I would love to write a fishing report about an epic day
catching fish after fish but that post will have to be another day. This past Saturday the plan was to take a guy
from work to my favor fishing spot and let him catch some trout. I suppose that mission was accomplished as he
was able to catch some fish, but the truth is that Saturday was a slow day of
fishing and as I sat on my back deck tonight I realized why. The full moon hung high over the trees in my
back yard and illuminated everything. My
guess is the trout on the Clinch River had been feeding all night and by
morning they had but little interest in my offerings. I have read many reports of fishermen
refusing to bother fishing during the full moon cycle due to the slow
takes. I made my way to the Clinch like
I have many times before and by 6:30 a.m. I was preparing to feel the cold water
against my waders once more. There were
four of us fishing and although I caught four fish and missed several others it
was nice just to cast a line and feel a tug at the other end.
At 9:30 I decided to break from the group and fish a run of
water that had netted me a few Brook trout and one decent Brown on a previous
trip. As I scanned the water the sun was
high enough on the water to see the fish moving about. Each cast would send trout in all directions as
my fly line hit the water and they would settle back in always looking up
stream and waiting. I tried my Olive
Scud with no luck. I tied on a San Juan
worm without a single nibble. The trout
wouldn’t even look at my Sulfur and as I tied on what I vowed would be my last
fly change of the day I was thinking more about lunch than fishing. I would end the day with a Bead Head Pheasant
Tail in a size 16. This is a larger fly than I generally fish at the Clinch,
but I had a couple large fish in mind when I tied it on.
When I waded into the area I immediately saw several large
Rainbow Trout cruising the pool but my casts to them were to no avail. I spotted what I first thought was a Carp in
the far side of the stream, but I determined this wasn’t a Carp but was in fact
a large Brown trout. As one of the other
guys fishing, Jeremy, walked his was upstream toward me I saw the Brown turn
and at the same time I felt me line go tight.
Since I had never hooked a trout this size here before I was fishing
with my Orvis 3 weight rod which I affectionately call May. May was bought for fishing the Smokies and I
wasn’t sure I could bring this fish in with a 3 weight rod. When the trout
realize he was hooked May began to sing and the “zing” of her reel was music to
my ears. As I fought the large brown I
never for one moment thought I would bring him (or her) to hand. Each time I made my way closer with net in
hand my presence was felt and fish would jet out to deeper water.
I slowly made my way further and further to
the bank until the fish was in shallow water and I was better able to manage
him without rushing him in and breaking my line. The struggle lasted what I would guess to be
about 8 minutes and as this beautiful trout found the bottom of my net the
fight was over and we were eye to eye.
It would be a lie to say that I didn’t think about keeping this fish as
a nice addition to my “man room”, but that thought was short lived and my only
concern was keeping the fish alive while allowing me a few picture to remember
him by. Jeremy snapped some pictures
using my iphone and I held the fish in the water until he could once again swim
on his own and just as quickly as this fish was caught, he was gone. It was a memorable day for me because it
marked the largest trout I have caught on the Clinch, but my hope remains that
it won’t be my last. 