S6, Ep 128: Catch Big Fish: Ellis Ward's Insider Tips for East Tennessee Anglers

Hey, folks, it's Marvin Cash, the host of the articulate flower, back with another East Tennessee fishing report with Ellis Ward.

Ellis, how are you?

I'm doing well, Marv.

Sort of tired for different reasons these days, but doing well.

Yeah.

And you've been whacking the snot out of them on the south Holston?

Yeah, it's been since Helene came and left, it's been running 3000 cfs, which up to a certain point, you know, rivers getting bigger, creeks getting big can, everything starts to get faster.

And when you have rivers and creeks that they kind of stay at a certain level.

So tailwaters for example, they just, the stream bottom, the banks, everything sort of acclimates to whatever cfs, to whatever volume.

So when you start pushing up to, you know, two x just for phishing purposes, you're, you're kind of looking at, you're not taking shots at the bank.

You're, you're taking shots maybe in the same places, but the four or 5ft of grass beyond the bank as you're drifting by, all of that's covered so it becomes a little less direct.

Things are in certain ways, you know, cushier like you have those soft edges that used to be two or 3ft.

Now they're, you know, five, six, seven, 8ft.

And I, you know, in the south Holston, there's just big sections that are pretty flat and normally kind of slicked out and somewhat slow moving.

And it's like the whole, the whole flat is moving at a clip.

So, you know, I.

Personal preference is to take a different approach to that and some of that, you know, it's hard work.

Been getting up at 530 or six and, and meeting anglers.

It's been a very busy last few weeks for me.

So this is.

It's been good and you know, one of the reasons it's been good is that I have people on my boat that are cool to get up at six and go out and fish, fish when it's 36 degrees and get some of that low light and continue to, I want to say be experimental, but I don't like to drink my own kool Aid.

And when a river is doing something it doesn't normally do and you start to piece things together, it can be very productive fishing and it has been so.

Really appreciate all the guys who have planned to be here.

There's a lot of faith in travel time and money and people's uncertainty with the area after Helene, but getting away from all the serious talk, we've been pounding big fish and it's been a lot of fun.

Yeah.

And so if you've got water that far up, kind of quote the bank, are you.

You know, you've got that.

You know, what's now the shallow edge?

Are you kind of fishing that big drop?

Is that kind of been the secret, or, you know, kind of what's been the money shot?

Yeah.

Good.

Good question.

I've had more confidence in the zones that I wouldn't generally fish as hard.

And the reasons this is going to be like weed bed flats in areas that I know big fish are.

I know where structure is.

I know that there's reasonable depth.

Some of these flats on the South Holston, upper South Holsten, are just.

They are.

They are very deep.

And getting, you know, fly line becomes our enemy very quickly.

Even when it's very sinky, it gets swept by current.

It doesn't matter, really, what you're fishing.

Something that is heavy enough to get down to where fish are holding in that type of water, if you're out in the middle, it's.

It's just really hard to do with the fly rod.

So in those areas, I'm looking more towards the shallower areas where I know there's weed beds.

I've moved fish before, areas that I wouldn't normally target if the water were super clear and the sun's really hot.

But what we have now is, you know, the watauga is chocolate milk, and that's because there's a layer of mud that's just gotten washed in from all the freestones above Watauga Lake.

The south Holstens, it's really.

It's kind of a perfect storm.

You know, there's a bunch of water, but it didn't.

South Holsten Lake didn't get as much sediment pushed in.

So what that results in is like this, I refer to as a limestone chalky color.

It's, you know, it's a turquoise green.

It's pretty off.

It seems kind of clear when you get up to the bank, but, man, when you get some depth, you start losing big white streamers are gone and, you know, under a foot of water.

So combining that with.

With some off peak fishing and.

And getting low light, I've kind of been approaching it in the same place, the same places that I would be approaching mousing, and the same way that I would approach a lot of the areas on the Watauga that I fish in when it's very muddy.

So sort of banking on those big fish having blinders on and not being as spooked.

Since that clarity is dropped and feedback has been, that is the case.

Well, there you go.

We got a question for you from Brenner.

And sounds like it's a dry, flat question.

He wanted to get your thoughts on casting tips and gear options for fishing on windy days.

Sure.

So if it's nothing, dry fly fishing.

If he's talking about streamers, my.

I guess my recommendation would be to figure, figure out where you're having problems because of the wind and isolate working on those when there's no wind, because casts and flies should matter very little when it's very windy outside of, like, really long casting with very big flies, like in musky fishing.

So trout fishing, I should say, you know, just kind of say that there's.

I'm not really reach out to me if you're having issues with, with streamer fishing in the wind.

Cause there's probably a couple of things to work on with hauling and line speed and all that.

So with dry fly fishing, this one can also be kind of challenging because you have to, you have to consider what the fly is doing on the water and how they're getting there.

What I mean by what they're doing on the water is if you have a very windy day and you're fishing a small CDC flydeh, it's going to get blown around on top of the water.

So one way to mitigate that or eliminate it entirely is fish.

Something that is kind of a half in, half out, you know, with, like, a little foam pore on top, a parachute atom, something that is hanging in the water as opposed to floating on top of the water.

And then for casting, man, I fish five weights and dry flies in a pretty similar way to saltwater musky streamers.

I really incorporate my left hand and use that left hand.

It's less of a hall.

People use the word hall, and I think they, they associate that with shooting line.

And the way that I personally utilize that left hand and the way that I teach it on my boat.

And we were just going through this today.

Shout out, Stephen.

Use it to gain tension.

Use it to overcome little points of weakness within the cast where you're losing tension in that line.

And what that looks like in practice is it you feel like you have to catch up with false casting, like you're not letting it extend, and then you, you kind of creep forward.

And then on that next back cast, you're really trying to go super fast, but also still end high.

And that's where you just sort of lose the cast and it falls in the water.

If you're doing that in the wind, you're going to know immediately it's going to get leaders going to close, something's going to splat or you'll just lose your line altogether.

So a way to get around that is, is working on your timing with your left hand and just really keeping that loop, keeping that tension throughout the cast and not just relying on the timing of the line extending itself.

Sometimes you got to force the issue, and that's just timing and practice with incorporating that fall.

And again, I'm not saying shooting line, but incorporating that whole.

Meaning using your left hand as a way to load the rod as opposed to just timing and line.

Yeah.

It's interesting because, I mean, really, what happens is with a good stop, right.

It kind of gives you this really pronounced turnover on the tip.

Yeah.

And you can both emulate that and shortcut.

So you don't.

You still need the stop, because without the stop, you're not going to understand how to work that left hand to emphasize the stop.

But once you get the stop, when you're coming forward, let's say your spring is loading with, you know, some, some force.

Once you get that stop and it's loaded, it's going to unload with that same force.

When you're coming forward and you pull on your line just slightly, you're taking that same force of you stopping and power is generated on your back cast.

Your forward cast is where you lose power.

You rush it.

Nothing good happens when you rush it.

That back cast, that big stop really high, letting that line come back, bend your rod, and then on your way forward, just pulling your left hand a little bit.

It's like keeping your finger attached to the line so that you make sure your line's not moving.

You're getting that full extension from the line back.

But if you have that left hand just pulling down a little more, that rod starts to bend back more when you're coming forward.

And then on your release point, you don't have to shoot it, just bring it back to your right finger.

And that process of just pulling slightly on your way forward emphasizes, you know, multiplies, adds to whatever load you're getting from your back cast.

There you go, folks.

Well, you know, we love questions on the articulate fly.

You can email them to us or dm us on social media, whatever is easiest for you.

And if we use your question, I will send you some articulate fly swag.

We're drawing for some cool stuff from Ellis at the end of the season.

And Ellis, before I let you go, you want to let folks know how to reach out and get on your guidebooks.

You know, you probably have a $1000 tales like inbound here in about three weeks, right?

All that kind of good stuff.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I went to the deer processor nearby.

I've been talking with a couple others, but went down to say what's up?

A couple weeks ago and archery season has been going on.

The familiar smell of November entered my nostrils and I thought, yeah, every year I have to get it over this.

Guiding, fishing, whatever.

Other questions, feel free to give me a call at 513-543-0019 websites ellis wardflies.com and fish pictures, other eye catching Advertisement type stuff, and some good fly pictures, too, can be found on Instagram.

Ellis Ward guides and all those things will supply you with information about bucktail here in the next couple weeks.

Well, there you go, folks.

Well, as I say, yo, it's yourself to get out there and catch.

A few tight lines, everybody.

Tight lines.

Ellis.

Appreciate it, Marvin.