S7, Ep 46: Navigating Seasonal Shifts: Fishing Tactics for Summer Success with Mac Brown

Hey, folks, it's Marvin Cash, the host of the Articulate Fly. We're back with another Casting Angles with Mac Brown. Mac, how are you?

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

As always, just trying to stay out of trouble. And you were telling me before we started recording, you're a little bit disappointed. The weatherman didn't quite get it right this weekend.

He really didn't. We're supposed to have a deluge of water again. And I mean, it hasn't even.Which I think they were predicting like Thursday last week, five and six inches. And I mean, we've had maybe just enough to wet the patio. So I'm kind of glad we've had a. We've had our share of floods, you know, so it's.It's kind of nice. We don't really need a bunch more floods going on right now.

Yeah, absolutely. You know, we're kind of heading into a transition time of year.Like, fishing is really good, but, you know, I guess we've got probably two weeks until DH Burns off, and then we're going to start to, you know, at some point kind of march into the dog days of summer, right?

Oh, yeah, it's common. But we've been really cool as far as the temps.You know, we've been really a lot cooler than normal for May, I think last week we had two days in the low 40s.And I think one of those days I talked to a guy on the radio up in New Hampshire and this really surprised me to be at the end of May, and it talked about Mount Washington being like 5 degrees and snowing, and I thought, wow, because Mount Washington's not near as high as the mountains, you know, around the house here. So it gets some pretty harsh weather, though. So, yeah, we're ready for some warm temperatures, though.

Yeah, so it's going to warm up. I think that was the kind of a nor' easter that kind of whipped through. And that's why our weather's been kind of cool and funky, too.But you were telling me that as you would expect, you know, probably water temperatures probably in the high 50s, maybe, maybe low 60s, kind of depending on where you are, is probably really, really good kind of dry dropper action.

Yeah, that's what's been the. The ticket the last few weeks. We're still doing a lot of dry dropper.And of course, with all these cloudy days, we've had a lot of fish up, like, really up in the column. So the dropper's not really that far away. From the dry, you know, it's like 16, 16 inches to 12 inches away.I mean, somewhere in that neighborhood seems to work really well when the hatches get rolling and. Yeah, that's. That's been the ticket. That's been probably the most productive thing I've seen the last two weeks. Yeah.

And that's going to, you know, that's going to continue to kind of work throughout the summer. It just may get a little bit tougher, you know, because once it starts, you know.You know, DH in most places, you know, give folks a couple weeks and they're going to clean out most of those fish. Right. And then you're going to have either educated, you know, DH fish or wild fish. And then it's going to get low and clear and hot, right?

Yeah. Then it'll be going back down deep. Of course, fishing early. Early. Like, I. I wish we'd. I. There's just no way to do it.But I wish we'd go to some houdal stuff here, you know, like when it gets hot. Because, I mean, we're done. Like the trips we do in the summer, we're at the door daylight and we're done by like 10:30. So it's like.But you can't really tell everybody to do that.But, you know, a lot of people want to wake up on vacation and start at 10 and finish at 4, and that's just a recipe for disaster, you know what I'm saying? If you're trying to do well in the summer, I just. As soon as the water temp hits about 68 degrees, it's probably best to quit, you know?

Yeah, it's kind of like if you start late like that, by the time you kind of get everybody in the boat and, you know, tell them which way to point the rod, it's kind of. You're fishing in the worst part of.

The day, that's it. And it's like, I. I kind of like the early morning. I really like. I like the early morning stuff on the water. I mean, that's probably my favorite.That's some of my favorite. And it's not that it's bad in the summer. You just gotta go at the right time. People always ask, is it a lot worse?And I'm like, well, no, it can be really good to you in the summer. It's just you gotta go when the fish are gonna be happy. And that's early in the morning.

Yeah, I would say, you know, gosh, in the summertime, you know, we're talking dry Dropper, probably my, you know, favorite rig is probably an elk hair Cattus and a soft tackle pheasant tail.

Mm, that'd be a good one. I mean, that would be definitely a good one. And of course, the terrestrial game will start to get bigger too, as we get into late June, July.But yeah, we're in a. We're going to be in a big transition here the next few weeks. It's not going to be the easy fishing we've had.I mean, you're going to have to work harder for them when it gets in, you know, into June, July. You're going to have to be doing exactly what they want.Right now we've been able to get away with a lot of stuff, dry dropper and not very selective on the, the nymphs. You know, just as long as it's something that looks buggy, it's been working fine.And it's like it'll start to be more selective here the next couple weeks.

Yeah, it's interesting too.I always kind of think too that, you know, particularly like a small black beetle is kind of my change up on really selective fish, like fish in the South Holston or the Watauga, you know, and because I think it's something a lot of people don't think to kind of throw at them. I tell you, another good one for me is a big June bug.

Oh, yeah, we like, we like the June bugs a lot too. And that works really well on these park streams, like the Freestones up here. We throw a lot of beetles and we throw a lot of inch worms, of course.And you know, everybody has all this hopper mentality from western England and they all come here and think they're going to throw a big hopper.And it's like, it's just very few places in Appalachia that it's not like Iowa or the Wisconsin or Illinois around the Driftless, where you got all these hoppers, grass. You know, how many hoppers you see in the woods? Very, very rare. So, like, my field has them.I've got eight acres of pasture around the house and of course we got them here, but unfortunately there's not a trout stream flows by my house. So, yeah, the hopper thing is overrated in Appalachia. I think what I'm saying, it's, it's, it's a western thing.

Yeah.I think part of it comes back to, you know, it's just kind of people paying attention and matching the hatch and it's kind of like, you know, even if you're out west if you're walking to the water and you're not moving a lot of grasshoppers, you might not want to fish a hopper, right?

That's. Yeah, that's right. But there's times that way, of course, they fly like, you know, hundreds of birds coming off the grass with, with the hoppers.I mean, when it's like that, it's probably a good time to do it too, so. Yeah, but we just don't have a lot of them. We have them here around the pasture.But like I say, most of the stuff that I work on out of the forest service or park service land, there's not any pastures up there in the national park that flow along the creeks, you know, so it's definitely inchworm is, is king in this part of the country. I mean, there's, there's close to 500 varieties of inch worms here in Appalachia.So that's a way more common food source to fish that live back in the woods, you know.

Yeah. How do you feel about crickets and ants?

I like ants a lot. Of course I like crickets. From as a kid, you know, we used to fish a lot of crickets when I was growing up.But, but ants, I use a lot of ants, black ant and cinnamon colored ants. I mean, I tie a lot of ants and I've done really well with ants that are like fishing them underneath.Like, I used to fish a lot of ants come June, July, where I'd have a floating ant on top, dry dropper, and then I'd have one that sinks underneath and I'd be fishing two ants, you know, at the same time. So ants can be really productive because there's a lot of big like carpenter ants and stuff up in the park too with decaying wood matter and stuff.And they'll fall in the stream. Pretty common fish. Definitely know what the ants are, you know.

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. It's interesting too. I mean, I have.I usually try to carry some beetles that aren't like made out of foam because I think sinking beetles, particularly June bugs, works really well too.

Yeah, they would. Yeah. I like terrestrial season a great deal. I mean, that's one thing I really do enjoy when it turns to summer because we're not going to have.There's really not a whole lot of per se hatches that are pouring off like this time of year already. I mean, if we went north, you know, drove a good ways north, I mean, they still got a lot of great hatches going on up north of us.But our hatch season's pretty much coming to a close for the most part until next, next fall. You know, when it cools off, it'll be a terrestrial game for the next next bunch of months.You know, you'll see a few bugs here and there like Isoperla stones and there'll be, there'll be a handful of things that are. I wouldn't really call that a hatch though, because most of the stones are coming off at nighttime.You know, you might see some fluttering about, laying eggs and things, but you're not going to see like prolific mayfly hatches and things on a freestone this time of year.

Yeah, it's interesting too. Right. So, you know, we're, you know, depending on where you are in the country, some kids are already out of school.Kids are getting ready to get out of school. I think you're telling me Duncan's going to be out of school, you know, middle of this week.I think my, my youngest son's in school for two more weeks maybe and then it's going to be kind of crazy. So you're going to be guiding and doing stuff like that too. And if I remember correctly, you don't have any schools kind of until the fall, right?

That's right. The next one that we do will be the cast, the two day weekend school like in September.And then we have a couple of, couple of five day schools that are going on October, November. And then we got the one in Arkansas with Davey for the wet fly school, the clinic and Mountain Home.I think that's really the only four big four things that coming up like in the fall or those four. So we're looking forward to all of those because I'm. I'm really looking forward to getting back to Mountain Home.

Yeah.And then, you know, get some, get some folks in, you know, I know you've got some trips planned this summer too, but get some folks to come out and fish with you, get in the boat or hike up high with you if they're up for that.

Oh yeah, yeah. That's always fun. Going up high. Going up high. And when it gets warmer like that, I'm, I'm really excited. I get to take Duncan.He gets done on Wednesday. Then we're going to go up and stay for four or five days up high, about three hours in, you know, walking in and so that'll be a lot of fun.That'll be a good way to celebrate being done with school and getting ready to become a junior. He's going to be a junior in high school. So Time's going fast, Marvin.

It happens that way, I think. You know, the last time we spoke it was, I think I just gotten back from my oldest son's graduation and he was the one that.From Carolina, and he's the one that was talking all that junk when he was like 8 years old and Raleigh at the fly fishing show.

Yeah, I remember. I remember. Well, yeah, that's hard to believe that he's graduated college already and. Yeah. Congratulations.

Yeah, no, thank you. He'll be 23 in September.It's kind of crazy, but I remember he was talking junk to you and I was just watching him and I thought you were going to swallow your dip.

Yeah, he was funny. I remember he was full of himself at that age.

Yeah, he's changed a little bit, but maybe not that much. But, you know, as folks already know, if they listen regularly, that they need to go to Mac Brown Fly Fish for all the, all the information.And probably the best thing to do is to call you, text you or shoot you an email if they want to get in touch and get on the boat or hike up in the park this summer. And you know, folks, we've got kind of a little bit of a break here in the Southeast.It isn't going to stay cool like this and wet and, you know, it won't take very many weeks of hot, hot, no rain, you know, to basically dry things up and, you know, move us onto the warm water fish for the rest of the summer. So as I always say, yo to yourself to get out there and catch a few. Tight lines, everybody. Tight lines, Mac.

Tight lines. Marvin.