Smith River 17-19 May 06

Started by Al, May 20, 2006, 20:26:41 PM

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Al

Fishing on the Smith this week was fabulous, it was ok and it was terrible. Let me explain.

I was in Bassett this week to attend the stocking of the Smith River with brown trout by middle school students from Martinsville/Henry County and Patrick County. These trout were raised from fry in their classrooms over the winter as part of a hugely successful Trout in the Classroom program coordinated by Dr. David Jones. What a great program. Here is a link to a story about it that ran in the Roanoke Times. http://www.roanoke.com/news/roanoke/wb/xp-65775

While in the area I decided to do some fun fishing. On Wednesday afternoon I fished the lower river below Stanleytown Bridge and couldn't keep them off my line. I met my goal of double digits before I rounded the first bend in the river and tripled that before I called it a day. The tally was about half stocked rainbows and half stream spawned brown trout. Unfortunately at least half of the browns were less then 6 inches long. None would measure more then 10 inches. Nevertheless they were fun to catch. Fabulous fishing!

Thursday morning I spent a little time fishing just below Bassett. This is usually a very good section and there is one pool where I have caught as many as 25 in one outing, but not today. This "honey hole" yielded one stocked rainbow. I knew right then that it was going to be tough fishing. I moved up stream and was able to catch a few more before suspending operations in order to attend the aforementioned Trout in the Classroom event. A couple of the browns that I caught exceeded 12 inches.  After witnessing the release of several hundred brown trout fingerlings into the river I went downstream to the Kohler area and fished a big riffle which I had heard was fishing real well. That was then and this was now. The riffle produced a total of three fish. Not bad but not as good as I had expected. I'd made my goal but it had taken me two forays on the river to do so. We'll call Thursday ok.

I heard the upper Special Regulation section was fishing well earlier in the week with the beginning of the Smith River's famous sulfur hatch producing good top water action. With that in mind, Friday morning found me as the first fisherman in the Mirror Factory parking lot. I was a little concerned with my prospects because Thursday evening and early Friday morning the air temperature took a pretty big drop and the breeze had picked up - all the classic signs of a cold front moving through. I flailed away for about three hours with nymphs and an occasion switch to dry flies. The water was gin clear and I could see fish hugging the bottom and moving away from me. They just were not interested in what I had to offer. I did not get skunked, but it was close to it. It was fairly cool, the wind was blowing my cast right back into my face and the fish were not biting. When I finally gave up and walked with head hung low back to the parking lot I saw that two other cars were there. Friday, for me at least, the fishing was terrible. I hope the late arrivals did better.