Secrets of Southern Tailwaters, with Tic Smith

Tom: Hi, and welcome to the "Orvis Fly Fishing Podcast." This is your host, Tom Rosenbauer. And my guest this week is Tic Smith from Southeast Angler. And Tic was nominated as one of the finalists for Orvis-Endorsed Guide of the Year. He [00:00:30.030] fishes southern tailwaters. He mainly concentrates on the Hiwassee River. And in this podcast, we're going to be talking about how to fish from a drift boat in a southern tailwater. What kind of strategy do you use? What kind of tackle? What kind of flies? And very important, how to read the water.
So, there are lots and lots of great tailwaters in the Southeastern United States, and very [00:01:00.090] popular these days. And if you fish in that area or if you plan on fishing in that area, I think that Tic's podcast, although he concentrates on the Hiwassee, which is a river with lots of public access and a great place for do-it-yourself, Tic will give you some solid advice on how to manage this kind of fishing.
And before we get into my interview with Tic and into the Fly Box [00:01:30.079], I wanted to talk to you and inform you about some of the great Orvis-endorsed guides out there. The guide this week, the Guide of the Week is captain Michael Pittman. And Michael is a Louisiana native. He's a lifelong fisherman, and he specializes in saltwater sight fishing from Hopedale and Delacroix on the West Side of the Mississippi to Myrtle Grove, Port Sulphur, and Venice [00:02:00.170] on the East Side of the Mississippi.
This is a great fishery, and I'm sure you've all seen videos and photographs of the big redfish chasing poppers and chasing streamers in shallow water. It sure looks exciting. I've fished this area, but I've never been around when the big fish are around, and that's something that I plan on rectifying in the future. You can do sight fishing in the marsh [00:02:30.009], and it's really as much hunting as fishing. You're looking for signs of redfish, black drum, sheepshead, sea trout, and jack crevalle.
And because he's a full-time year-round guide and a Louisiana native, this allows Michael to really stay in tune with the subtle changes in that Louisiana fishery. There's a lot of guides who [00:03:00.009] back up their flatboat and head to Louisiana for the height of the season. But Michael's around there all the time, and it is a year-round fishery.
Our Outfitter of the Week is Covered Bridge Outfitters and Lodge. And these guys are located about an hour from Cleveland, and they specialize in steelhead fishing. They have access to some private waters on Steelhead Alley for [00:03:30.534] steelhead fishing. And that fishery can get pretty crowded, so having access to some less crowded water is pretty important.
And not only that, but they also fish the South Shore of Lake Erie, which is a very, very productive lake for muskie, pike, largemouth, and smallmouth bass. And they've also got sight fishing for carp, catfish, and freshwater drum. Freshwater drum is a fish that's starting [00:04:00.034] to get more notoriety in the fly fishing world. They're tough, and it's really, as in carp fishing, it's more like saltwater fishing, more like hunting. So, this is a great fishery. Year-round fishery pretty much. And if you're in that area of Ohio or Pennsylvania, I would urge you to look them up.
And our lodge this week is in a similar area in the Northeast. [00:04:30.095] It's The Lodge at Glendorn, and they're located in Northeast Pennsylvania, about three and a half hours from Pittsburgh and three hours from Cleveland. These are luxury accommodations. They're located on 1,500 acres bordering the Allegheny National Forest. And they have great fishing in smaller streams and ponds on their property. They can also float fish on the Clarion or the Allegheny for [00:05:00.404] trout, bass, muskie, pike, and carp.
They're the only licensed full-service outfitter permitted in the 750-square-mile Allegheny National Forest. They have great guides. They have a full-service fly shop on the property. It's a gorgeous, gorgeous property. And there's also lots of outdoor activities for non-anglers. So, if you want to go with your family, this is a great place to go. And they recently acquired some property [00:05:30.165] on Spring Creek with wild brook and brown trout. So, The Lodge at Glendorn is a great place to experience both luxury and some great fishing in the Northeast.
Okay. Well, let's do the Fly Box. And the Fly Box is where you ask me questions or you pass on a tip. And I either pass on your tip or I try to answer your questions. If you have a question for the podcast, you can send it to me [00:06:00.004] at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. Either just type your question in your email or attach a voice file. And thank you all for the numerous voice files this week. I didn't have any last week that I could answer and had lots of good voice files this year. So, I really appreciate you paying attention to my needs and sending me some voice files.
So, the first question [00:06:30.245] is an email from Kevin. "First, I want to thank you for great wader advice you gave on a previous podcast. When asked about waders that leak beyond repair, you suggested using them while removing snow. I had a pair of waders that reached the end of their fishing career this fall and tried them out in the snow this past winter. They kept me dry, and the studs kept me from slipping. This is one of the best wader tips I ever got."
They also make good rain pants, Kevin. And here's Kevin's question. "I fish for stripers and blues [00:07:00.279] north of Boston, and my question is about running lines. I have an old depth charge line that has damage in the head. Is it worth it to clip off the head and reuse the running line with a shooting head? I'm hoping to limit waste if possible, but not sure if it's worth the effort. If it can be repurposed, what's the best way to connect the cut end to shooting head or backing?"
Well, Kevin, that's a good question. Yeah, you can use that running line for a shooting head. Certainly, if it's still in good shape. [00:07:30.199] Maybe give it a good cleaning. Soak it in soap and water and then clean it with a paper towel or an old cloth.
The best way to attach it to both your shooting head in the front and your backing is to put a loop in the fly line. And the best way to do this, kind of an old-fashioned way, but it's probably the most secure way to put a loop in a fly line [00:08:00.050] on your own, is to double the fly line over about, I don't know, maybe start with a couple inches. Double it over a couple inches, and then tie 3 nail knots over the fly line using 16- or 20-pound monofilament. You can use a speed nail knot to do this. Makes it easier. You can look that up on the web somewhere, [00:08:30.100] a search engine, if you don't know how to do a speed nail knot.
And put three nail knots over the fly line pretty close together, and that will give you an incredibly strong loop. The fly line itself will actually break before that loop will break. And then cut off the tag end of the fly line that's sticking out beyond those nail knots, and then maybe put a little flexible epoxy or super glue on the [00:09:00.090] ends of that just so it smooths out that fly line that you cut off. It's not the smoothest connection, but it's pretty darn smooth. It'll go through the guides, and it's very, very strong. And you can do that on the back end of the fly line, and then you can put a Bimini twist in your backing, a big, long Bimini twist with a big loop. And then you can change lines easily to your backing. [00:09:30.120]
Irma: Hi, Tom. This is Irma Bird from Texas City, Texas. And today, I have a question for the Fly Box. Recently, the area where we go trout fishing has received a great amount of rain, and the river we fish is a tailwater coming out of a dam. Normally, the flow rate, what we found out, of the dam is at 200 to 300 CFS. However, now it's running anywhere between [00:10:00.807] 2,500 and 3,000 CFS. Do you know if this will have any effect on the fish that inhabit the tailwater? Thanks for all you do, Tom. Have a great day.
Tom: So, Irma, that's a pretty good flow, but it doesn't sound catastrophic. And the fish generally tuck into areas of slower water anyway unless they're out really actively feeding. So, when they're spooked [00:10:30.154] or when they're resting, they're going to tuck into areas behind rocks, in front of rocks, close to the bank, around brush piles.
And the velocity of the river actually is not that much greater close to the bottom or in those little nooks and crannies, even when the river's in flood. Trout have evolved for hundreds of thousands of years to survive floods. And even though I think I know [00:11:00.520] what river you're talking about, it is hatchery supported, but those fish still have the instinct to get out of the way when the flow goes up.
And unless the flood is catastrophic, where boulders start rolling around, or unless people start putting bulldozers and other machinery in the river, your habitat's going to be in pretty good shape, and I would expect that most of your trout are going to survive. They'll ride it out. I've seen it time [00:11:30.105] and time again where we've seen catastrophic floods and we thought, "Oh my God, this river is not going to come back for years," and the river comes back in really good shape. So unless it's catastrophic, and that kind of flow doesn't sound catastrophic, I think your river's going to be just fine when the water drops.
Here's an email from Greg in Central Pennsylvania. "Hello, Tom. [00:12:00.835] Relating to a recent question on Fly Box concerning fumbling with your equipment when landing fish. My question is, do you or Orvis believe putting your reel underwater when, for instance, landing fish will hurt or eventually ruin your fly reel? I do know that there is grease inside and, I guess, ball bearings that could become damaged due to water."
Well, Greg, I don't think so. They're meant to get wet. And I am always [00:12:30.777] throwing my reel in the water when I'm landing a fish or laying it down in the water, dipping it in the water, whatever. And nearly all reels these days have a sealed drag, so the water doesn't get in and affect your drag. And grease is meant to be water repellent.
So, yeah, even in salt water you can put your reel in the water. Rinse it out afterwards, maybe, or [00:13:00.065] take the spool off and rinse it out because you might get a little mud, gravel, or sand inside there. But because the drag is sealed, it's not going to hurt it at all. So, no, you don't have to worry about it, and you can put your reel in the water. I do it all the time.
Here's an email from Nick. "Hello, Tom. I live in North Alabama, primarily fish for bass and carp. I spent the past few years refining my quiver, if you want to call it that, of rods [00:13:30.085] from 6 weight to 8 weight with those fish in mind, along with the occasional trip to the coast.
Lately, I've been looking to get a rod more dedicated to the smaller red eye bass, something that can handle a size 6 hopper, but it's still going to be fun catching 10-inch bass. I currently have a 7.5-foot, 3-weight Clearwater and a 9-foot, 5-weight Clearwater. The 3 weight is a blast on the smaller fish, but casting a big hopper isn't the most enjoyable, and the 5 weight isn't quite as sporting.
Long [00:14:00.184] way around the barn to get to my main question. What are your thoughts between the Recon line and the Superfine Graphite line for my purposes? Is a 7-foot, 9-inch, 5-weight Superfine going to give an added fun factor while still delivering bigger foam flies? Will the 8-foot, 4-inch, 3-weight Recon reasonably cast a size 8 BoogleBug? Am I overlooking the Superfine glass? I've rambled on long enough, but it's important questions like this that keep me up at night. I appreciate everything [00:14:30.075] you do for us. This podcast is an asset, not only on my daily commute, but also on many long drives to and from the water."
So, Nick, I am a huge fan of the new Superfine graphite rods, carbon rods. And I think that that 7-foot, 9-inch, 5-weight is going to really add to the fun factor. It'll throw those size 6 hoppers and BoogleBugs really well, but it'll really [00:15:00.205] bend in a smaller fish. It's a slower action. It's not slow in the butt like the older Superfines are. It's a very progressive feel and the rod feels very light in the hand and they're just a delight to fish.
If you want something a little less expensive and with a little more mass to it, a little heavier, the Superfine glass [00:15:30.139] is fine. It'll give you the same amount of fun, but I'm just again, I'm a huge fan of those new Superfines, and I think that's the rod that you're going to have fun with.
This one's from Eli in Montana. "Wanted to throw in a question for a Fly Box or future podcast topic that popped in my head the other day about proper wading etiquette. Here's a bit of context. As we all know, Montana is great for stream access, much better than my home state of Wyoming. [00:16:00.190] Because of this, I ran into an awkward situation I've never had to deal with while out on the Bitterroot River during the famed Skwala Hatch.
The river was crawling with anglers at every access point and bridge. I got into the water at a less busy access point that was surrounded by private land, made my way upstream while staying below the high water mark. An important thing to note is this was a braid of the river, so it was relatively narrow, about 20 to 30 feet bank to bank. Eventually, about a quarter [00:16:30.389] mile upstream, I saw another angler. Being courteous of their fishing experience, that's where I decided to stop and fish well downstream of them rather than encroaching on them.
However, I quickly found myself being the angler upstream of another that came upriver after me. Not a problem as we all gave each other plenty of space. After fishing for a while, I began to realize that I was trapped, so to speak. The day was waning, and I needed to be home for another commitment. So, I began working my way downstream [00:17:00.029] back to the bridge where my car was parked, walking as stealthily as I could, trying not to spook every fish as I moved down.
I came across angler number two, asked to pass from a distance, and apologetically made my way around him. I could sense his frustration with me as I passed. He said I needed to give him more space and get out of the water well away from the person fishing when passing, and he wasn't exactly friendly about it. What he wanted me to do is my usual approach when fishing on [00:17:30.119] public lands or with an easement. The only issue is there was nowhere else to go around without leaving the water and trespassing. This is a big no-no where I grew up, so I've always learned to respect the landowner and avoid trespassing if at all possible.
So, my question is this: what is the best way to handle this type of situation when wading in a stream surrounded by both private land and other fishermen? Was I in the wrong? Should I have just waited until the guy below me decided he was done fishing and followed him out? [00:18:00.105] Is it on him to understand he might run into this situation? Unfortunately, the popularity of this river makes it feel like a war zone some days, something I'm not used to that ruins the fly fishing experience for me a bit. Maybe the solution is to find somewhere else to fish. Thanks. Love listening to the podcast."
Well, yeah, Eli. Finding some place to fish would be a good solution. You said you were on a side channel, and I'm wondering if [00:18:30.079] you could've gone... Maybe you couldn't wade across, but you could've gone on the other side on the other channel and waded down through there. There might have been another angler there, but that's one thought.
The other one is, not knowing the exact situation, I don't know where the high water mark was, but maybe you could have gotten out of the river up to the high water mark and crept around him instead of staying in the water. [00:19:00.315] You did everything you could, and I wouldn't worry about it.
If it was me, honestly, I would've gotten out of the river and maybe kind of getting into a little bit of private land and quickly scoot around the other angler and then get back in the water. I don't think getting out of the water [00:19:30.345] quickly and getting back in and crossing private land for a few yards is probably not going to upset most landowners too much. So, it depends on the landowner, obviously. But you did the best you could, and I don't think you had any other option other than to maybe find a place that's less crowded.
Charlie: Hi, Tom. This is Charlie from Maple Plain, Minnesota. Thanks for the podcast. I continue to love it. [00:20:00.894] I have a question for you regarding dry fly fishing leaders. I've heard a number of contemporary experts reference their handmade leaders and provide formulas with how to tie them. I'm wondering if you're aware of an Orvis leader or Scientific Angler leader or any company's leader that is a good long dry fly leader.
My follow-up question would be, I've heard some people say [00:20:30.214] that one should snip off the end of a store-bought leader and replace it with the appropriate-sized tippet because the extruding process sometimes makes for some weak sections in the thinnest part of store-bought, tapered leaders. Thank you, Tom.
Tom: Well, Charlie, I use machine-made knotless tapered leaders [00:21:00.015] all the time, long dry fly leaders. What you need is a 12-foot, say, 4 or 5x depending on what you're using. And what I do is I start with a 12-foot, 5x leader when I want a long dry fly leader. And sometimes I'll extend the butt section a little bit if I want an even longer leader. And then I'll usually extend the tippet. And there's a couple ways of doing this.
One is you got probably 20 to 24 inches of machine-made tippet [00:21:30.125] included in that taper on the leader. And one of the things you can do is to just tie on another couple feet. Let's say it's a 5x leader. Tie on another couple feet of 5x. So, you got a knot in the middle of your 5x. What I do, and this may seem like it's unnecessary, but what I do is I feel the leader. I just kind of run my fingers down it and figure out where the 5x [00:22:00.474] portion ends, where the machine-made tippet ends.
And you can just hold a piece of 5x alongside the leader and watch where it starts to get a little bit thicker than that 5x. And I cut it off there because I really want to know how long my tippet is, and I want to know when it's getting too short. And if I tie it in the middle of the other tippet, yeah, sometimes I don't really know. So, I just like to [00:22:30.085] cut the old tippet off and put a new one on so that I've got a nice long tippet and I know exactly how long it is. But you can do it either way. But I do think that, for a long dry fly leader, unless it's really windy, you do want a little bit longer tippet that comes on those machine-made leaders.
And are they better or worse than hand-tied knotted leaders? I think the tapers are pretty darn good on the [00:23:00.335] either Orvis or Scientific Anglers knotless tapered leaders. I don't have any problem with them. I do eventually put a bunch of knots in them because I cut back and then I extend and I cut back and I extend. So, I end up with half a knotted leader and half a knotless leader until it just gets to the point where I've made too many changes and I don't want to put any more knots in it and then I'll start with a new leader. But I might use the same leader [00:23:30.154] all season long.
And I think they're good. Not to say that a hand-tied leader isn't just as good. You got a bunch of knots in there. Sometimes they catch on moss and stuff if you're fishing a spring creek or a lake. But making your own knotted leaders, making your own tapered leaders is a really good thing to do because it teaches you how to tie proper knots and it teaches you about how a leader is tapered. [00:24:00.380] You get to understand it better by making your own leaders. So, either way is going to work, depends on what you want to do.
Here's an email from Justin. "Regarding the question about where are the baby carp." This was a question that came up a couple of podcasts ago. "I'm a wildlife biologist in Nebraska, so I asked a fish biologist in our office for insight as to why little carp are not easy to find and where they might be hiding. He said the reason [00:24:30.230] you most likely don't notice baby carp is because they grow very rapidly. In Nebraska, within one year after they hatch, they can grow to 12 inches. They go from tiny fry to robust fish in a short amount of time.
They are freshly hatched when we are fly fishing in the summer for carp. They're still very small and schooled up. The schools may be hiding deep in weeds or in deep water, but if you find one, you usually find them all. And like Tom said, they may not be distinguishable from minnows or other small fish without [00:25:00.240] seeing them up close. Carp's ability to grow so fast is part of the reason carp can become so prolific in some bodies of water. They go from perfect bite-sized prey to too big to eat in a relatively short amount of time. Every water body is different, but hope this helps paint a better picture as to why we don't notice those baby carp."
Well, thank you, Justin. That's news to me. I didn't realize they grew so fast and appreciate [00:25:30.390] you digging into that question.
Here's an email from Mike from Falls Church, Virginia. "I was gifted a Tenkara rod a few years ago. I enjoy it. It's very simple in many ways. I catch fish on it that surprise me on small streams, in particular, with a dumpy looking little fly that came with it. I'm still not sure what this is all about. Nostalgia for an ancient art? Heritage from another nation's fly fishing traditions? I'm not knocking it. Just wondering [00:26:00.230] if Tenkara fishing is a thing/movement or just another item to buy and try in fly fishing.
I do it to upskill and try to keep learning in our sport, but I love the feel, the patterns, the sounds and sequences of having a reel and line management, and everything else messy and frustrating about it on the water. I'm truly at peace with the whole thing in my hand, for better or worse. Just curious what you and the stream "intelligencia" [00:26:30.174] do with or think about this technique and how widespread Tenkara is these days? Do you have to use a specific Tenkara fly with this technique? Their literature sort of pushes that idea. Or does any match the hatch still do?"
Well, first of all, Mike, you shouldn't care what anybody else thinks of Tenkara. You're having fun with it, and that's all that counts. I do think that it's become quite popular [00:27:00.230] in certain areas of the country, particularly in your area of the world, Virginia, North Carolina, and then in the Rocky Mountains, particularly in Colorado, I've noticed, a lot of interest in Tenkara. And again, don't worry about what I think about it or what anybody else thinks about it. If you're having fun with it and you're learning something new and maybe some techniques that'll benefit you when you fish [00:27:30.295] with your standard fly fishing outfit, then do it.
The one piece of advice I will give you is that you can use any fly with a Tenkara rod. When I use a Tenkara rod, I typically use something like a Parachute Adams or a small chubby Chernobyl. The same kind of thing I would use in small streams with a standard fly rod outfit. And you can fish nymphs with them, any kind of nymph at all. You can fish indicators with them if you want.
So, those Tenkara flies [00:28:00.065] are pretty cool, and those reverse tied hackle flies do have a cool benefit in that you can kind of pull on them and jig them up and down and suspend them, and they kind of force themselves back down in the water because they're pushing against the direction of pull. So, it's kind of an interesting technique, but no, you don't have to use those flies. You can use any damn fly you want on a Tenkara rod. [00:28:30.000]
Here's an email from anonymous, and you'll understand why it's anonymous. I want to read the comment. "I would ask that you not use my name for fear of retaliation. As a proponent of conservation, I'm asking you to please let your listeners know what is going on within government, specifically within the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The current administration is proposing to eliminate 75% of the Office of Research and [00:29:00.075] Development.
This organization is directly responsible for developing solutions that keep our air, water, and land clean. Recent examples of where this organization has delivered solutions that have helped the American public is the train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio, cleanup of the Gold King Mine, and fires in LA, as well as removing lead from the drinking water in Flint, Michigan. Research conducted here has developed solutions that enable [00:29:30.275] the removal of PFAS chemicals from our water to protecting salmon populations in the Pacific Northwest.
As an avid fly fisher and outdoorsman, this proposal bothers me as it should for every American that values clean air, land, and water. I know that many of your podcast listeners would find this disturbing, and I ask them to consider contacting their senators and congressmen to voice their support for ORD and the research they conduct in support of all [00:30:00.204] Americans. Thank you for all you do and all Orvis does in protecting our resources."
Well, thank you for that comment. And I don't think there's anyone that disagrees that there's a lot of waste in government and a lot of inefficiency, but in my opinion and I think in most people's opinion listening to this podcast, the one place we don't want to sacrifice our government resources is for [00:30:30.460] clean water, clean air, and clean land. So, yes, please contact your senators and congressmen and voice your support for ORD.
Here's an email from Mark from Clarence, New York. "I love the podcast, and I've found it to be a great resource for a novice like myself. This March, my brother and I took our first trip to the Catskills. What an experience and special time with my brother as we caught beaver kill, rainbows, [00:31:00.089] browns, and even ventured up with our 3 weights into the hills for some native brookies, which leads me to my question. How in the world did those native brook trout get so high up in those streams? Was it birds? Was it holdover from glaciers thousands of years ago or something else? By the way, my Pro Approach wading shoes provided great traction on the mossy gravel beds and were very comfortable hiking throughout the day."
Well, Mark, that's a question I've asked myself [00:31:30.150] many times, when fishing some of these high altitude brook trout streams. And honestly, I don't know. They could have been there since the glaciers and there might be ponds or lakes above those streams that hold wild populations or held wild populations of brook trout. And these little brook trout can jump surprisingly high falls. So we think they're isolated [00:32:00.299] up there, but unless there's a really, really high impassable falls, they can get up and down in those stream systems pretty well.
Are they original brook trout from pre-European settlement or are they brook trout that might have been stocked at some point in time, maybe lower down in the river system and got up there? I don't have any idea. I like to think that they've been there forever. But I don't think [00:32:30.099] we can ever answer that question. Perhaps a DNA analysis might give us a clue to that but they're obviously wild up there now. Nobody's stocked them up there. Nobody would go up that high in a little tiny stream to stock fish. Or unless they were trying to restore a population of brook trout, which could've happened. But yeah, basically, I don't know. I don't know, and I don't think anybody really knows for sure. [00:33:00.119]
Here's an email from Austin from Alberta, Canada. "We have a number of small to medium low-gradient brown trout streams here. These places are some of my favorite places to fish. They generally have slow-moving stained water with good visibility and can hold spooky and occasionally surprisingly large trout. I have good success catching fish on dries and dry droppers. However, never had any luck fishing these with a streamer.
Stealthy casting and approach [00:33:30.039] is necessary on these streams, and the plop of a streamer into the water seems to scare the fish. I wanted to know if you have any tips on streamer fishing for these trout, or is it that type of fishing is just incongruous with this environment, and should I focus on nymphing and dries? As a newer fly fisher person, the podcast has been a wonderful resource, and thank you for your time."
So, Austin, I think that it's the time that you fish a streamer rather than how you [00:34:00.164] fish it or where you fish it or exactly what fly pattern. A stream like that, in a bright sunlight in the middle of the day, probably a trout isn't going to chase its streamer. But toward dark, very early in the morning, rainy days or when the water goes up a little bit and gets a little bit more stained, those are the times you're going to have luck with a streamer.
And you're right, it probably spooks trout most of the time, under most conditions. But streamer fishing [00:34:30.255] is really situational. And if you want to have effective streamer fishing, in most rivers, you need to pick your times. And they're just not going to work all the time. You would think that there's a big brown trout living under a log. He's going to just jump on my streamer, but doesn't happen usually under bright sunlight and in the middle of the day. They just don't chase their prey until the light gets lower. Their prey [00:35:00.025] has a disadvantage in high dirty water.
Brian: Hi, Tom. Brian in Watertown, Massachusetts here. I've recently outfitted myself with the Helios D 9-weight for fishing the salt along Coastal Massachusetts, and I'm wondering which gear and equipment do you have that is dedicated strictly to freshwater, strictly to salt water, and which gear do you use for both? Do you use different waders and boots, packs and boxes? I have different pliers and nips for [00:35:30.164] the salt, but what gear should I not use for both so as to avoid the corrosive effect of the salt? Thanks for the tips, and keep those lines tight.
Tom: Well, Brian these days, most of the stuff that is sold for fly fishing is pretty resistant to salt water. The zippers we're careful to put noncorrosive pull tabs on zippers [00:36:00.465] and noncorrosive zippers. And honestly, all the raincoats and the packs and waders and wading boots and fly boxes that I use, I use both in fresh and salt water, and I never had a problem with anything.
The one area that I've had problems with, first of all, it's kind of obvious is flies tied on noncorrosion resistant hooks, freshwater [00:36:30.295] hooks. Those will rust if you're not careful, if you don't rinse them off right after you finish with them in fresh water. And the other thing is flashlights. I fish at night in salt water fair amount. And a lot of flashlights will get corroded and ruined with salt water. So, you have to be careful about what kind of flashlight you use. But other than that [00:37:00.539], I can't think of many things in basic fly fishing tackle that I've really had problems with in salt water.
All right. That is the Fly Box for this week. Let's go talk to Tic about fishing southern tailwaters.
Well, my guest today is Tic Smith, and Tic has been nominated for guide of the year, Orvis-Endorsed Guide of the Year [00:37:30.159] for 2025. And I can't say that I'm hoping you win because I want to play favorites, but it's an honor just to be nominated, Tic. And so, congratulations.
Tic: It sure is, and it's a reflection on our whole group, and we just take a lot of pride in it. It sure is nice to be recognized.
Tom: Yeah. So, tell people a little bit about your operation just so people can place [00:38:00.320] where you are and what you fish and who you work with.
Tic: Okay. Well, there are six of us in total that guide. We're all guides, but we all work under the same umbrella of Southeastern Anglers which is owned by Dane Law. He kind of handles all the business end of things, and we guide. We get to concentrate on what we love doing. And we've been together for a long time. Everybody's [00:38:30.360] got a lot of experience. I'm the oldest one of the group, so I guess I've got a little more on these other guys. But it's really nice to have a group of guides that work together and share information.
We're on the Hiwassee River in particular. That river, you have to be permitted by the National Forest Service, Cherokee National Forest, to be able to work there. [00:39:00.340] So, you don't have a lot of other guides that guide on that river. It's pretty much just us. There are a couple of other outfitters, but it's not like some places, I would think, where guides are really competing against each other. We're not that way. We work together, and it just really helps out having friends and coworkers, I guess, you would call us, to share that kind of information because we all learn [00:39:30.079] from each other and pick each other up and keep it going.
Tom: Yeah. It's always helpful when you see somebody else on the river, you know that you're not going to have any issues with them because you guys have probably already figured out who's going to fish where and you're...
Tic: Right. Yeah, we all work very well together. And like I said, we've been doing it quite a while. This will be my... I started in '94. So, I guess this is [00:40:00.090] 31 years or something like that.
Tom: Wow.
Tic: Yeah, I've been at it a while.
Tom: Yeah, I guess you have. So, well, that's good because what we're going to talk about today is tips for fishing Southern tailwaters, and that's become an incredibly popular part of the fly fishing world these days are these Southern tailwaters, places where there probably were never trout, but because of dam releases, you got cold [00:40:30.150] water throughout the season, and you have year-round trout fishing. So, it's a valuable resource and extremely popular. And so, let's give people some tips on how to fish these kind of rivers.
Tic: All right. Sounds good.
Tom: Why don't you take us through the seasons first, and what people should expect at different times a year. That's probably a good idea.
Tic: Okay. [00:41:00.014] Well, let's just start right now with this time of year, and I'll work us through the winter. Much like the rest of the country, our spring is just getting started. And the seasons will, especially spring, some years they start earlier than others. And this year for us, I would have to say that we're starting a little bit late. But our good [00:41:30.175] hatches are literally a week away, and it'll start out with blue-winged olives and little black caddis. Those will be our two prominent hatches for the next...until we get to about the second or third week of April, then we start seeing Hendricksons.
And the Hendrickson is one of my favorite hatches that we have on the Hiwassee, because that's like the first real good size [00:42:00.275] mayfly that everybody can see, and they hatch in big numbers, and they're not real good about getting out of the water when they hatch. And the nymphs are very unique, and the nymphs migrate up the river. And the river really comes alive at that time, the Hiwassee does. And that really kicks off our dry fly season just like most places.
I will say, particularly, the Hiwassee has [00:42:30.224] a lot more insect activity or at least diverse insect activity as opposed to a lot of southern tailwaters. Most of your southern tailwaters are going to have one or two prominent species that hatch. The Hiwassee is not like that. The Hiwassee goes through quite a few different hatches, but we don't necessarily have one that predominates over the other. I would say the most prolific [00:43:00.034] of the hatches would be blue-winged olives because we can get those in different broods throughout the season.
But our sulfurs on the Hiwassee last for about a month, whereas on some other typical tailwaters like the South Holston or the Cumberland, they can last for many months. On the South Holston, you can have sulfurs for nine months out of the year, which is a good thing, and it can be kind of tough [00:43:30.125] if you're in month seven fishing sulfurs because the fish are really tuned into it.
Tom: Yeah. I know some rivers like that.
Tic: Yes. And then in the early weeks of April, we'll start getting our cinnamon caddis. And they hatch in large numbers on the river in April. And so, by the time we get in, to the time that the dogwoods are blooming and it's pretty outside, all that good stuff, we got a lot going on at least on the Hiwassee, [00:44:00.550] and that's where we are concentrating our efforts this time of year is on the Hiwassee.The Cumberland has not quite awake yet.
So, as far as the Hiwassee goes, that's what I'm talking about through early summer. And then in May, we'll have our sulfurs that will begin to hatch in large numbers. And we'll have good sulfur fishing and up through about the second week of June. [00:44:30.489] And olive caddis are out, and then we have the granum caddis that comes out around the end of May as well.
So, kind of painting a picture where when you're out there on the water, you better have your box full of quite a few different things because you can encounter different hatches during the day depending on where you are on the river, either wading, but especially in a boat. We can go from one [00:45:00.210] hatch to the next as we drift down. So, we are right at the cusp of great dry fly fishing, and that's kind of what the Hiwassee is known for.
And then towards the June, my favorite hatch is the Isonychia or Slate Drake. I know that you guys up east love the Isonychias, and we do too. We have some really nice ones, nice hatches of those on the Hiwassee [00:45:30.539] in late June and early July, and they will sporadically hatch into the fall. That's a fun hatch to fish.
Tom: Now that's a mayfly that crawls out of the water like a stonefly, right?
Tic: They do. They like to. Mm-hmm.
Tom: But you find that they still get in the river and you could still have dry fly fishing with them?
Tic: A lot of it is the nature of the Hiwassee [00:46:00.320] itself, and I'll get more into that as we talk about these different tailwaters. But the Hiwassee has shoals that run all the way across it. In many, many places, it's a shallow, rocky river that's 200 to 300 yards wide. Okay?
Tom: Yep.
Tic: I'm talking 3 to 4 feet of water in a lot of places. And there's a lot of rocks that are exposed. So, those Isonychias can hatch out of the middle of the river [00:46:30.329] because of the rock formation. They don't have to swim to the bank. An Isonychia nymph is a swimming nymph. They really swim. But we'll have Isonychias right out in the middle of our river when they're coming off. And our stoneflies do the same thing. Our large golden stones in particular, you'll see them pop out right out of the middle of the river.
Tom: So, even though they're hatching onto rocks, what do they get? They get knocked into the river, [00:47:00.269] they get blown into the river by the wind and so on?
Tic: Yeah. Or they hatch as a cripple. Things happen to them. And then, of course, you'll have a spinnerfall in the evening. But, yes, as those guys are emerging, unlike a lot of mayflies that emerge underneath the water, they like to get to the dry before they start popping out their wings and stuff. But yeah, when those nymphs are on the move [00:47:30.539] and the adults are hatching, there's some really good action with Isonychias. It's a very fun hatch to fish because all of a sudden you got a number 10 parachute on. Everybody can see that, and it'll float all day long.
Tom: Yeah. You can...
Tic: And we tie some great patterns for those.
Tom: And you can actually fish a nymph and strip it like a streamer, right? During that hatch.
Tic: AKA, Isonychia-colored wooly booger. They work very well [00:48:00.014] in about a size 12.
Tom: Okay. Interesting.
Tic: Yes.
Tom: And then what about midsummer on those tailwaters down there? What do you see?
Tic: Okay. Well, that's when we transition to the Cumberland River in Kentucky. We typically will leave the Hiwassee in early July because everything is in full gear on the Cumberland, and it's a completely different river than the Hiwassee. [00:48:30.594] You don't have the hatches that you have like you do on the Hiwassee, but you do have sulfurs and blue wings in early July. You've got a short window there in early July, late June, where you will have some really good sulfur blue wing action. But the terrestrial fishing kicks in right at that same time. And the water out in the Cumberland is in the mid 50s in July [00:49:00.005] and August. You're fishing 55 to 58 degree water in the middle of August.
Tom: Wow.
Tic: So, the fish are very active. And that river, as opposed to being rocky with lots of shoals like we have on the Hiwassee, it is more of a single current kind of flat water with a few gravel bars, but what you have are limestone bluffs that run up and down that river. And along those bluffs or rock walls [00:49:30.155], as we call them, you have seams. And these seams will run...they can run for hundreds of yards down a bank with a drop-off or a series of drop-offs coming off those walls. And that's what we fish with those terrestrials: beetles, ants, hoppers, and a summer cicada, the big green cicadas. We catch fish on those in the middle of the summer as well.
Tom: Is that an annual cicada [00:50:00.135] that you have down there?
Tic: That's an annual. Yeah, that's just your normal summer cicada that we have down south, but that river is the only one where I've really ever fished that pattern for trout and had success.
Tom: Okay. And aren't you going to have...
Tic: I mean, we're talking a really...
Tom: Aren't you going to have the periodic cicadas this year in that area?
Tic: Yes, we will. There's going to be some sections of East Tennessee that will have them, and the Cumberland River will have [00:50:30.170] them. We fished them the last time they came around. And so, we're very confident that we're going to have them again, and we're extremely excited about that. I know that you have fished Chile, and we have too, and that kind of fishing is very similar to fishing the Cantaria beetles down there. It's really not something that's 100%.
[00:51:00.909] We have our maps of where they're going to hatch, and we kind of know when they're going to hatch, but it's not 100% they're going to be right here on this part of the river or right down there on this part of the river, but they're going to be there. And you'll have a two- to three-week period of peak activity, which will be somewhere between late May and the first three weeks of June. That's when it's going to happen.
[00:51:30.710] And we are extremely excited about that because the Cumberland is not the type of river that you go to to catch numbers of fish. It's a little bit harder to fish, but what you do have are big brown trout and big rainbow trout. There's a slot limit on that river of 15 to 20 inches. And to be honest with you, Tom, that's what you catch, up to 22 [00:52:00.570] to 24-inch fish.
Tom: That's pretty nice.
Tic: There are days out there where I wish I could find a bunch of smaller fish just to kind of keep things going, but I don't know where they are. I don't catch many little fish there. But a typical day on the Cumberland can be anywhere from an angler hooking up, fighting somewhere between 6 or 7 up to 15 or more of those fish in that slot limit size [00:52:30.269] or bigger. And that's what you're there for, to catch the big ones.
And that time of year when you're... Of course, we'll have the cicadas this year, which is going to be a kind of a different thing. But typically, when we're fishing the hoppers and the beetles and such, those big fish, that's what they're looking for. We'll put a dropper on that time of year, of course, fish the hopper dropper thing. But to be [00:53:00.139] honest with you, we probably do better on the dry patterns than we do the droppers, believe it or not...
Tom: Nice.
Tic: ...on the size of fish. And there's many times where I don't even put a dropper on because I want that fly up tight to the bank, you know? The Hiwassee, as opposed to the Cumberland, is definitely more of a numbers-type thing. The fish of the week on the Hiwassee would be kind of [00:53:30.139] like an average fish on the Cumberland. And I mean, that's just the way it is.
We catch a lot of fish in the smaller range from 10 to 13, 14 inches. But for anglers that just kind of want constant action, that just really want to hone their skills, say, then the Hiwassee is just excellent for that. We catch a lot of fish on that river in a typical day. [00:54:00.110] But there are big fish in the Hiwassee. There was a 32-inch brown caught up there last year, and we've boated many fish over 20 inches in the last few years, but you're not going to get 4 or 5 of those in a day. That's going to be the fish for a while. The better fish.
But as we go through the late summer, we're still on the Cumberland, and [00:54:30.070] we will fish that all the way into the end of October. And that terrestrial fishing lasts all the way into there, through October. One thing I did not mention about the Cumberland is it does have a good stonefly, especially the giant black stoneflies. And that's a great nymph that you can fish on that river any time of year and catch some good-quality fish on that.
[00:55:00.725] Now, we don't see the adults because they're nocturnal, but the stonefly nymph is very important on that river. And if you're lucky enough to hit the blue wings and sulfurs, then all of a sudden, you've got fish like that that are rising consistently. And you're throwing size 16 sulfurs at them with a 5x tippet. That's very challenging fishing. You can get them to eat, but getting them to the boat's a whole different deal.
On the Hiwassee, [00:55:30.039] we use a raft or ClackaCraft drift boats depending on our water level. And then on the Cumberland, we use jet boats, a 16-foot jet boat, so that we can cover a lot of water. The Cumberland has over 90 miles of trout water.
Tom: Wow.
Tic: Yeah. The Hiwassee has about, at the most, 20. About 15 miles below it. But we can cover, with that jet boat on the Cumberland, we can [00:56:00.514] we can stay ahead of a generation schedule that we don't want to fish, or we can get behind it. It just gives us a lot of options.
Tom: Now do both of those rivers have a generation schedule where they fluctuate daily, Tic?
Tic: They do. They do. Absolutely. And the Cumberland is a much bigger system, much bigger dam, much bigger lake, similar to what you would have on the White River. That size of lake. [00:56:30.585] And the Hiwassee is a tributary, was considered a tributary river or system to the main arm of the Tennessee River. And so our lakes for the Hiwassee or our lake for the Hiwassee is much smaller, and you're dealing with much less CFS.
When they're generating full capacity on the Hiwassee is when we like to drift it. And that's different than most all your other southern tailwaters. Generally, [00:57:00.144] you want to fish the other tailwaters on low water, which you certainly can do on the Hiwassee, but we have the added benefit of being able to use our drift boats when they're generating full power because the river's so wide and shallow, and we're just fishing 3,200 CFS. It's not that much.
The Cumberland is way different than that. They can they can run 15 to 25,000 CFS [00:57:30.735] at any time through that river, which they predict. They give you that predicted schedule, but you have to fish the Cumberland when it's a low generation, like an average of 7,500 or less is what we're looking for most of the time, and we get that during the dry months of the summer and early fall. We have the optimum water flows for the Cumberland Dam.
Tom: Now, a lot of people that fish southern tailwaters have to deal with these generation [00:58:00.264] schedules, right? Because they're mostly hydro dams.
Tic: It's the first consideration you should make when you're thinking about these. And just to finish up going through the end of the season...
Tom: Yeah. Sorry.
Tic: ...before we get into that. I'm sorry. But a great thing is that we have pretty decent weather in the wintertime. We have excellent winter trout fishing. I love to be on the Hiwassee November through [00:58:30.405] February. December-January can be some really good fishing, and we actually have dry fly fishing then with very, very small betas. I admit they're little bitty bugs, but you at least get to dry fly fish in January, which is kind of cool. And then your typical nymph and streamer fishing is excellent in the wintertime. Our water temps at the very coldest will get down [00:59:00.085] into the mid 40s.
Tom: Oh, that's still good.
Tic: Whereas the mountain streams around us could be in the mid 30s. So, the fish are fairly active. Well, they are. They are active all winter long. So the wintertime is important to us. Of course, you want to have good weather. You don't want a lot of wind. And that time of year, the sun actually seems to really help the fishing. But, yeah, we have 12 months of fishing. That's for sure.
Tom: Now do you get midge hatches [00:59:30.704] on those rivers during the winter?
Tic: Yes. Okay. So, on the Hiwassee, the midges are important during the early winter months. Okay? That's because we don't have a lot of other things going on. Over the course of the winter, you'll have midges and you'll have betas. And that's when the midges are the most important to me. Once I get into this time of year, yes, we have midges. [01:00:00.485] If you want to fish midges, go for it, but I'm putting on a caddis or something else. I want to start going after the larger species for the hatches.
And the Cumberland is very much tuned in to midge fishing, particularly on the upper reaches of it. Like I said, you have many, many miles of river [01:00:30.025] to fish. The first 8 to 10 miles below Wolf Creek Dam on the Cumberland is definitely a midge fishery because that's about the only type of insect that can survive up there under all that water pressure that comes out of that dam. The substrate there is cleaned out due to all that water coming down through there. [01:01:00.039] But midges are very important up there, and people catch giant fish up there on midges all the time.
Where we fish, we start about 15 miles below the dam, and we'll fish as much as 45 to 50 miles below the dam. We like fishing down there, primarily because you start getting into more insect population. That's where your stoneflies are. That's where your craneflies are [01:01:30.130] and your sulfurs and your blue wings. You got a little bit more diverse biomass as you move down that river. So, we don't really fish that upper stretch a whole lot, but there are guides that do. They use drift boats with a kicker on the back. But we're downstream from that. So, midges just aren't that big of a deal to us fishing either river except for a couple of months [01:02:00.119] out of the year.
Tom: Okay.
Tic: Which is fine with me.
Tom: In low water, can both of those rivers be wade-fished?
Tic: All right. Well, that's a great question. First of all, yes. The answer is yes. But the Hiwassee has far greater access. Okay? There's not another southern tailwater that has the access to a do-it-yourself angler than the Hiwassee because it's in a national forest. [01:02:30.280] Okay? You don't have all this private land up and down it. And there are hiking trails that you can access the river with.
There are many places where you can park your car and look out across the river and say, "That looks like a good spot. I'm going to go out there and fish." It's just perfect for the do-it-yourself angler. And when the water is off, you will have a [01:03:00.079] lot of wading anglers out there, but it's a big river, and people can spread out and have their own areas to fish, especially if you get on one of the hiking trails and hike 10 minutes, you're going to eliminate 75% of the people you'll be fishing around.
Tom: Yeah. That's pretty difficult.
Tic: Now the Cumberland, even though it fishes great on low water, unfortunately, it does not have the access. You have [01:03:30.179] big farms that run up and down this river. You don't have much development. There's not many houses on it, but you do have big giant farms. And there's just no access to the river except in just a few designated places, which you can imagine get hammered. And I would not recommend the Cumberland as a destination for that type of angler. You have to have a boat, really, [01:04:00.369] to fish that river.
Tom: Now, what's the access law on the Cumberland? It's in Kentucky, right? So, what's the access law? Once you get into the river, can you cross private land if you're still in the river?
Tic: Yes. Yes. We don't have that on either one of these rivers. Obviously, the Hiwassee National Forest, you don't have that problem. But on the Cumberland, no, Kentucky [01:04:30.144] does not have that stipulation.
Tom: So, if somebody wanted to get in one of those access areas and walk a bit, they might be able to get away from the crowds.
Tic: They can. It's just the makeup of that river, Tom. You can get in in an access point, and you can have a lovely shoal to fish or gravel bar to fish, but that's about all you're going to get. You can't just get in the river and go up and down it as you can on the Hiwassee or some of these other tailwaters.
Tom: Okay. [01:05:00.085] All right.
Tic: The Hiwassee typically is going to have its lowest generation schedules during the months of April and May because that's when they're filling up the reservoir up above us, up the summer pool. So, they're not running water through. They do what's called a pulsing schedule, where they'll run 750 CFS up to 1,200 CFS for about an hour, and then [01:05:30.094] it'll be off for three hours, then they'll cut it back on. But the water only fluctuates maybe a foot for a short period of time. So, during the months of April and May, a lot of people will travel to wade fish the Hiwassee because they don't have to worry about the water coming up.
Tom: Right. Okay. Good to know.
Tic: Once summer gets going, they'll start generally generating around 10 a.m. in the morning. And depending on where you are on the river, [01:06:00.255] if you're 5 miles downstream fishing, that water is not going to reach you till after 12 or more like 1 or 2 in the afternoon.
Tom: But you do need to be aware of those generating schedules, right? Because you want to get out of the river when it starts to...
Tic: It's the first thing you do when you're researching a tailwater to fish. You need to know that generation schedule. And you can get that online through tva.com. [01:06:30.114] It's Tennessee Valley. And the Hiwassee, the way you find it, is actually you click on Appalachia. You don't click on Hiwassee. That's kind of a confusing thing, but our water comes from Lake Appalachia. It's the Appalachia powerhouse that will show up on your screen. That's the generation schedule you want to check. And the Cumberland River is Wolf Creek Dam.
Tom: Okay. Now, what species... I assume you got browns and [01:07:00.085] rainbows in both rivers, right?
Tic: We have browns and rainbows in both rivers, and the cutthroat trout are stocked a couple of times a year in both rivers as well. We get the eggs from the Snake River cutthroat, and they raise them in the hatcheries. And we'll get some of those. And the cutthroats actually do pretty doggone well. We'll catch [01:07:30.429] cutthroats that have been in the river for a couple of years in both rivers. They hold over fairly well.
Tom: Interesting.
Tic: Not as well as the Browns do, but they that has been somewhat of a success for us, and and clients love catching a cutthroat trout in Tennessee, which brings them out. It's not the same as catching one of those beauties out in Wyoming, but it's still kind of a neat thing for us.
Tom: It's amazing to me [01:08:00.010] that browns and rainbows reproduce so well throughout the country, but I've never heard of a self-sustaining cutthroat population East Of The Mississippi ever.
Tic: Yeah. I don't know what it is about them, but evidently. I don't know, but for whatever reasons. But the brown trout in the Cumberland River are very successful [01:08:30.329] at spawning. So, we have a strong population of wild brown trout in that river. And that's what we're targeting when we're on the Cumberland. That's what we want to catch. And we catch the big rainbows that get just as big as the big browns, but it's those browns that we're after. And they're mean fish, and they're fun to catch. They're a challenge. [01:09:00.020] I get a lot of humbling out there.
Tom: Now, are are all the rainbows stocked in those rivers?
Tic: Yes, but they will spawn as well. Some of the feeder streams... There's a feeder stream right below Wolf Creek Dam that will sustain some spawning from both species. And the rainbows and the browns both will spawn on the gravel bars during their specific times [01:09:30.270] of the year. But I am of the opinion that the rainbows are just not as successful at spawning as the browns are. You can kind of, you will catch some very small brown trout sometimes, and that tells me they're reproducing. They don't stock 4-inch brown trout.
So, they will stock them. They do stock as well. But [01:10:00.140] because of the length and just the lack of fishing pressure, all that good stuff on the Cumberland, the holdover population in both species it's really high. You've got a lot of three to four-year-old fish in that river.
Tom: Okay. I know in a lot of the southern tailwaters in particular, the white people get excited about the brown trout spawning run and target those [01:10:30.685] big fish that are moving up through the system to spawn. Do you have a similar situation in your rivers?
Tic: Well, we do on the Cumberland, but we don't target the brown trout when they're doing that. But what you can do is you can get a couple of casts below a gravel bar where you see the reds and those big rainbows will be sitting down there eating those eggs. We don't mess with the fish that are on the reds.
Tom: Yeah. [01:11:00.295] That's a good thing, but in some rivers they do.
Tic: Well, that's just us personally. I'm sure...
Tom: Yeah. No, that's admirable.
Tic: ...there's that do. But I guess, it's kind of hard sometimes to tell the difference between the female and the male, the males around the red. But we're just of the opinion just leave them alone. Good grief. And they don't all spawn at the same time anyway. So just keep fishing. [01:11:30.145] You'll catch them, but you don't need to mess with those fish there.
Tom: Yeah. And they're moving anyways. So, they may not be on the reds, but they might be moving up into the area, right?
Tic: Yeah. Yeah. But typically though on the Cumberland when that's happening, you're looking at mid November, okay? And it can be miserably cold there in mid November. So, a lot of those fish are pretty safe.
Tom: Good. Well, that's good to hear.
Tic: [01:12:00.255] Yeah. They're pretty safe. And on the Hiwassee, you just do not have the spawning activity because of the constant difference and fluctuation on that river. It's just not nearly as conducive to spawning. But there is some brown trout spawning on the Hiwassee, but it definitely depends on stocking and the holdover of fish is what creates the fishing on that river.
Tom: Now, you just said [01:12:30.154] you kind of leave the Hiwassee in the summertime. Does it get warm? Does it get warmer?
Tic: It does. Yes. Temps can easily reach into the upper 60s by late July. Still fishable. You can still catch fish, but we'd rather be somewhere else where we're not hurting the fish. We just feel like if you're catching fish in 68 degree water [01:13:00.215], especially a good one, he's got a high chance of mortality. So, we can be in a much better stretch of river just an hour further away from most people, and fishing for trophy fish, and that's why we go there.
Tom: Okay. Now, if someone's going to head your way, what do you recommend for tackle? What rod and line do you recommend?
Tic: Well, [01:13:30.095] your average rod weight of 5 and 6 weights are what most people have, and that's what they bring. And those will work for a lot of the type of fishing that we do. And the odd weights, the smaller rods, and the bigger rods, like 7 weights with sink tips for streamer fishing, that type stuff, we have that ourselves. But on either one of these rivers [01:14:00.074], you can fish the lightest rod that you want to, dry fly fishing, up to a 7 or 8 rod with 250 to 300 grain sink tips on both rivers.
The type of fishing varies so much on both rivers, but your typical 5 and 6 weight rods, 8.5 or 9-foot rods, those fish very well out of a drift boat and will allow you to cast into whatever type of [01:14:30.154] windy type conditions we have or the size of flies that we use. In the month of May, I may have an 18 or a 20 blue-winged olive parachute tied on, and an hour and a half later, you're fishing a number 6 stimulator.
So, you just change your leaders, right? You change your leader. You change your tippet. But being in a boat, we can carry rods with us. [01:15:00.314] But the typical 5 and 6 weights work great on the river. I personally love to throw a lot of smaller rods, 3 and 4 weight rods dry fly fishing. I just think a 4-weight rod is just a... I guess it's a shameless plug, but that Helios 4-weight rod is something special.
Tom: That's okay. We can shameless plug on this podcast. [01:15:30.859] It's our podcast.
Tic: Yeah. But everybody hopefully has their favorite type of dry fly rod. And when I say dry fly, I'm talking size 14s and smaller, maybe a size 12 and smaller. They're just wonderful to fish with. And if you catch a big fish on it, it can handle it. It's fine. So, I do [01:16:00.000] carry those with me because most people will, like I say, show up with a 5 weight or a 6 weight or both. And we get on a really good hatch and things are happening, I'll pull out a 3 or a 4 weight and say, "Let's give this a shot." And they really enjoy fishing that way.
Tom: Do you ever fish 10-foot rods on those rivers?
Tic: Yes, but not with dry flies. I know a lot of guys like those 10-foot rods, especially out west if you can reach out and get them. [01:16:30.029] And we can kind of talk about how we fish the tailwaters. But when I'm using my 10-foot rods, I'm more nymph fishing with those. Okay? Because they can more line off the water with them.
And I don't really encourage the dry fly fishing with a 10-foot rod. There're some guys that fish them with me, and I'm not going to tell them not to fish them. They definitely work on the Cumberland. But [01:17:00.279] on the Hiwassee, if you imagine a shoal running across a river that's 200 yards wide, what you're going to have coming out of that shoal are little runs, just like a 15-foot wide trout stream that you would fish, except you might have 15 of them in a row going across the river. And the boat's going sideways. I get below a shoal, and I'm going from one run to the next.
Well, you don't want to [01:17:30.090] cast across one run and then slack water into another run. You're never going to get adrift, right? So, typically a lot of people fishing out west or whatever, they think they have to have these rods to so they can make longer casts out of a drift boat. Well, on the Hiwassee, I'm reining people in. I'm like, "20 feet is fine right here. You want to get it adrift. You don't have to cast it 50 feet. You're not going to get adrift.
[01:18:00.170] And you can easily do that with 8.5 to 9-foot rods or even smaller. But the 10-foot rods do work for me when I'm fishing a nymph rig. I do like that. Or like a jig booger type fly, I do like the 10 lengths for that just for the reach. It's not euronymphing. I'm not euronymphing, but I'm close.
Tom: Now, you haven't mentioned much about nymph [01:18:30.109] fishing or euronymphing. And I know a lot of people like to do it. Is that productive on your rivers?
Tic: Well, on the Hiwassee on low water, I'm sure that euronymphing is very effective for the wading angler. Euronymphing from a drift boat is not productive. Not for us. We don't do that. But we do [01:19:00.194] do our nymph fishing, and some of the guides are much more in tune with that than I am. I just kind of have a philosophy of trying to catch fish that I try to use as little strike indicator and 8-foot deep nymphs as I can get away with. And I know it's a very productive way to fish, and it's a very productive way to fish on the Cumberland because you have [01:19:30.244] a very average gradient or depth all in long stretches on that river.
On the Hiwassee, you can go from 2-feet deep to 12-feet deep in 20 yards. So, if you're trying to fish on the bottom of the Hiwassee as the boat is drifting downstream, I would have to literally be changing my indicator. I would have to change it 10,000 times in one day. [01:20:00.274] It's not an effective way unless you anchor on a run, you know how deep it is, and you dedicate yourself to nymphing that run, then it does come into play.
And I fish a ton of nymphs, don't get me wrong, but I'm fishing nymphs 2-feet deep or 3-feet deep because I feel like the fish that I'm fishing for, the active fish are going to [01:20:30.225] be looking up. When that water gets turned on at these dams or powerhouses and that water comes rushing down the river, it is washing nymphs off of rocks and grass or whatever. And so you have this biomass floating down the river. It's either floating or it's in somewhere between the bottom and the top, or some of the nymphs obviously are going to settle to the bottom.
But we all know that there's less current at the bottom of the river [01:21:00.494] than what's on the surface. And then there's something halfway up where you still have a bit of current. I'm fishing for those fish that are looking up into the current to bring them food, which means I'm typically fishing fairly shallow water. I'm not targeting fish in 10 feet of water. I'm targeting fish from 5 feet or less or even less than that. Three feet deep.
Tom: So, you don't need to change your indicator, [01:21:30.114] and you're not trying to scratch the bottom, right? You're just trying to fish subsurface?
Tic: No, I'm not. I'm fishing somewhere between the middle of the water column up to the surface. And I'll use a rig a lot as my dropper, my dry, that I can adjust my dry fly. I don't adjust the nymph. I adjust the dry fly. And I do that with my little dropper piece of tippet has a perfection loop in it. [01:22:00.295] And let's say I put a beadhead nymph 12 to 18-inches below my tippet knot. Okay? I have a tippet knot, and then I have my nymph 12 to 18-inches below that.
Up above that knot, I'll just cut off about a 6-inch piece of 4x or 5x, and put a perfection loop in one end of it, and run that loop underneath my main leader [01:22:30.175] above that tippet knot and then take the tag end over that leader back through the perfection loop and cinch it down. And then I'll tie my dry fly 3-4 inches off of my main leader. And if I want to go from fishing 20-inches deep to 30-inches deep, all I have to do is wet that little knot that goes over the leader, and I can slide that dry fly up.
Tom: Interesting.
Tic: All right? Yeah. And if a fish eats [01:23:00.225] that dry fly, then that knot will slide down to my tippet knot, but it'll stop right there. It doesn't slide. And that way, I can kind of work my way down the river, and all I'm doing is adjusting that dry fly. My nymph's where I want it to be. And it's great for hoppers as well to use that rig.
Tom: That's interesting. So, you have an adjustable dry dropper rig.
Tic: Yeah. And to be honest with you, I can drop 4 feet if I want to. [01:23:30.600] I can slide that dry fly up if I'm using a 12-foot leader. I can have my dry fly 8 feet down from my fly line and still get a decent cast with that, but I can have my net 4 feet deep if I have to? And I usually don't do that, but I can. But I can really play with that 12-inches to 30-inch depth using that rig.
Tom: That's great. Well, [01:24:00.409] that's the first reasonable adjustable dry dropper rig I've ever heard of, and I'm going to try that myself.
Tic: Really?
Tom: Yeah.
Tic: I learned it a long time ago up on the Bow River, up in Alberta. Those guys were using it. And I just I've used it ever since when I'm putting a bead underneath a dry. And even an unweighted nymph, if I'm fishing a rising fish, it'll work for that too. [01:24:30.050] It'll work for that too.
Tom: So, you just put a perfection loop on the end of that extra piece of tippet, and you just do it like you would a line leader connection, basically. Put the tag in through and cinch it down.
Tic: Yeah. Well, yeah. So you've got your main leader, and then you add your tippet just like you would, say, 5x, four-O, 18-24 inches long, and then you put your bead head on. And then you're going to cut that 6-inch [01:25:00.170] piece of line, and then you're going to go back up above your tippet knot. And you're going to have a perfection loop on one end. And the deal is you put that loop underneath your main leader and then take the other tag end and go over the leader and just run it through that loop and pull it tight. And it'll stay there. It'll stay there. It won't slide up and down as long as you pull it tight.
It helps to be able to tie a fairly small perfection loop. That does help. [01:25:30.090] But if you practice it, you can do it. But even if you can, it still works. And it's really, really good for hopper dropper. Like on the Cumberland, when we're fishing those seams, there'll be a drop off off of those bluffs. Like, where the bluff enters the water, you may have a foot or two long shelf that comes out from the bluff, and that could be anywhere from 4 inches [01:26:00.300] of water to a foot deep. And then there'll be another drop off. And that drop off can be anywhere from a foot to 4 feet deep.
And those fish love to hold right on the edge of those drop offs, somewhere around that first shelf. But they will come up onto that shelf to eat. A lot of it depends on where the scene is. And that rig allows you as you go down river, you can tell if it's dropping off more [01:26:30.310] or the shelf's coming out further, etc. So, you can easily make adjustments, and you're not having to cut and retie and all that kind of stuff.
Tom: Yeah. Yeah. That's a method I'm going to play around with this year for sure.
Tic: Okay. Yeah. Yeah, I think you'll like it.
Tom: Yeah. Yeah, I'm going to give it a try.
Tic: It just makes things a little easier and more efficient.
Tom: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. So, Tic, anything we left out, any other [01:27:00.010] advice you would have for people that are planning on visiting a southern tailwater?
Tic: Well, I think I'd like to maybe talk about some things that I see in the boat for anglers that go fishing from a boat once or twice a year or may have never done it before. There's obvious mistakes that we all know about as far as casting and presentation and drag, and I [01:27:30.029] won't get into that because there's plenty of talk about that. But one common thing that I seem to talk about daily is reading the water when you're in a drift boat.
When we're working in a regular trout stream and we're wading up a stream and we approach a pool or run, it's natural for us to kind of scout it out, right? We look at the pool or the run, and we kind of figure out how we [01:28:00.034] want to work that and plan our cast and our presentation and fly selection, whatever, to that particular run that we have waded up to. That kind of comes natural for people.
But when they get in a drift boat and start going down the river, their fly rod all of a sudden becomes a machine gun and they're just whipping out these casts and it's like the more casts you make, [01:28:30.154] the better the opportunity to catch a fish. It's like we're not in a rush, okay? And I think they get to where they just want to rapid fire their casts out there towards the bank or the seam or the run, and they're not really looking at it before they do it. It's like they think we're in a rush.
Most of the time, we can slow our boats down, especially a drift boat [01:29:00.185] is made to surf in the current. We can hit the sticks a few times and stop that boat dead in fast water. And typically, we're going slower than the main current. But if people will take the time to look at what's coming up downstream from them future targets or the runs, and just kind of think about how you're going to make that cast and how you're going to make that presentation [01:29:30.564] to the optimum piece of water that you can reach.
And I think clients give guides a little bit too much credit or they rely on us a little bit too much for us to tell them where to cast. And I tell my clients, I said, "Now, if I'm telling you where to cast, it's probably almost too late." Once we identify the way that we're going to [01:30:00.005] fish a certain stretch of river, you should be able to kind of pick that up on your own and I can work along with you, but don't just blindly cast out there and hope just because you have a good looking bank coming up or a scene. You need to know what's coming up downstream from you. And I think a lot of people don't think about scouting the water when they get in a drift boat. I think they just, they lose that.
Tom: [01:30:30.314] Good point.
Tic: So, that's one thing I would think about. And it's like going to any river. If you're coming down to fish on your own, just do your research, as far as bug selection goes. And I'm a fishing guide, so I'm going to get pretty specific on what I fish or what I talk about. But, of course, a prince nymph, a beadhead pheasant tail, all of your soft hackles. [01:31:00.314] I mean, soft hackles are so important to us. Just general flies, your Pat's rubber legs, because we have stoneflies in both rivers. You can get away with a lot of that.
And then when the bugs are hatching, if you're somewhat familiar with what's hatching, you have a hatch chart from the internet for wherever you're fishing, you'll have a smattering of parachutes and emergers and caddis to choose from once you see [01:31:30.734] the activity on the river.
And there are times where you can get into frustrating hatches, of course. Sulfurs can be can be a little taxing to all of us, but that's part of the fun, right? It's part of the challenge. But a lot of your basic type flies work just fine on both tailwaters.
Tom: In other words, don't leave home without [01:32:00.204] your Parachute Adams in lots of sizes.
Tic: Right. Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah. That and pheasant tails, you can go a long ways with those.
Tom: You sure can.
Tic: That's for sure. That's for sure. But we do. We have a neat thing about the tailwaters that we have in Eastern Tennessee, Kentucky, Western North Carolina, North Georgia. They're all very different. They're not the same [01:32:30.064] bodies of water. Even though they're classified as tailwaters, they are all very different fisheries, and they're all good. They're all excellent fisheries, but they all have different characters.
I would say that the Hiwassee is the prettiest river that you can just about find anywhere. And I've gotten to fish all over the country and down in South America, and the Hiwassee is just to be [01:33:00.699] less than three hours from a whole lot of people in many different directions, it's kind of hard to believe that that body of water is that beautiful. It's protected. It's protected because it's in a national forest.
Tom: It's public land too.
Tic: That's there for us to use. Absolutely. For sure. Yes.
Tom: Well, that is great, Tic. And those are some really good tips, good suggestions, and I'm sure [01:33:30.095] that people, as you said, the southern tailwaters are different, but I'm sure that people who fish other tailwaters have picked up some good tips on how to fish any of them.
Tic: Well, I hope so. There are a lot of great tailwater anglers down our way, and we all kind of do our different things, I'm sure. But it's just it's a great resource. And for people that are really cold in the wintertime, coming [01:34:00.289] down south to fish is wonderful. And then in July and August, you can come do some great fishing for big browns with terrestrials and not have to get on an airplane.
Tom: That's pretty nice.
Tic: Yeah, for sure.
Tom: All right, Tic. So, remind people where they can find you guys.
Tic: Our website is southeasternanglers.com.
Tom: Right. And they can also find you on the Orvis website too, right? As an endorsed guide.
Tic: Absolutely. We are on the Orvis website. We've [01:34:30.039] been with Orvis for many, many years, and they have just been so helpful. I can't say enough about that company and what it's meant to me personally to work with them and all the assistance that they give us.
Tom: Oh, thank you, Tic.
Tic: And it's getting better.
Tom: Thank you. Thank you.
Tic: That company is really on a roll.
Tom: Thank you.
Tic: Just what they do for the sport and for the guides out there is [01:35:00.100] it's unheralded what they do for... People don't realize what they provide for us. And we can provide that to our customers, right?
Tom: Yep. Yep. Well, Guides are...
Tic: It's a great partnership. Great partnership that I'm very proud of.
Tom: Guides and fly shops are the backbone of this industry. So, we understand it.
Tic: Well, we're trying. We're trying. It's a lot of fun. I think the industry's in really good shape. And I do the fly fishing shows [01:35:30.369], or we do the several of those. And there's constantly new people getting into the sport, and that's a great thing. New types of people. And the more people that we have involved, the better our fisheries or the more protection our fisheries can have. That's the way I look at it.
Tom: Absolutely. Yep.
Tic: That's the way I look at it. And the sharing aspect of it is [01:36:00.329] off the charts. It's as big as it's ever been, and we have to share what we know to help the entire sport.
Tom: Yep. All right, Tic. Thank you so much. I really appreciate it. Really appreciate you taking the time to share your knowledge with us today.
Tic: Well, it's been a real pleasure talking with you, Tom. I'm a big fan, and I really would love to get you down soon.
Tom: Well, yeah. I'd like to do that. I'd like to do that [01:36:30.210]. We'll do it some year.
Tic: Okay. All right, Tom. You take care. Have a great season.
Tom: Okay, Tic. You too. And good luck on the Endorsed Guide of the Year.
Tic: Well, I've already won. So, just being nominated is enough for me, but thank you very much.
Tom: All right. Thanks, Tic.
Man: Thanks for listening to the "Orvis Fly Fishing Podcast" with Tom Rosenbauer. You can be a part of the show. Have a question or a comment? Send it to us at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. in the body of an email or as a voice attachment [01:37:00.198]. You can find more free fishing tips at howtoflyfish.orvis.com.