S7, Ep 103: Staying Warm and Catching Fish: Matt Reilly's Winter Fishing Strategies

Hey, folks, it's Marvin Cash, the host of The Articulate Fly. We're back for the final Southwest Virginia Fishing Report of the year with Matt Reilly.Matt, how are you?

I'm doing all right, man.

How are you? Just trying to stay out of trouble. I know you haven't been home long because I saw you upgraded your Instagram feed and you were on the water today.Have you thawed out?

Yeah, man, today was great. It's a little windy and started off pretty cold, but we hit the high 40s for a little bit before the wind turned on, so, yeah, it wasn't too bad.

Yeah, it's always funny because, you know, the difference between being on my side of the mountain when I'm home in Virginia and your side of the mountain is probably 10 degrees and probably 20 miles an hour.

Yeah. Well, the news, a big river. If they're calling for significant wind, there's. There's a lot of places you don't want to be.

Yeah.And so it's funny, we were talking before we started recording that, you know, we're kind of in this weird time of year where even though, you know, we're heading into winter, the temps are kind of bouncing around a little bit from a conditions perspective, and that kind of makes the musky fishing a little funky.

Yeah, I mean, I would say that the fishing itself hasn't been too, too funky that I always, I always pretty much call Thanksgiving the beginning of winter on the river proper. And it was pretty much true. This year. By the time Thanksgiving was gone, we had water temps down around 40.We'd had two or three pretty big cold fronts come through. And that's just, you know, just going to continue through the winter.We're, you know, gosh, four, three, four days ago we had, you know, temps that didn't get out of the mid-30s. All day we got 4 or 5 inches of snow. And then we saw, well, we saw 50 degrees sunny day before that. Then we saw some snow.Then we saw, you know, another 40, 50 degree day with some sun. And then today we had this other big cold front roll through and it's not going to get above freezing tomorrow and blow like crazy.And it's going to be relatively cold through the weekend. But then we're going to be back in the high 40s, 50s is a high next week. So it's, it's all over the place.But that's just kind of how winter goes, you know, day to day and couple degrees and couple miles an hour wind can, can make a Big difference.

Yeah. How's it affecting kind of patterning the fish?Right, because this probably hasn't been cold enough long enough to really put them in their wintering holes, right?

Oh, I would say it definitely has. They, you know, like I said, I would. I would define winter on the river.Like I said, as, you know, basically 42, 43 degrees and cooling, which we passed back at the end of November. And that's what's gonna, that's what's gonna pack everybody into those, those areas.So, you know, before that, you're seeing fish kind of in more sort of marginal fringy areas and, and now, you know, it's like the meat of the meat and that's, that's where you need to be spending your time. You can get, you can take some cues. I think I probably say this about every year, but you can take some cues from the other fish in the river.You know, there's relatively few muskies compared to carp and suckers and. All those other species. And all those fish kind of go to the same places in the wintertime.And like, particularly this year, our water's still really low, still very clear. And so you can, you can see a lot of that stuff, particularly on a sunny day if you're paying attention.And you know, again, I was like, I was telling my guys today, two weeks ago, we were seeing. We were seeing a bunch of carp and suckers in. In sort of shallow habitat near deeper water.Today we rolled through their 37 degree water temperatures and, you know, nada until you get right into the like, deepest of the, you know, spot in the whole, you know, slowest moving water. So that's, that's, that's generally how all that works.And it's not to say that you can't sort of feather spots out and fish other things, but, you know, dayto day, as we go through that transition, I kind of, I kind of work on that.You know, until we hit that low 40s consistently, I'll be fishing some, like, BC spots and feathering them out a little bit, fishing above them and below them. And then, you know, just as the days progress, as it gets colder, you'll just stop seeing stuff in those spots.And they just kind of all compact and that's, that's where we are right now.

Got it.And of course, you're a pro at not freezing to death in weather like this, but, you know, for, for folks that want to get out on their own, you know, you got any kind of inside baseball tips and tricks for you Know, dealing with the wind really from kind of an apparel perspective and a comfort perspective and the temperatures, you know, because I mean it's cold and then you know, it may not get dark until around five o' clock but you know, once that sun drops behind the ridge, it starts chilling off pretty quickly.

Oh yeah. Yeah, I will say so. Just sort of my, how I approach every day. You know, I have a, I have a pair of Simms.Like, like, I don't know what you call them exactly, like rain bibs. Basically. I've got a pair of challenger insulated bibs.I've got a puffy jacket, got a raincoat and I've got a challenger jacket which is basically like a wind stopper raincoat that's insulated pretty heavily as well.I've got my waders and I've got like knee high muck boots and man, if, like if I'm in the jet boat and the water conditions are such where I'm pretty confident that I'm not going to have to get out of the, out of the boat all day, I'll, I'll stick to my boots and my pants. If it's going to be real cold, I'll wear insulated stuff.If it's going to be, you know, in the high 30s, 40s, I might just wear sort of my, my wind rain type type stuff. I try to avoid the waiters as much as possible, especially if I'm going to be sitting down rowing because I know my feet are going to get cold.That's, that's always the biggest battle with waiters because you know, you kind of, you get your blood flow restricted around your ankles where your pants and your boot laces and stuff are and your feet turn into blocks of ice and you're just not really walking around doing too much. So I'll try to avoid that as much as possible. You know, if I have to wear waiters, if I'm in the raft or something I'll, I'll usually wear waiters.But you know, I also pretty much in the winter always have couple pairs of gloves. Neoprene gloves if I'm not be fishing, like if I'm just rowing the boat. I like neoprene gloves. They're a little bit bulky.You don't have the dexterity that you have with like a fingerless glove. But they're waterproof and they're warm so they're pretty comfortable.And if I'm gonna be fishing then I usually wear a pair of fingerless insulated gloves.And regardless I usually Wear a pair of like, heavy duty extra large latex gloves below, you know, underneath of those, just to keep your hands from getting wet, because that's really what saps a lot of the, the warmth out of your hands. And it's tough to recover from if your hands get wet. So, and those are, those are very easy to fish in. You know, you lose like almost zero dexterity.Man.And then like, I pretty much always have a cold weather buff because that's another place you'll get cold is in your, in your neck, you know, especially if it's windy. You'll have, have a breeze hitting you in the back of the neck and that'll get you pretty quick.You know, beanie over the hat, over the ears, keeping all that heat in. And then if I, you know, have my ducks in a row, which I rarely do, I'll have my chemical heat warmers boiled down, ready to go.So, you know, I can always have one of those running in my pocket and they last for like 8 hours. Otherwise I always have a, like a bulk box of those, like hot hands in the truck. Give out to people and. Yeah, I think, I think that's about it.I always try to eat something warm during the day to lift spirits and kind of bring people back to life if it's, if it's particularly nasty. But that's, that's sort of where, that's sort of where I'm at.I'm sure there's some other things to, to do, but that, that takes care of me pretty well.

Yeah. So, you know, folks, listen up. If you're fishing with Matt or you're trying to do it yourself, you know, being cold is pretty miserable.

Yep, it's, that's, that's sort of the number one, you know, daytoday. You know, like I said, I, I, I canceled tomorrow. I gave, gave my, my guy the option. We're supposed to fish two days, so we're just gonna fish Friday.But, you know, high of freezing and 15 to 25 mile an hour winds takes the fun factor out of it. Um, so even, even if it's 40 degrees, you know, if you get cold and you lose that battle, it's pretty tough to recover from.And then it's just not gonna be fun. So number one priority should just be being comfortable. And then having fun and then fishing and catching fish.

Yeah.And so, you know, as we kind of wind down into the holiday season, that always means, you know, show season in early 2026 for folks that are on the water as much as you are, but I know you're actually going to be on the road in 2026. Where are you going to be so folks can come by and say hi and maybe see a presentation?

Yeah, I'm not doing much, but I am going back to see my friends in Cincinnati. They've got a. The Buckeye United Fly Fishers have a little show over there that's. It's been really fun. Really busy in the past.It's a one day show Saturday. Gosh, I just looked at it. I think it's February 7th, whatever that Saturday is in Loveland, Ohio. But yeah, met a lot of cool folks there.So I took last year off, can't remember exactly why, but gonna go back this year and, and hopefully see some new folks and see some folks that I've gotten to know since last show too. So that'll be fun.

And I saw your newsletter come out. You got a smattering of dates in January and February.You want to let folks know kind of generally what's available, how to get in touch and all that kind of good stuff.

Yeah, there's, there's, there's couple weeks a days probably between January and February still open. Some days will disappear due to reschedulings and things over the next couple of weeks. But.You can find all that either, either through my newsletter. If you want to subscribe to that, subscribe to a website or just, just through emailing me or text me.You know, as I always say, all my information's on the website. It's Matt Riley fly fishing.com and you can, you know, call, text, email, whatever you'd like to do, get in touch.

Yeah. Well, there you go. Well folks, we won't talk again until we're on the other side. Into 2026.Want to wish everybody a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, Matt.

Merry Christmas, Marvin.