Marvin: Hey folks, it's Marvin Cash, the host of the Articulate Fly,

Marvin: and we're back with another East Tennessee Fishing Report with Ellis Ward. How are you, Ellis?

Ellis: I am doing well, Marv. How are you?

Marvin: I'm getting there. I was looking at your weather, as I always do,

Marvin: and you know, you've got probably, looks like you've got a front coming through

Marvin: that's going to drop your temperatures, but the good news for you is you've

Marvin: got a little bit of rain for like the next four days. You ought to be going

Marvin: out of your mind on the draft life, right?

Ellis: Yeah, I'm pretty excited. It's been, you know, I think last we talked,

Ellis: it was just the tale of maybe the last two times of just that,

Ellis: you know, call it the shoulder season.

Ellis: I get a little cringy with that because you can always find something,

Ellis: but it truly was just a lot of wind, big sun,

Ellis: You know, followed by 80 degree days, followed by 40 degree days.

Ellis: So kind of mellowing out into some consistency here with even with the temperature

Ellis: dropping, you know, it's going down to low to mid 60s.

Ellis: I think tomorrow will be mid 70s, even with gray skies and rain coming through.

Ellis: So, yeah, on the drive-fly front,

Ellis: I'm guessing, I mean, it's pretty rare that these podcasts happen to fall on

Ellis: a day where I'm like, oh, man,

Ellis: the next foreseeable future looks really good compared to, let's just say, the last week.

Ellis: But that is the case today where just started getting some water moving on the

Ellis: South Holston and that's been the first time in years.

Ellis: Beyond the hour pushes, they'll do these pulse releases on the South Holston from the dam.

Ellis: And beyond that, there's been

Ellis: one or two hours intermittently where we're getting some all-day flows.

Ellis: And after it sort of clears up, that's been going for a day or two now.

Ellis: And after that, it sort of clears up because there's a lot of bank.

Ellis: There's just, there's a lot of structure.

Ellis: There's a lot of stuff that has not seen consistent high flows for months.

Ellis: I mean, since the fall.

Ellis: And so it's, you know, it's pushing some debris down, but that's,

Ellis: it kind of triggers a couple of things happening in the lake.

Ellis: And, you know, a lot of the, obviously, predator lies does open up when you get water.

Ellis: You can actually float the river. So it does a couple of different things.

Ellis: One, it obviously opens up the South Holston for fishing.

Ellis: And then for the Watauga and just for other areas in northeast Tennessee,

Ellis: it acts as sort of a siphon because it has not been fished and people have been,

Ellis: you know, guides primarily have been fishing the same sections of water on the

Ellis: Watauga day in and day out for a while now.

Ellis: And so a lot of the good stuff that on the Watauga has not seen much water.

Ellis: We've been getting a little bit here and there, maybe a week on,

Ellis: but generally pretty low water there too.

Ellis: But it's opening up with bigger water, and now we have two rivers.

Ellis: So there's just, there's a lot of river on both of the rivers that.

Ellis: It's almost new, and it's coinciding with the amount of the daylight that we have,

Ellis: which I continue to think is more influential than ambient temperatures.

Ellis: But getting getting some of the bigger yellow bugs and,

Ellis: kind of seeing the last of the caddis but those the big caddis those you know

Ellis: size 16 to 20 still hang around and then yeah man next couple days.

Ellis: Remains to be seen if if the first push of sulfurs are going to happen on an overcast day.

Ellis: It typically likes on your days. I was actually talking with a biologist about

Ellis: why that might be the case versus the blue wings.

Ellis: I think at the end of the day, some of the blue wings are pretty light and tan

Ellis: and some of the sulfurs are sort of darker and tan.

Ellis: So if you can get a dry fly or just fishing double dries that maybe one's an

Ellis: emerger and they're kind of in the 18-ish range and they're sort of yellowy tan,

Ellis: you'll probably be doing all right.

Marvin: Well, there you go. And, you know, we got a question for you while we're on

Marvin: the small bug topic from Tom. He wanted to get your thoughts on your favorite

Marvin: midge patterns for this time of year.

Ellis: Sure. Yeah, you mentioned Midge,

Ellis: and I immediately thought of Nymph,

Ellis: which I know folks don't necessarily – when I talk with people and, you know,

Ellis: be it other guides or folks that think I'm just a diehard streamer junkie or whatever,

Ellis: that tone elicits, yes, I love streamer fishing.

Ellis: Fishing yes i love dry fly fishing for you know my atsu class for a lot of beginning

Ellis: anglers for heck for people that were streamer fishing like there are spots where i like to stop and,

Ellis: and dunk some bugs in and um you

Ellis: know sit there and fishing indicators you know floating all day and and going

Ellis: with the current again fantastic way to catch fish just not necessarily my style

Ellis: so So I have been doing a lot of classes for ETSU.

Ellis: And man, this time of year just gets, there's just this life force emerging

Ellis: from under rocks, literally.

Ellis: So something about it gets me nymphing a lot more and gets me tying smaller bugs.

Ellis: So I'll say for the submerged.

Ellis: For the weighted, for the classic NIMH midge patterns, I can't get away from

Ellis: a black zebra midge with silver wire.

Ellis: And it's hard to – my buddy John was talking about A-B testing,

Ellis: some different patterns that he has, and a guy like that as thoughtful as he

Ellis: is, sure, you can do that.

Ellis: That but i think it's hard to be able to to

Ellis: compare and contrast the difference between

Ellis: let's say a black zebra midge

Ellis: on you know an 18 curve

Ellis: nymph hook with a two millimeter tungsten bead

Ellis: and a little bit of um you know

Ellis: densely wrapped black uv ice dub versus one with a 2.4 millimeter tungsten bead

Ellis: and no ice dub and you know like all that said with all the different variations in it,

Ellis: Something with a little bit of scraggly, dark, but also shiny collar.

Ellis: I see outfish two to one.

Ellis: And I tend to throw either a good piece of split shot or two smaller ones on.

Ellis: So I'm getting bugs down anyways. ways and avoiding some of the detail there

Ellis: it's it's something um small you know i also tie the zebra midges with a pretty

Ellis: significant taper and when you start talking about like a an 18,

Ellis: black zebra midge with a pronounced taper you start popping under rocks that thing looks like

Ellis: so much it looks like half of the little bugs in there and so there's standouts

Ellis: and i generally fish two nymphs and one of them this time of year is going to

Ellis: look a little more sulfur-y.

Ellis: Um but the yeah that that midge pattern even go down to a 22 but there's just

Ellis: this time of year there's so many bugs midges and and betas and sulfurs that

Ellis: are dark and there is segmentation.

Ellis: And that fly with the little scraggly whatever, it doesn't have to be UVI stub, some sort of dubbin.

Ellis: And that's certainly one of my go-tos. And then for the top water, it's the best water.

Ellis: This can be a tricky one just because you're oftentimes fishing in times where

Ellis: you can't see flies in the water.

Ellis: And when you do see the flies, they don't make hook that are even twice the

Ellis: size of what you're looking at, let alone the actual size. So, yeah.

Ellis: And I've tied down to a 26 and I'll fish that fly, but it's a little bit of

Ellis: a pain because you're fishing at that point to actually get a decent presentation with it.

Ellis: You're fishing on 6.5 or 7X, really 7X.

Ellis: And the diameter of that hook is the, you know, the wire gauge is so small that

Ellis: it is almost a zero hook set just because it's a fish that it's already in.

Ellis: And if you put any pressure onto 7X on a dry fly eat, especially if it's the

Ellis: first one of the day and you might have the yips, you're breaking that thing off immediately.

Ellis: So I tend to stop fishing dries around the 22.

Ellis: And at that point, you can go with the cluster. It is hard to get hackle that small.

Ellis: So, you know, fishing a Griffith's gnat is a great pattern.

Ellis: I've also seen people have different names for it, but the Puff Daddy,

Ellis: the Thread Body with a little bit of taper, not terribly pronounced,

Ellis: and then two or three wraps, Palmer CDC,

Ellis: which CDCs have shown great.

Ellis: Because it has these, all those little barbules have these really,

Ellis: really fine touch points, and it's random.

Ellis: It doesn't look like the hackle on an Atoms where it's these very finite touch

Ellis: points that are, for example, feet or legs from a bug.

Ellis: That CDC is just sort of splayed out, and it's all sort of touching in,

Ellis: you know, like thousands and thousands of different points.

Ellis: Um, so if you're not going super small, doing something that is more,

Ellis: you know, buggy or like a Griffith's gnat, um,

Ellis: or a messy CDC emerger, uh, like a puff daddy or are two good options.

Ellis: And then if you're tying or if you can find in the shop or you happen to know a guy,

Ellis: getting down into the 2022s and doing something like a CDC comparadon with a really sparse tail.

Ellis: And either hone in on your dry fly presentations because it's pretty easy to

Ellis: cast those things right through the film and the water or just drop it behind

Ellis: one of those 18s, drop it behind a Griffiths Nat, drop it behind a Puff Daddy,

Ellis: drop it behind some other.

Ellis: Honestly, Parachute Adams doesn't really seem like a buggy fly to me,

Ellis: but I like to not drink my own Kool-Aid, so I'll sort of pivot back to that every once in a while.

Ellis: Thing catches fish so put your your tiny bug um you know 12 to 18 inches behind

Ellis: that that bigger fly and it'll stop it from puncturing through the meniscus

Ellis: it'll sort of slow it down on its descent and also give you an indicator since

Ellis: you can't really see a size 22 yeah.

Marvin: And i would say maybe uh go with a decaf and only half of a strawberry pop tart

Marvin: and that'll help you on the early hook set.

Ellis: Yeah I mean you're also going to have me screaming about,

Ellis: I typically, I typically encourage hard hook sets.

Ellis: It's a good problem to have. I'll, I'll, I'll take a, I'll take an amped up hook set over not.

Marvin: Yeah, there you go. Well, you know, folks, we love questions at the articulate fly.

Marvin: You can email them to us or DM us on social media, whatever's easiest for you.

Marvin: And if we use your question, I will send you some articulate fly swag and you

Marvin: were going to enter, you know, drawing for some cool stuff from Ellis at the end of the season.

Marvin: And, you know, as we're getting ready to get into the thick of the sulfur hatch,

Marvin: Ellis, you want to let folks know where they can find you so they can book in fish with you?

Ellis: Yeah. Website is elliswardflies.com. Instagram, which is sort of most of a picture

Ellis: of what I'm doing on, we'll say, week-to-week basis.

Ellis: But that's at elliswardguides. and

Ellis: then if you want to give me a call and actually see what's what's going on on

Ellis: a day-to-day basis as opposed to websites sort of i'll do kind of a seasonal

Ellis: update um instagram is mostly what's,

Ellis: visually appealing um so if you want to talk about trips see what's going on

Ellis: here um book trip I best way to do that is myself running 513-543-0019.

Marvin: Well, there you go. Well, listen, folks, show it to yourself to get out there

Marvin: and catch a few. Tight lines, everybody. Tight lines, Ellis.

Ellis: Appreciate it, Marv.