Smith River - 15 & 16 May 08

[al k]

I was in the Bassett area to attend some of the Trout In the Classroom release events on Thursday and Friday of last week. The releases were in the mornings and as I was already in my waders decided to take advantage of the window of opportunity for fishing before the COE started generating at Philpott Dam in mid afternoon. As soon as the school kids and dignitaries left on Thursday, I headed for the Dam section of the river where I hoped to catch a few of the recently stocked rainbows and some stream spawned brown trout.

I should have known better then try a recently stocked section of the river. Every "pull off" or parking spot held at least one vehicle. I finally spotted an open section of the river which has been good to me in the past. This was a wading section which was flanked on both ends by fishermen either standing in a pool or sitting on overturned buckets or folding camp chairs while waiting for fish to find their offerings.


The strike indicator took a dip almost immediately and I responded by raising my rod tip which put a nice bend in the rod. First fish of the day was a typical 8 inch brown trout. It was followed in rapid succession by 4-5 more of the same species. I figured I was in for a good day - Now if I could just luck into a pod of those recently stocked rainbows......


The bite stopped abruptly as it had started. After the sixth fish (all browns), I could not buy a hit. I slowly worked my way to within conversation distance to three fellow sitting at the bend of the river and they all reported that they had good luck earlier but that the fish appeared to have turned off. I pulled in my line and walked a respectful distance around them from the other side of the river before stepping back in to fish a long flat area which I needed to exit on the far end before the generation surge would appear at about 3:15pm. I knew from past outings that this section holds a lot of rainbows as it is just upstream from one of the stock truck dumping spots and not many locals access it because not many of them appear to own waders or do much wade fishing.


I will admit that I sort of rushed through this section as I did not want to get caught half way through it by the high water, but I did cast to all likely spots and slowed down considerably as I neared my "get out" point. I did not receive a hit and observed only a few dimples on the surface. I ended the day a few short of my self imposed goal of double digits. Still a good day on the water

The next day, following another TIC release event, a local fisherman and I decided to try our luck in the middle of the Special Regulation Section. We parked at the Rosemont Rd parking area and walked a considerable ways up the railroad tracks before entering the river. My fishing companion had been experiencing good luck with a dry fly (Light Cahill) in recent outings so he started with that while I stuck to what I know best which is fishing my Allieworm. Past experience has also shown me that a person fishing a dry fly ahead of me does not seem to effect my catch rate as long as that person is a careful wader, i.e. does not "bull" his way through the good water as he progresses upstream.

I fished downstream for a bit while waiting for my partner to work his way about 100 yards upsteam of our starting point. It did not take me long to catch the first fish of the day. As I released this typical Smith River Brown I looked upsteam and saw my companion was also doing the same. It was going to be a good afternoon!


This particular section fished very well. I was fishing "used water" but it did not seem to matter because they really liked what I had to offer. I slowed down and my partner increased the distance between us which probably helped my fishing.


None of our fish would put the Historical Smith River Brown Trout record of +17 pounds in danger of being broken but we did catch some nice ones. By the time I caught up with my partner, who had slowed down at one particularly rewarding run, I was well past double digits and he reported doing nearly as well.


My partner had to call it quits due to other obligations but I decided to push on to the "Fish Camp". We parted ways and my good luck continued to the point where I was just shy of hitting a second double digits. The wind had picked up and the sun was bright but the fish were biting and I was enjoying every minute of it. The little fish pictured below changed all of that.


Just as I had the fish in one hand and camera in the other, a strong gust of wind blew my wide brimmed "Tilley" hat off my head and into the water where it started floating downstream at a rapid clip. I dropped the fish and the camera, one still attached to my line and the other to a cord around my neck and chased the hat. Somewhere in this frantic flurry of activity I must have knocked off my glasses because when everything was back under control they were gone. I didn't miss them until I started casting again and noticed my strike indicator was not as sharp as usual. I spent some time searching the bottom but was in a long run of riffles and they were probabley tumbling
merrily along.


I expect that one of the big browns that still call the Smith River home will start wearing them and be twice as hard to fool because he will be able to use their 2x reading lens and polarized clip-on shades to really scope out what us poor fishermen offer him.