Region streams are clear and icy-cold. At least they’ve been a bit warmer for the last few days, but will drop back down to 40F or lower when this next Arctic blast hits us on Sunday night. . Rivers are flowing at seasonal norms, while headwaters are just a bit skinny. Plan your leaders and flies to match those water conditions.
Main county and state roads are fine, but some shaded back roads up here in the mountains are still icy, especially in the mornings. I called my Chattahoochee Forest friends yesterday and they said the WMA road closures on the east side are still in effect:
https://www.fs.usda.gov/alerts/conf/alerts-notices/?aid=45343
Each district office will have the best info on its respective road status. Find the districts here:
https://www.fs.usda.gov/main/conf/about-forest/offices
Trout fishing should be good (for the winter) now, with these warmer afternoons and then will die with the water temps next week. Fish will be sluggish and hunkered down on the bottom. Saturday’s rain may lead many anglers toward indoor events like the Rabun Rendezvous. Catch rates will drop once again with next week’s arctic blast that arrives on Monday.
Lake stripers and their prey remain cold and sullen. They’ve been deep and slow, with some rare surface action. The shallow water bite will likely be slow for a while as Lanier temps slide downward through the forties.
Catch Wes’ weekly update to his hot fly list and the latest fishing reports from our UO staff and avid angling friends here:
http://blog.angler.management/
Unicoi Outfitters: Friendly. Local. Experts.
Wes’ Winter Fly List:
Dries: Micro chubby Chernobyl, orange stimulator, parachute Adams, blue wing olive, little black stone. They’re mainly strike indicators for your nymph droppers.
Nymphs & Wets:
DH streams: small Frenchie, tungsten baetis, small pheasant tails and hares ears (both soft hackles and nymphs) slush egg, RS2, micro mayfly, diamond and zebra midges.
Mountain streams: Pheasant tails, micro girdle bugs, prince nymphs, root beer midge.
Streamers:
Olive and black buggers, sparkle minnows, CDC squirrel leech, bank robber sculpin.
(Bass & stripers) Somethin’ else, Clouser minnow, micro changer, jerk changer.
Headwaters:
They’re clear and real cold. Many national forest roads are still snow covered and icy, so many bluelines are not easily accessed. Honestly, the cold winter water from freezing overnight air temps will kill the bite. You’ll do better with trout on bigger, warmer streams at lower elevations.
Delayed Harvest Streams:
They’re clear and cold and flowing at normal winter levels. Unfortunately staffer Sydney said that Smith DH was 44F at 3PM yesterday. Fish are cold to the touch and sluggish, but they’ll still eat on warm afternoons. Don’t expect the high catch rates you found in the fall. But you won’t find the crowds, either. Divide your fall catch rate by 2 or 3 and consider that new winter tally to be a good day.
Hit the winter refuges of deep, slow pools and dredge your double nymph rigs during the winter window of 11AM to 3PM for a few nice fish at the daily high water temps. A tractor-trailer rig is most effective. Put your larger attractor fly (pats rubberlegs, egg, sexy walts or leech) a foot behind your split shot. Then drop a tiny fly (pheasant tail, rainbow warrior, frenchie, or midge of choice) a foot off the back of that first fly.
Prospect those pools with deep, bottom-bumping drifts. Winter fish won’t move more than a few inches to intercept your nymphs, so cast just a foot apart to cover the entire width of each pool. Hits are subtle, so strike with any small hesitation of your strike indicator or sighter.
A second technique with winter promise is swinging and twitching small streamers and/or soft hackle wet flies - deep! Use a sink tip line, a poly leader, or a long, light tippet with multiple split shot to get your bugs down to those fish hugging the bottom.
Pick some streams near your parked car so you can retreat to that car heater and thaw frozen toes and fingers. You might even have a thermos of hot soup or chili tucked in the back seat. (Mom used to boil hot dogs and put them and the water in a wide mouth thermos for our hot lunch as fishing kids).
Good choices are Toccoa, Smith, Ami at 53 and Steel Bridge, Nantahala, and Tuckaseegee. Tougher folks can hike into the Chattooga, beautiful and uncrowded in the winter. Trout pod up in the deep, slow pools. Just beware the shaded, curvy, black-iced mountain roads (Warwoman and Hwy 28) to get there!
On the 15th three Rabunites hit Smith DH. Bluejay went early and picked up four fish on a slush egg. Dredger and Ospreydawg went in the afternoon and did pretty well on tractor-trailer rigs (bugger with a small soft hackle dropper)via two techniques. The first was a downstream cast with a swing and then a slow twitch back upstream. No hits were counted until two extra split shot were added, then it was game on.
The second method was an upstream cast and a downstream drift with twitches. On both techniques, the soft hackles (#16, 18 pheasant tails and hares ears) were strongly preferred over the #12 bugger.
UO staffer Sydney: “I started out Thursday on some small, wild streams midday, but with the north slope water temps too darn cold, I couldn’t get anything to eat.
So I headed over to Smith DH in midafternoon and got some action. I didn’t have to change flies once. I did a Chubby dry with a #16 tungsten bead Baetis dropped below it. Caught a few and lost a few, but still had some incredible takes! Also spotted a ton of fish still in the crystal-clear creek. A fellow angler told me that the black or red midges have been working well in the afternoons leading till sundown.”
Private Waters:
Private water trips were scarce this week due to cold temperatures. Try the Delayed Harvest techniques, above, if you’re heading to private waters this week.
UO buddy CDB:
“Our Veterans Flyfishing organization
https://veteransflyfishing.org/
had our first outing at Nacoochee Bend Sunday. The water was only in the high 30’s. Nevertheless,you can see rods were bent as some good fish made their presence known! Fortunately, the fish were gentle on our angler’s delicate hands, executing long distance releases so folks wouldn’t have to put their hands in the water.
Monday on private waters small eggs rolled right along the bottom got the best results. As the sun came up and water warmed a bit, fish could be had on small nymph patterns and perdigons with green or blue flash in them as long as they were fished deep.
Heading off to South Dakota next week (weather permitting) to gather some fly tying supplies for about a week. See y’all in February!”
Are you planning your private waters action for 2025? Give us a call at 706-878-3083 to book your own trips this year with our UO guides. Call soon, as those prime spring weekends book quickly.
Tailwaters:
No recent reports. They should fish better than headwaters because of warmer reservoir discharges.
Lakes:
UO buddy AJ: “I got out Sunday PM, hoping that a little sun and warmer weather would have some fish moving around. Marked some smaller groups of stripers around 30 ft, but could not get any on a sinking line. About an hour before dark, I found a lot of very shallow bait flicking on the surface. The gulls found them too, but the stripers were a no-show to the party. Water temps were between 45-48. Hoping to get out and do a little recon Fri PM and possibly Sat AM for some trips planned next week (barring another ice/snow event) and hoping for a little more active fish.”
Alex Jaume
Lanier on the Fly
IG - @lanier_on_the_fly
Afar:
UO buddy Athens MD: “Conditions seemed right for shallow water reds this past weekend, so Athens Jamie and I headed to the coast with the Towee in tow. We arrived mid-day to blue-bird skies and near-low tide which made spotting the numerous fish relatively easy. Throwing a small light-brown shrimp pattern on an 8-weight floating line, I hooked (but lost) my first redfish on a fly. Jamie suggested I performed a trout-set, but show me the tape. Huge thanks to my fishing partner who knew the area and poled my large frame around while I cast to reds in a foot of water and landed two over the next couple of hours. I took the pole after a while and pushed the boat in pitiful circles as the tide started to rise. Jamie pulled in a very nice red the next day under overcast skies which made the fish hard to spot. So, all-in-all a great couple days. And it's nice to have a friend with a boat!”
Upcoming Events:
Tomorrow! January 18: 38th annual Rabun Rendezvous in Clayton. BBQ, Live Bluegrass, raffles, and silent auctions. Yearly fundraiser by the Rabunites. Check out the prize list that includes two Winston rods, two lodge stays, nice artwork, and plenty more flyfishing goodies. Everyone welcome.
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1853SypxRF/?
Jan 31 to Feb 2 : Atlanta Fly Fishing Show at Gas South Convention Center in Duluth. Stop by our UO booth and swap fish stories. We are back at booth #436, next to Pond A, once again.
https://flyfishingshow.com/atlanta/
Ongoing: Dream Trip ticket sales. Win a week of fishing in Yellowstone for just ten bucks, or one of a dozen great runnerup prizes. Drawing in mid-March. Details here:
Good luck this week. It’s probably a good one to stay indoors, so catch up on your fly tying and equipment cleaning until this next arctic blast passes and streams warm back up a bit. Better yet, go warm your buns with fishing buddies at tomorrow’s Rabun Rendezvous. You might just win a Winston rod or a private trout trip!
Stop in either UO shop if you’re in the neighborhood. The shops are warm and the intel is hot, as always.
Unicoi Outfitters: Friendly. Local. Experts.
