Clinch Brown

 

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.