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

Marvin: and we're back with another Southwest

Marvin: Virginia Fishing Report with Matt Riley. How are you doing, Matt?

Matt: I'm doing great, Marvin. How are you?

Marvin: As always, just trying to stay out of trouble and getting ready for the Easter Bunny.

Matt: Yeah. Yeah, we, uh, the, uh, little guy got his picture taken with the Easter

Matt: Bunny downtown last week. So, it's officially spring. Things are starting to happen.

Marvin: Yeah, there you go. You didn't go to the hardware store and buy any chicks or ducklings, did you?

Matt: I didn't. I can't speak for my wife, but I haven't gotten home yet.

Marvin: Yeah, well, there you go. Well, you know, it's funny. We were talking before

Marvin: we started recording, and, you know, weather kind of in our part of the world

Marvin: has kind of been a little bit all over the place, but mercifully,

Marvin: we've been getting a decent amount of rain.

Matt: Yeah, I'm pretty happy. Of course, the last day I had on the river was kind of my springtime dream.

Matt: You know, it's been, rivers have been full.

Matt: You know, we've had fairly consistent rain, but nothing like, you know, crazy heavy.

Matt: I wouldn't even call the rivers high. They're just real, real happy and a good place.

Matt: We've had some, you know, every couple of days, some pretty cloudy,

Matt: kind of drizzly weather.

Matt: Weather uh yesterday we fished most of

Matt: the day in the rain heavy overcast um

Matt: filling some some bait fish flies that small mouth that have a great time um

Matt: still be dry for the next couple of days with kind of temps and the like seasonable

Matt: to slightly warm you know So 50 to 70 degree range.

Matt: And then we got some more rain coming next week. So I think things are looking pretty good.

Marvin: And so can you give us a little bit more detail on the pre-spawn Smalley front?

Matt: Uh, yeah, we've, uh, you know, again, depending on where you are,

Matt: um, water temps and, and, you know, day to day overnight lows and,

Matt: and things like that are going to dictate where you start out water temp wise and where you end.

Matt: And, you know, whether you have sun on the water or clouds, think to how much

Matt: of a tail bump you get over the course of the day.

Matt: But, you know, generally speaking in the high, high 40s to mid 50s range is

Matt: where we've been at for the last week or so. And it's a really nice place to be.

Matt: Fisher, real happy to chase flies, you know, certain days you need a little

Matt: bit longer suspension, longer pause.

Matt: Um, but you know, with a little bit of water in the river to, um,

Matt: some pace to the, to the string flow, there's a kind of an incentive or a need

Matt: for those fish to, to, uh, to eat and, and they're kind of pinned up and,

Matt: and fairly predictable places too.

Matt: So, like I said, I'm real happy on that front.

Matt: We've mainly been able to avoid any kind of, you know, deep dredging at this point.

Matt: Had a couple of days in the last week and a half, two weeks where we've had

Matt: some, you know, cooler overnight temps.

Matt: We're starting out fairly cold where we've had to drop down a little bit.

Matt: But for the most part, um, swim flies, different streamers is,

Matt: has kind of been where we've been, where we've been staying,

Matt: which again is, is very happy place to be.

Marvin: Uh, there you go. And got a question for you from Brenner. He wanted to get

Marvin: your thoughts on your favorite, uh, crayfish pattern colors for small mouth.

Matt: Yeah. Um, I, I keep it pretty simple. I guess this goes for most flies that I fish.

Matt: I'm not a gotta-have-12-different-color-schemes-in-the-box kind of guy.

Matt: I realistically fish maybe four or five different colors over the course of

Matt: the whole year max for crayfish imitations.

Matt: Um the the go-to is always going to be you know the crayfishy color kind of a tan brown um.

Matt: Just kind of what people might call green pumpkin, a little bit of olive,

Matt: you know, in the conventional world.

Matt: Big fan of black, black and blue, black and purple is good.

Matt: You've got a little bit of extra color staying in the water.

Matt: And that's more or less just for some contrast and just showing up a little

Matt: bit better, particularly in cooler water.

Matt: I'm a believer in the fact that, you know, if the water's cold and you've got a little bit of stain,

Matt: those fish, their reactive distance is a little bit lower or smaller when it's cold.

Matt: Because then they're not going to like move a long distance to to take a fly and so it.

Matt: Very basically kind of the sooner they can become aware

Matt: of that prey item in

Matt: their sphere of awareness um the easier it is for them to catch or or go grab

Matt: if it's if it's real cold and they're not you know moving around real quickly

Matt: um so black and blue black black and purple um you know Purple is always a good

Matt: kind of accent color for smallmouth,

Matt: particularly on crayfish flies, I think.

Matt: So like kind of a brownish purple, again, what they call peanut butter and jelly

Matt: in the conventional world with tube jigs and jigging pigs and stuff like that.

Matt: That um and uh you know i guess maybe another color scheme i guess you could

Matt: call it would be just that typical kind of tan brown with a little more detail

Matt: um this is something that i do.

Matt: Um just more or less to help me and i don't think it hurts um for the fish um

Matt: as as the water drops Pops out later in the spring or into the summer,

Matt: I'll start tying my crayfish flies a little bit lighter than my standard kind of springtime bugs.

Matt: So if I put a large or an extra large dumbbell eye on a size two or one or one

Matt: odd crayfish, I might put a medium on that size two.

Matt: And just to help me keep track of them i'll uh i'll add like a little kind of light orange,

Matt: nail polish to the tips of the claws on them

Matt: just to help me keep track of which ones are which and you know the other way

Matt: to think about that is uh you know as the water gets a little bit clearer a

Matt: little bit of detail isn't isn't a bad thing so maybe that's another color scheme

Matt: and then And the other one that's relevant would be,

Matt: You know, late, late June or early July when we're having a crayfish molt and

Matt: the fish can tend to key in on crayfish pretty heavily for a week or week and a half or two.

Matt: Something a little bit lighter, like more of a peachy tan kind of color is a good one to have.

Matt: I mean, a lot of times they'll eat the standard fare then too,

Matt: but that just might be a little bit more realistic.

Matt: But yeah, I would say don't, don't overcomplicate it too much.

Matt: You know, look at the food that matches colors and, you know,

Matt: to that end, you know, some creeks, some rivers do have fairly unique,

Matt: uh, uniquely colored crayfish.

Matt: So maybe, maybe check into that.

Matt: Um, but otherwise it's just natural colors. And then, you know,

Matt: maybe a little, uh, kind of a secondary color just for different water conditions,

Matt: you know, like those dark contrasted colors.

Marvin: Got it. And, you know, do you like, you know, you know, different platforms

Marvin: in terms of presentation?

Marvin: Like, is it for you mostly fishing a kind of a jig style presentation or do

Marvin: you have some other kind of presentation flavors you like with your crayfish?

Matt: Um, yeah, so, so there's a kind of two main ways that I, that I fish them.

Matt: One would be just a, you know, a jig.

Matt: Um, and I, I talk about conventional gear a lot because I do both,

Matt: um, a lot, but you know, that typical, you know, my favorite platform,

Matt: I guess is, is the claw dad trucks pattern.

Matt: Um, and I, I tie a pile of different kind of variations on it.

Matt: To hit um but that's a that's a jake

Matt: style grudging um bug with

Matt: dumbbell eyes and not a lot of buoyancy um

Matt: that to get down fairly quickly you're gonna fish

Matt: it with a leader that's fairly small in diameter

Matt: in the in the lower half

Matt: just to help it get down a little bit um and

Matt: yeah your fish i fish those on floating lines um just

Matt: so that you're you can really fish the

Matt: fly as opposed to a sink

Matt: tip or an intermediate or something where there's water tension

Matt: on the line dragging the fly around and um the uh necessary you can use the

Matt: tip of the fly line which should also be a fairly visible um fly line you know

Matt: heavy-headed streamer line um Um,

Matt: something that I have kind of come into my program lately is, um,

Matt: I guess it was maybe two years ago, scientific anglers changed the color of

Matt: the Titan long streamer line, which is the one I, I really like for floating line.

Matt: And now they've got kind of a like camo dark brown olives tip.

Matt: Which is not what you want if you're trying to use your fly line tip as an indicator.

Matt: So lines like the older Titanese, the Bass Bug, which is a heavy-headed fly

Matt: line that's a wider, more visible color, are good.

Matt: You're just kind of bouncing them on the bottom, watching the fly line tip for

Matt: any kind of stop or twitch.

Matt: Or there's some timing involved there where you want to try to identify when that fly hits bottom.

Matt: And just bump it either with a strip or a rod tip jig or a little mend,

Matt: you know, as soon as you see that, just to hop it up off the bottom.

Matt: That'll keep it from getting snagged. If you see kind of a sharper twit or pop,

Matt: or if you go to mend it or jig it or whatever,

Matt: when you see that line lines start to slow and you

Matt: feel some resistance or or something fishy you

Matt: know then you're just giving them the the bill bands with the

Matt: rod after stripping the the slack in um

Matt: that's that one way to go about it the other

Matt: way um that that i

Matt: like to do it is and and do it with the same

Matt: fly more or less you just change things up a little bit a

Matt: little bit lighter dumbbell eyes um you

Matt: can go bigger um in diameter on the rubber

Matt: leg size so instead of fishing like a medium rubber leg

Matt: you fish a large rubber leg um which gives

Matt: the fly a little more buoyancy in the water or a little more drag as it as it

Matt: sinks and you can kind of swim those a little bit more um as as the water warms

Matt: up it it but if it's you know if if for some reason you feel the need to fish a crayfish fish, um,

Matt: and not be on the bottom, um, which, which again can come into play kind of

Matt: like late spring at times, early summer.

Matt: Um, you can fish those up a little bit larger diameter leader to again,

Matt: just for some drag, keep it up off the bottom a little bit, suspended a little bit more.

Matt: Um, the other fly that I do employ a fair bit in that situation,

Matt: which I, uh, you know, kind of from,

Matt: one perspective, I kind of,

Matt: don't understand what it is about the fly but um those tequilis the the fully mill pattern um.

Matt: Is a is a is a great one when fish

Matt: are just being kind of lethargic um moody

Matt: and it it really does not look

Matt: much like a crayfish at all but i think they eat them as crayfish

Matt: um and that that fly kind

Matt: of again employs some of the same uh tying

Matt: strategies as as i mentioned in kind

Matt: of my more buoyant uh whim crayfish kind

Matt: of style with the claw dad where it's got

Matt: uh three pairs of two rubber legs that

Matt: just kind of stick out perpendicular to the body kind of

Matt: act as a parachute a little bit um some marabou um a really kind of like bushy

Matt: body material material and not a ton of weight but enough to get it down in

Matt: the water column and those you know you can you can dead drift you can fish

Matt: them a lot slower but you can kind of fish them like.

Matt: Like lower middle water column and uh that's that's a good one too um you can

Matt: mess with those colors you know the standard that you buy is like a copper with

Matt: yellow legs and yellow black tail You know,

Matt: I, I, I'll fish some with the kind of more muted kind of root beer-y tan body with,

Matt: with like peach or, or brown,

Matt: uh, marabou and some different color, color rubber legs.

Matt: Um, not a bad idea. Just kind of a, a buggy, you know, smaller,

Matt: you know, more subtle crayfish, I guess.

Matt: Um, yeah, that's, that's, that's kind of where I, I tend to live.

Matt: I, I'm really not a guy that likes to spend a long time, uh,

Matt: tying crayfish flies because you will leave a lot of them on the bottom and

Matt: it just hurts too bad to spend an hour and, uh,

Matt: you know, eight different materials on a crayfish and then snag them up on the second cast.

Marvin: You don't do that. Only your clients, right?

Matt: Yeah. I've never, I haven't lost a fly since I was 12.

Marvin: Yeah, there you go. Well, you know, folks, we love questions on the Articulate

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

Marvin: And if we use your question, I will send you some Articulate Fly swag.

Marvin: And we're going to draw in for some cool stuff from Matt at the end of the season.

Marvin: And Matt, before I let you go, because I just saw your email,

Marvin: I know you've got some last minute pre-spawn Somali openings,

Marvin: but why don't you let folks know kind of what you have in your calendar,

Marvin: how to reach out and all that kind of good stuff.

Matt: Yeah good call man i guess we nailed the timing on that one um i had uh three days just pop open um,

Matt: some folks had to move their their calendar around kind of prime pre-spawn streamer

Matt: fishing small mouth days and those are april 3rd and the 8th and the 9th so

Matt: not that far off but i mean right right in the sweet spot of,

Matt: you know, central really starting to blow up right now.

Matt: They're getting real fat because, um, you know, they're starting to chase it.

Matt: He a lot water still fairly cold.

Matt: Um, they're just going to get heavier. Um,

Matt: and, uh, with the, the water we have in the river right now and the kind of

Matt: consistent kind of rainy, wet, cloudy weather we're, we're having,

Matt: um, things, things have been real nice.

Matt: So, um, those are, those are there.

Matt: I do have like two other dates that just opened up for the rest of the year.

Matt: I think they're July 30th and September 29th or 30th.

Matt: Um, but other than that, we're pretty much taken care of on the small mouth front.

Matt: And, uh, we are starting to book some musky stuff for the fall winter.

Matt: Um, always booking trout trips. We've had some really cool dry fly days.

Matt: Days, um, the last week or so.

Matt: And, uh, that's only going to get better through, you know, May, June.

Matt: And then, uh, as the summer wears on, you know, terrestrial attractor dry fly

Matt: kind of stuff is going to come into effect.

Matt: So booking a lot of stuff, but the small mouth stuff's real limited.

Matt: So if you want to get out and poke some small mouth this year, give me a shout.

Matt: And I've got got a couple of things i can do with the calendar to to get you

Matt: out but um yeah contact info is on the website that's matt riley fly fishing.com

Matt: and just reach out however you feel best.

Marvin: Yeah well there you go we'll listen folks show it to yourself to get out there

Marvin: and catch a few tight lines everybody tight lines matt thanks marvis.