicator or straight-line tactics. In these situations, I often fish the Green Weenie in tandem with a second fly. One of my favorite combinations is a Green Weenie for the top nymph and a smaller, more subdued nymph, like a Pheasant Tail, about 15” below it. Trout often take the Green Weenie. I believe just as often, its bright color gets attention and trout take the more subdued fly. When nymphing shallower runs or pockets, I’ll often replaced the weighted trailer nymph with an un-weighted nymph or soft hackle pattern.
Another favorite technique for fishing shallow runs and pockets is to put the Green Weenie off the back of a dry fly. In these instances, I prefer an un-weighted Green Weenie. The weight of the hook is enough to get it down in this kind of water and the dry fly floats better and longer in choppy currents without the extra weight. I do sometimes like to add a glass bead to the fly for these occasions.
Barbie Bug
I most often fish this fly in a bright lime green to chartreuse color. Drab olive and insect green shades do well, too. Others have reported a lot of success with white, beige, and tan colors. And for whatever reason, pink seems to work well. You will sometimes see the pink version referred to as a Barbie Bug. Regardless of color, I tend to fish them in sizes #10 through #14. The smaller sizes, sometimes down to a #16, are reserved mostly late summer and early fall when the water is lower.
Learn more about Smoky Mountain hatches and flies in my hatch guide.
The Ginger Caddis of the Smokies is known in other circles as the Great Brown Autumn Sedge. Many lump it together with a few other similar species and refer to them all just as October Caddis. No matter what we decide to call it, fish just call it food! Caddis of numerous varieties are available most of the year in the Smokies but really seem to come into their own in fall. And of the many caddis species hatching in the fall, the Ginger Caddis is the undisputed king.
Orange Stimulator
Ginger Caddis are big, big bugs – in the hook size #10-8 range to be exact. They are in the stream all year, most of the time in a larval encasement of lengthwise sticks. The larvae feed mostly on decaying leaves throughout the winter and spring. In early summer, when that food source has diminished, they seal off their cases and remain inactive until late summer. In late summer, they begin pupation. Emergence, mating, and egg laying occur in early fall. Eggs will hatch in late fall when most of the leaves have fallen, and the larvae will again begin feeding on this foliage. Their entire life cycle is completely synchronized with this food source and they are one of the most important converters of leaf material in the woodland streams of the Eastern United States.
What does that have to do with you? Well, it gives you a good idea of what to tie on the end of your tippet. You will probably only see a handful of these on the stream. The adults tend to fly mostly at night, but there is plenty of spillover near dusk and dawn. And trout don’t seem to care that their not supposed to be seeing them in the middle of the day. They regularly take these imitations with plenty of vigor!
Neversink Caddis
While there are a number of more exact imitations out there, I have found few flies that work better than an orange Stimulator or an orange Neversink Caddis in sizes #12-8. Even when they’re not hitting the dries, these are both highly buoyant dry flies that do a great job of suspending a dropper. For dropper nymphs, the usual suspects like Pheasant Tails, Princes, and Green Weenies are always good choices. Or you may try a #12 orange soft hackle pattern to imitate the Ginger Caddis pupa.
Actively fishing an orange soft hackle by itself or in tandem with another nymph can be very productive, especially in the early morning. Refer to the Active Nymphingarticle in the Journal section of my web site for tips. Ginger Caddis begin showing up (hatching) in the Smokies in mid to late September and typically hang around until late October.
Learn more about Smoky Mountain hatches and flies in my hatch guide.
In general, I mostly look forward to spring and fall fishing the most in the mountains. Temperatures are mild and fish are typically at their most active. However, there is one particular thing that makes me excited for the warm weather of summer to arrive: Beetle fishing!
With mayflies, it’s different. Sure it’s cool seeing a trout casually come up and sip your mayfly imitation out of a foam line, but I’ve seen trout cross from one side of a pool to another to eat a foam beetle. And it’s not a sip; it’s a GULP!
Common Black Beetle
Terrestrial fishing is a big deal in the mountains in the summer. Hatches of mayflies, caddisflies, and stoneflies are fewer and land based insects like inchworms, ants, and hoppers fill the void. Beetles are one of the most prolific terrestrial “hatches” in the park and there are about as many different types of actual beetles as there are beetle patterns to imitate them. I used to tie a fly called a Java Bug that was a beetle imitation made with a painted coffee bean epoxied to a body of peacock herl. The coffee bean not only provided a perfect profile, but would land on the water with an enticing “plop,” much like a real beetle might.
My favorite beetle imitation for a beetle, as the title not so discreetly suggests, is a foam beetle. With foam, you can still get the desired “plop,” but in a much more durable body. Many patterns, including some I tie, will have a peacock herl or even a sparkle dub body to capture that iridescence found on most beetles. They look great and fish great, but I’ve found that a simple thread body does about as well. For legs, I’ve seen everything from hackle to thread, but in my book, it’s hard to beat thin rubber for the movement.
I mostly use a size range of #10 – #14. I lean more toward the smaller sizes later in the summer when the water is lower. Most of mine are tied in black or brown, and I like to put a small strip of yellow or orange foam on the top to make it easier to see.
Foam Beetle
Trout seem to be looking for them more in the afternoons, but certainly try them anytime of day. Beetles seem to be more active in the afternoon and evening so I think they’re more available to fish at those times. Windy days can be great beetle days (or any kind of terrestrial) as more of them end up in the water. And as you might expect, fishing them under overhanging tree limbs can be very productive.
Most of the time, I fish them like I would any dry fly. I drift them from the top of a current down to the fish. But I sometimes alter my tactics in slower pools. Beetle imitations do hit the water a little harder, which can be good and bad. If you spot a nice fish in a slow pool and plop that beetle in front of him, he’ll often spook. But if you plop it down a foot or so behind him, he’ll often turn around for it. This is one of my favorite kind of takes!
Tie some for yourself or give me a shout and I’ll tie some for you. They are included in my Boys of Summer fly selection. Whatever you do, just make sure you have some with you on any summertime trip to the Smokies!
Simple Foam Beetle
Hook: TMC 100 #16 – #10
Thread: Black 8/0
Back/Shell: Black 2mm craft foam, tied in rearward and folded over
Body: Black thread
Legs: Black rubber legs, small to micro depending on hook size
Sighter: Orange (or other bright color) 2mm craft foam
Note: Numerous other colors of foam and thread can be used but black and brown are my best producers
Learn more about Smoky Mountain hatches and flies in my hatch guide.
If you are new to fly fishing, particularly for trout, it is easy to be overwhelmed by the number of fly patterns available. Which ones do I need? What colors? What sizes? Do I need all of them? First of all, if you carry every trout fly with you, you need a wheelbarrow to go fly fishing! While there is no way to make it immediately simple, there are ways to simplify the process. As with many things in fly fishing, find a good starting point. Learn as you go from there.
Sulfur mayflies can come off in bunches on the Clinch in May, and you better have a good imitation
First, There are many fly patterns that imitate a very specific bug when it is hatching. These may only be relevant on certain rivers at a specific time of year. Some only imitate certain stages of that hatching insect’s emergence. These hatches may involve hundreds of bugs coming off for hours out of the day, and maybe over the course of several weeks.
When that’s the case, fish can get highly selective. They may ignore anything that doesn’t look like what is actually hatching. You need to match the hatch. The heavier the hatch is, the more selective the fish can become. They may only focus on one stage of the emergence. For instance, they may opt to ignore the nymphs and adults, and purely key in on emergers just under the surface film.
This kind of situation can be exciting and frustrating at the same time while you try to unlock the puzzle. But these situations are rare. Most of the time, particularly in smaller mountain streams like the Smokies, you’re not going to see many heavy hatches. Rather, there will be sporadic small hatches of a few different types of bugs. And the fish rarely key in on one specific bug. They can’t afford to. Often, there won’t be anything hatching at all. So, a good starting point with trout flies is with a basic selection of attractor patterns in their most common size(s).
The Parachute Adams is one of the most universal topwater trout flies in the world
Attractor fly patterns, also referred to as generals, generics, or prospecting flies, are not designed to imitate anything in particular. They will either be rather drab looking flies, like a Parachute Adams, that look similar to a lot of food items. Or they may be something with some color that doesn’t look like anything at all, like a Royal Wulff, intended to trigger a feeding response from a trout. In most situations, if you have a basic selection of attractors and you present them well, you can catch trout anywhere in the world.
Many of you may have seen, or even purchased, the Great 8 fly selectionfrom my online store. That’s exactly what it is – a collection of eight dry, nymph, and streamer fly patterns that will work on trout most anywhere in the world. Now if you ask ten different fishermen their eight must-have fly patterns, you won’t get the exact same answer. But I guarantee you’ll see a lot of similarity and crossover. A simple selection of these types of flies is a great place to start your fly collection. From there, you just gradually add fly patterns based on multiple sources and scenarios.
Maybe your buddy told you he did really well at Tremont on a size #12 Yellow Humpy. Pick up a couple and give them a try. Or maybe the guy at the fly shop said people have been doing well on #16 Copper Johns. Pick up a few of those. Or maybe you purchased my hatch guide for the Smokies and it indicated there should be good hatches of Light Cahills when you were coming. Better have a couple of Light Cahill patterns with you.
There are hatch guides and charts for most every popular trout fishery in the country and they can be very helpful. And the folks at the local fly shops are great sources for information. When they’re not fishing, they’re in the shop talking to people who have been fishing. They almost always have the most up to date information. After doing that for a while, you start to accumulate a lot of fly patterns. And through the process, you start to find your own personal favorites.
So, now that you have all of these patterns, how do you know what fly to fish when? Fly selection is about 1/3 experience, 1/3 scientific, and 1/3 dumb luck. If you fish an area a lot, you will begin to draw from past experiences to choose your fly. If I am fishing the Smokies in June, I don’t have to actually see a beetle get eaten by a trout to make me decide to tie on a beetle pattern. For decades, I’ve done well on beetles in June. It will probably be one of the first flies I tie on.
Are you seeing a lot of these?Try something like this
I might use a more scientific approach on water that is less familiar, or even on familiar water when something unusual is happening. The scientific approach could be reading something like a hatch guide and choosing a fly accordingly to match the flies that should be hatching. Or you could be on the water and see fish feeding on the surface. If you see an abundance of natural insects on the water or coming off the water, catch a couple in your hand and try to find an imitation in your box that is close in size, color, and profile. You can do the same thing with nymphs by turning over a couple of rocks and choosing a fly that resembles what you see.
The dumb luck method is just what it sounds like. The biggest brook trout I ever caught in the park came on a day when the fishing was tough. None of my usual patterns were producing and I wasn’t having much luck matching naturals. I finally dug through my box and saw a fly I hadn’t thought of, much less fished, in the last ten years. I figured I couldn’t do much worse. So, I tried it and ended up catching several fish on it, including that big brookie. Don’t be afraid to experiment.
Probably the most import thing to remember is that it is more often the archer, not the arrow. Too many fishermen blame their fly for a lack of success. With the exception of super big, technical hatches, specific fly patterns are probably not as important as most people make them. Approaching the fish without spooking them and putting a good drift over them with a “reasonable” fly pattern will catch fish most of the time.
Someone smarter than me once said that most people’s favorite fly is the fly they happened to have on the first time the fishing was good. In other words, the fish were feeding well that day and probably would have hit most anything. But from that day forward you have confidence in that fly. It’s often the first fly you tie on and it’s the one you leave on the longest. There’s a lot to be said for confidence.
Most of the big brown trout, probably 75%, I’ve caught in the Smokies have come on a Tellico Nymph. That may lead some people to believe there is something extra special about that fly. The truth is I spotted most of those big brown trout before fishing for them. And I usually tie on a Tellico Nymph when I fish to a big brown. Know why? It’s the fly I happened to have on the first time I caught a big brown in the Smokies. There’s a lot to be said for confidence.
Learn more about Smoky Mountain hatches and flies in my hatch guide.
