Transcript: Central VA Fishing Report with TaleTellers Fly Shop
S5, Ep 109: Central Virginia Fishing Report with TaleTellers Fly Shop
2023
http://www.thearticulatefly.com
Transcript
Marvin:
[0:04] Hey folks, it's Marvin Cash, the host of the Articulate Fly, and we're back with another Central Virginia fishing report with Ethan Martin at Telltale's Fly Shop. How you doing, Ethan?
Ethan:
[0:14] I'm doing good today. How are you doing?
Marvin:
[0:15] As always, I'm just trying to stay out of trouble, and it looks like we've probably got another three or four days of crispy heat on the other side of Labor Day.
Ethan:
[0:24] Oh yeah, it's been low and clear and nice and toasty for September.
Marvin:
[0:29] Yeah, it's interesting, right? I saw your post on Instagram, you know, the boys at Mossy Creek pushed out the notice that I guess all fishing in the Shenandoah National Park is closed because of high temperatures and low water.
And I think you commented on the trout side that that's pretty much where things are in Central VA. Yep, yeah.
Ethan:
[0:48] It's not the first time they've done that too. So, you know, if you're newer to fly fishing and you're kind of freaking out about, you know, hearing that news, it's not the first time that's happened, won't be the last time, but basically it's just due to the fact that if you go and fish for brook trout, you're pretty much going to kill everyone that you catch just because it is so hot.
And so all of our brook trout streams, you know, in our media area within central Virginia are pretty much at the same point, just super low, super clear.
So we've been telling everybody just go fish for smallmouth, which is pretty much what, you know, most of us do all summer anyways, but you know towards that front it's been low and clear.
It's pretty, I mean it's really easy to wade downtown, so it's if you are in central Virginia you know you still have plenty of options to fish.
Marvin:
[1:39] Yeah and I mean you know the unfortunate thing is we're not seeing any water in the forecast so it could be cool and low and clear on the trout streams in the next four to six weeks.
Ethan:
[1:51] Yeah, which is still pretty much normal. Like I know everybody always freaks out when I say that, but like you know fall is typically always going to be lower water in our parts and we always hope that we get a nice shot of rain to kind of free up the streams of any like debris and fallen leaves that happen towards the fall.
It's kind of crazy that we're talking about fall right now, but so you know that that's pretty much normal for this part of Virginia.
And so, eventually that rain will come and it'll be nice and cold and we'll be telling everybody, you know, get on out there.
It's 30 degrees out, which is crazy to say, you know, when right now we're recording and it's 86. But so, like I said, just go catch a smallmouth.
Marvin:
[2:37] Yeah, it's interesting too, because what I'll expect to have happen in North Carolina is if we stay in this trend, what will happen is they'll delay the delayed harvest stockings down here.
But, yeah, but to your point, you know, this is the time of year where like you wake up in the morning and at seven o'clock in the morning you hear the cicadas. You have a pretty good idea what you should be fishing. Yep.
Ethan:
[2:56] And I mean.
There's nothing like going out there this time of the year and you get a little bit of that like fall crisp air that comes through those nights and you can go out either floating you know if you're willing to drag your canoe or kayak or raft some but or just going out waiting and the water temp is like incredibly hot compared to the air temp um so i don't know i i love this time of year to fish um because like you said cicadas are just about starting to drop uh i i mean you And you can hear them everywhere, just our annual cicadas.
And when they start dying off from that first frost that happens, the fish go crazy.
They're already going crazy on topwater. So if you haven't gotten out yet this summer, then this is a great time of the year to go out with just a topwater bug or topwater bait fish if you want to throw something a little more active and catch some fish.
We've seen a lot of really good numbers of that footlong, smallmouth.
So I've been pretty happy from everybody that I've been talking to, you know, newbies and experienced anglers alike.
So yeah, nothing to be scared about with the water levels. It's just kind of business as usual, as they say.
Marvin:
[4:08] Yeah, it's interesting too, because it's always good to hear that we're seeing lots of different sizes of smallmouth, right? Because I mean, we've had, you know, you and I've talked about this a ton, you know, probably the last five or six years.
Before that, we were having these just scouring rains and flooding during the spawn and it was getting a little grim.
Ethan:
[4:29] Yeah, I mean, there's no way around it, like, five years ago, six, the fishing just sucked, you know, the numbers just weren't there.
And so year by year, we've slowly seen that age class of that, like, 13, 14 inch fish that we have now, you know, kind of come up through the ranks.
So it's, it's comforting to see that it's just, you know, we will have that little bit of a gap here in a couple years for those huge fish, you know, I would say 20 inch fish, fish, that there'll be just a few of them because for so many years the spawn died off.
But yeah, I mean, you just, it's happy when you go out there and sometimes you just have a day where you catch a bunch of dinks and you're like, man, this sucks. I didn't catch a giant.
All I did is I caught a bunch of dinks, but you know, five years ago, if we had gone out and caught 50 fish in a day, it would have been, it didn't happen.
You know, we had days where we got and catch like three, four fish, even the guides, you know, struggle. And it wasn't the client necessarily.
It wasn't anything other than just the way the fishery was. That was due to a whole bunch of different factors. We just didn't have the numbers that we've had now.
And so the past three years really, particularly last year and this year, we've seen a lot better numbers.
[5:46] So that's encouraging. There's always a bunch of sad news, especially around the fishing world, because that's usually what gets the attention, but it is definitely an encouraging thing when you go out now and you catch a 20-inch smallmouth and you catch some 16-inch maybe, and then there's a dink, and maybe you get mad at it at first, but you just remember that that's the fish that in 10, 12 years is going to be that 20-inch fish, because that's usually what it takes, you know?
Marvin:
[6:14] Yeah, and I would say too, right, so if folks want to fish like in downtown Lynchburg, I would imagine that's an early morning, early evening game, right?
Ethan:
[6:23] It is, yeah.
[6:26] Midday is usually not the best time. You can still catch fish, so don't get me wrong.
If you are in college in the area and that's when your classes are off, for sure, go fish when you can.
But if you want a shot at some of those better fish and you just want to increase that probability, then it's going to be your mornings, it's going to be your evenings, that's going to be your shot, basically.
And that could be anything. You could go and throw a clouser, you could go and throw a topwater.
There's fish kind of all around Percival's Island. There's more and more people that fish down there, but it's nothing like the popular trout streams around.
If you wade fish around that part of Central Virginia, talking about the James in downtown, Percival's Island's long. It's like two miles long almost.
Maybe not two miles, but you've got two sides to it.
So, plenty of water. If you show up and you see six other anglers, you can get away from them very easily, whereas on some trout streams in Virginia, that's not possible.
[7:32] And then if you want to kayak, you can put in there and float down.
There's plenty of good floats around too.
Starting in central Virginia, really Lynchburg and down, it's been pretty good numbers.
Upper James sometimes still has problems cause they don't have quite the, uh, flood protection is what we do down towards Lynchburg, but, um, yeah, it's been good, so no complaints there on the small mouth.
Marvin:
[7:57] Yeah. Well, there you go. And you know, folks, we love questions on the articulate fly. You can email them to us or DM us on social media, whatever's easiest for you. And if we use your question, I will send you some articulate fly swag.
We are drawing for some cool stuff from the shop at the end of the season.
And Ethan, before I let you, uh, leave the piggly wiggly parking lot and get back to your family at the beach.
Do you want to let folks know shop location hours and all that kind of good stuff?
Ethan:
[8:21] Yeah, so we're located in downtown Lynchburg, Virginia. We're right on Main Street.
We are closed on Sundays and Mondays right now, but we have actually extended our hours. So now we're open from 10 to 6. And then on Saturdays, we are now 9 to 4.
So the hours have changed a little bit just to give people who are getting off from work, They can make it in that last hour.
Um, but yeah, if you can't make it to the store, then everything pretty much is online on our website, or you can actually just call the shop, you know, and ask if there's something that you're looking for.
Um, and we might either have it in stock or we can help you get it, uh, or something similar. Um, so don't be afraid to do that.
And yeah, that's it. Yeah.
Marvin:
[9:02] Well, there you go. Well, listen, folks, you owe it to yourself to get out there and catch a few. Tight lines, everybody. Tight lines, Ethan. Taglines!