S6, Ep 77: Summer Strategies and Streamer Tactics: Ellis Ward's East Tennessee Report

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. Ellis, how are you?

Ellis: I'm a little hot right now, but I'm doing well. How are you?

Marvin: I'm just trying to stay out of trouble. Yeah, it was funny. We were talking

Marvin: before we started recording, and I was in your neck of the woods last week,

Marvin: and you were telling me I'm kind of unlucky with the weather because I seem

Marvin: to show up when it's boiling hot.

Ellis: Yeah, I think you were here last year during, it didn't, you know,

Ellis: we're sitting on top of a little bit of an air conditioner when we're on the river,

Ellis: but when it's in the upper 90s, it really doesn't matter if,

Ellis: the fortunate part for fishing is that we still have 60 degree water, but man,

Ellis: being under that full sun and just out exposed when it's 90 something, He's up for nineties.

Ellis: It taxes you a little bit.

Marvin: Yeah. And I don't buy any of that malarkey that Matt Riley's peddling that,

Marvin: you know, it's a little bit cooler and drier where he is. I think that's a lie.

Ellis: Well, he's full of it and has been for years.

Marvin: So the silver lining of all of this is ironically, while I get on a plane to

Marvin: go to Orlando to see what it's like to visit the tropics for ICAST,

Marvin: you're actually going to get a pretty decent break in the heat around Johnson city.

Marvin: And you're going to get, you know, I was looking at your weather,

Marvin: like after maybe tomorrow, you're going to get a spate of days in the eighties

Marvin: with some rain and cloud cover. So you should be happy as a clam.

Ellis: Yeah, it it's, it's a mix of happy and I'm sort of backloaded this month.

Ellis: So, um, uh, early plug book your trips.

Ellis: It's, it's nice to have these days for my own fishing when I don't have trips, but, um, yeah, last.

Ellis: I had last week a good couple trips, and yeah, this week it just coincides with

Ellis: a break in trips and also a break in weather.

Ellis: I'm always pretty good at taking advantage of that, but the happy as a clam

Ellis: part turns into, oh man, I need that.

Ellis: I need the one who wants to be out here and when it's quote unquote bad weather out um,

Ellis: but we end up getting plenty of those so definitely feeling

Ellis: positive about the the rainfall because it's been you know on the retirement

Ellis: we get those the five hour pushes every afternoon for six days a week so it's

Ellis: not like we're hurting for good streamer conditions dry fly conditions conditions, um,

Ellis: big water, cool temps, happy trout, all that stuff is here, but having the tributaries

Ellis: full and having that water table bump up a little bit makes everything a little happier.

Ellis: And, um, you know, for the small mouth and musky water around here, we need it.

Ellis: Um, we're, we're certainly not as dry as some areas talking with Richie back

Ellis: in DC. He was saying that the Potomac up by Harper's Ferry in Maryland was up to 91 degrees.

Ellis: So I think this, the whole region, southeast, mid-Atlantic, needs a good shot of rain.

Ellis: And at least for this little zone we have, I think we might get dumped on tomorrow, but we'll see.

Marvin: Yeah, which is great, right? Because then you can pull streamers on the mud

Marvin: line where the Doe River comes into the Watauga.

Ellis: Yeah man you know it and that that whole lower section and i can reserve,

Ellis: some of those thoughts for um a conversation around low water fishing but but

Ellis: that was we've had a couple of those i think we were talking,

Ellis: before recording that um yeah you did here and then you know we had a shot of rain or two and,

Ellis: i had a guy a day after one of those and it was just these these bumps and everyone

Ellis: who fishes freestones knows this the bumps that happen during the summer are and i've i've seen some,

Ellis: memes that joke about this where it's it's lower here or blown out of money

Ellis: and you get like one day or maybe a half a day where it's not that.

Ellis: And the nice part about the Watauga, the South Holston to a certain extent,

Ellis: it's not as influenced by tributaries, but.

Ellis: When it's low and clear above the dough,

Ellis: but below the dough, because that's a freestone coming in that's chocolate milk,

Ellis: it can provide for are some pretty

Ellis: cool opportunities if if you know where the fish are

Ellis: and and you know where the rocks are

Ellis: because you can't really see them on your own over them so we

Ellis: had a couple couple big eats that eats to kick things off and um we we learned

Ellis: quickly that rod setting with a one-odd hook is a good way to feel the inside

Ellis: of a brown trout's mouth but but not see the fish.

Marvin: Yeah well there you go so it's interesting right so you're going to cool off

Marvin: you're going to have cloud cover which i would imagine for your streamer by

Marvin: it's going to make the fish a little bit chasier right.

Ellis: Yeah every i mean dry fly fishing everything the birds the bugs everything,

Ellis: I won't get too spooky, but maybe even the plants. It just, you can feel it

Ellis: when you're out there, the spook with everything drops.

Marvin: Yeah. And then I would say too, right? I mean, you should see a little bit more

Marvin: predictability around your hatches in that situation because you're going to

Marvin: have a little bit better predictability on cloud cover and temperature.

Ellis: Yeah. Yeah, the hatches and where we're fishing for risers and what that looks

Ellis: like can change a little bit with the clear water and more stable flows or low flows.

Ellis: The fishing can be tough, but it can be a little more predictable in the sense

Ellis: that I know where the fish are going to be and at what times.

Ellis: In which sections and to a certain extent

Ellis: what they're going to be eating and when the

Ellis: water is bigger those dry fly

Ellis: places move around a little bit uh

Ellis: but they're still very much there the the high water

Ellis: does absolutely nothing to turn

Ellis: them off it just sort of switches things a little bit and then

Ellis: when you throw a cloud cover in you start to

Ellis: get it's not just the last two hours of daylight um you

Ellis: know it's not just the the 9 a.m to 11 a.m it's it can sort of fluctuate throughout

Ellis: the day and where they're eating and what they're eating can change and and

Ellis: it just it opens things up a little bit.

Marvin: Yeah very very cool and we've got a question for you uh from brenner and you

Marvin: know since we've been doing uh low clear uh shallow water in the summer he wanted

Marvin: to get your thoughts on dry fly and leader setup?

Ellis: Yeah.

Ellis: So with the tailwaters.

Ellis: I've been fishing, I've said this enough times to where I'm not sure if it's

Ellis: redundant at this point, but I don't like to drink my own Kool-Aid.

Ellis: I think I do a little bit with the dry fly setups.

Ellis: I am, at this point, if it's a nine foot leader, that doesn't feel right to me. And...

Ellis: It has less to do with spook from the leader.

Ellis: Like a, and I think this is somewhat universal.

Ellis: It's, we're not talking about just the tailwaters, but it is relative to fly size.

Ellis: And so when you're fishing flies that are in the 20, 22,

Ellis: 24, which is not uncommon at all,

Ellis: you know even when you're seeing 16s

Ellis: 18s if you look

Ellis: into the water if you look with the fish reading um just kind of look around

Ellis: at the i refer to it as the fuzz in the air and right above the water there's

Ellis: a huge biomass that is made up of way smaller than the 18s and And, you know,

Ellis: sometimes some of these 20s even look big.

Ellis: So when you're getting down that small, it has to do more with,

Ellis: I compare it to fishing a Clouser minnow on 50-pound full carbon with a clench knot.

Ellis: It's going to look like it's being moved through the water by a stick.

Ellis: And so fishing 15-pound fluoro loop knot, it's nice and wiggly.

Ellis: Um you do that with dry fly fishing and

Ellis: you know you everything starts to get all these little changes get magnified

Ellis: so finishing a size 22 with a 5x tippet i mean you just look at the knot you're

Ellis: tying it's a quarter size of the bug and so the way that is.

Ellis: Not necessarily they're seeing the knot or seeing

Ellis: the tippet it's it's that that there's not much

Ellis: freedom of movement the biggest

Ellis: piece of mass at that terminal end is

Ellis: the tippet and maybe the knot

Ellis: versus the fly being delivered

Ellis: by that tippet so going down to six six point five which at this point i also

Ellis: feel a little spoiled because the you know six x is 3.2 pounds i think if you

Ellis: get at the fancy furrow it's it's up to three and a half it's a big trout and at the end of the day,

Ellis: outside of too many horsepower on your first the initial hook set which is a

Ellis: good way to to snap big fish off um fishing bugs that small you don't have to

Ellis: put a lot of pressure onto it so So you can afford to do a,

Ellis: you know, take that non-foot 5X leader and just add an extra foot and a half, I would say,

Ellis: of 6X, maybe cut some 5X back and add 6X onto that.

Ellis: And it's really hard to put.

Ellis: Three plus pounds of pressure onto a fish with a bend in a four or five weight

Ellis: so it becomes less about breaking them off um you know during the fight it's

Ellis: really that last lifting into the net,

Ellis: or getting them to your feet if you're waiting and um in the initial hook set the stuff in between

Ellis: is is playing fish i think if the you know if you get good fish on on 6x and

Ellis: it turns and runs on you and you hold on to it you're probably gonna break it off on 5x anyway so,

Ellis: um yeah i'd certainly say going down to six six point five um that was kind

Ellis: of limited to one or two of the manufacturers but most of the um companies that

Ellis: are making tippet are making

Ellis: them in 0.5s, and that 6.5 is kind of a good range to be in.

Ellis: And unless you have, I am a bit of a diva when it comes to the dry fly presentations.

Ellis: And there's different leader setups you can get.

Ellis: When you are going down that small, there's different options you can get,

Ellis: But Rio and Scientific Anglers both make some of these finesse presentations

Ellis: that they don't start super fat.

Ellis: And so you can afford to be fishing them and they unroll nicely on lighter weight line.

Ellis: And just things that deliver flies that are a little smaller,

Ellis: especially at both close and long ranges, it's important to consider all of that.

Ellis: And once you get your system in place, it can be a little clunky to get there.

Ellis: It becomes copy and paste to a certain extent because you know it works,

Ellis: so you don't have to reinvent the wheel there a little bit to get to that happy

Ellis: place, but once you're there,

Ellis: it's certainly worth it.

Marvin: Yeah, and I would imagine on the streamer front, You know, probably,

Marvin: you know, you're probably pretty much running the same rig all the time anyway, right?

Marvin: I mean, it's just a question of you maybe get to step up a little bit if the water's stained.

Marvin: But, I mean, they're not liter shy, so it's not like you're fishing 6X with a D&D, right? Right.

Ellis: Yeah, and also, no, to a degree,

Ellis: the leader setup with streamers kind of varies the butt and the,

Ellis: we'll say, the midsection of

Ellis: the quote-unquote leaders, not necessarily taper, but I go from 25 to 20.

Ellis: And, and, you know, in bigger water or fishing just big flies where we're,

Ellis: you know, fishing a game changer and moving it fast and I'm, I'm worried less about.

Ellis: Um, how things are turning over and moving in between strips and more about

Ellis: getting this big fly there.

Ellis: And, uh, there's so much mass relative to the leader and line system on bigger

Ellis: flies that you can afford to, to stay at 20 pounds.

Ellis: And when, when you're fishing long clear,

Ellis: it's, it's the same principle with the dry fly where, you know, um,

Ellis: fishing the drunk or even fishing the, the simpler strip flies with weight on

Ellis: them, like the peanuts, you going down to 15,

Ellis: I tend to revert 12 from in

Ellis: the boat because we're fishing water and really

Ellis: when it it compiles because

Ellis: when we're when we are fishing 12 or when there is that need to drop down below

Ellis: 15 or below 20 it's probably because we're getting really sneaky with our casting

Ellis: and i like to do that all the time but but it becomes required when the fishing is harder.

Ellis: And we're doing that in areas that have fast-moving water adjacent to them.

Ellis: And normally, we're in the boat water, and so it's pretty easy to snap.

Ellis: 12-pound mono or fluoro, and so I kind of like to stay in that 15 and do a loop

Ellis: knot, and most of the flies,

Ellis: most of the streamers outside of the real small ones or the real big ones,

Ellis: they can be happily delivered with a 15-pound fluoro and a loop knot.

Marvin: Oh, well, there you go, and you know we love questions at the Articulate Fly folks.

Marvin: 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 and we're

Marvin: going to enter a drawing for some cool stuff from Ellis at the end of the season.

Marvin: And Ellis, before I let you go and, uh, plan what you're going to do with all

Marvin: this awesome weather that you have, you want to let folks, uh,

Marvin: know where they can find you so they can book in fish with you.

Ellis: Yeah. Website is elliswardflies.com and you can follow me on Instagram at elliswardguides.

Ellis: Best way to contact me about trips or asking any questions is to text or call at 513-543-0019.

Marvin: There you go. And don't forget, folks, you know, we've got a great community

Marvin: here at the Articulate Fly. We host it on Patreon.

Marvin: And two of the benefits, you know, if you have a bucktail addiction,

Marvin: there's a level of membership that will help you out with some of Ellis's roadkill.

Marvin: And then also if you want to go out and fish with Ellis we've got another tier

Marvin: where you actually get a guide credit every year so you might want to check

Marvin: those out and you know weather's improving and as I always say you owe it to

Marvin: yourself to get out there and catch a few tight lines everybody,

Marvin: tight lines Ellis appreciate it Mars.