Transcript: Southwest Virginia Fishing Report with Matt Reilly
Transcript
Marvin:
[0:04] Hey folks, it's Marvin Cash, the host of the Articulate Fly, and we're back with another Southwest Virginia fishing report with Matt Riley. How you doing, Matt?
Matt:
[0:13] Man, I'm doing good. I'm walking the dog and chewing on a pawpaw in the backyard, so can't complain too much.
Marvin:
[0:20] Yeah, there you go. And you're on the water today, so it really doesn't get a whole lot better than that.
Matt:
[0:25] No, no. I think that's what everybody should be doing in September, but I guess, who am I to judge on that?
It's definitely been a good, solid couple of weeks here.
Marvin:
[0:40] Yeah, it's interesting, right? Because it looks like, at least in the southeast, we're dry, right? But we're getting the temperatures we want, and I mean, I'm hopeful we're going to get some rain. But I know, we were talking before we started recording, that it's becoming challenging, challenging because you've got kind of unusually low water for this time of year.
Matt:
[0:57] Yeah, you know, I wouldn't necessarily say unusually low.
It's pretty seasonal, but it's been pretty statically low and we really have basically no rain in the forecast, sun every day for the next couple of weeks, with maybe a little exception here and there, but Yeah, we could definitely use it, but we're trucking along, I'm not complaining too much.
Marvin:
[1:28] Yeah, so I guess the big trick with no rain, it's not better levels and no stain in the water either, but you were telling me it makes for killer bug fishing.
Matt:
[1:38] Yeah, yeah, so I mean, we only have our temps have really dived a little bit.
A couple weeks ago, we were still in the low to mid 80s for water temps in the middle end of the day.
And we've been starting now, we started this morning out at about 68 degrees.
And we're getting up to like the low, maybe mid 70s, depending on where you are.
But, and that's pretty chilly. That means that the mornings are a little bit cold.
I mean, it was like 48 degrees and I left my house this morning.
But like you said, sun on the of water helps that, um, and the, the bug fishing has been, has been real good. Um, which is a good thing because with that low and clear water, it's pretty tough to sell them anything else in the middle of the day when the sun's on them.
Marvin:
[2:32] Yeah. And I would imagine too, right. I guess, you know, when, when the, it's not full blown sun, probably the bait fish bites pretty decent, right?
Matt:
[2:39] Yeah. So, I mean, I talk to people about this just about every day for the last week so the two ways that I kind of look at cold, you know, kind of shock this is you can, and I reckon and this goes for just about any time.
[3:01] You can either go finesse, which in my case and smallmouth case is bug fishing, or you can go just really aggressive, big poppers making a lot of noise, that kind of thing.
When the water's real low and slow, It just bores me to no end to just drag crayfish on the bottom, because you really are just fishing spots.
If there's not a whole lot of current, it's not moving the fly down the river.
You can pull that out in some pockets and wedges and stuff like that and make things happen, but for the most part, I might have somebody test the waters with an aggressive approach, and then somebody stay on the bug train and see what happens.
And it can be kind of 50-50 in the morning.
I'm always just looking for an excuse to get back on the bug program this time of year.
And Mike, we were kind of talking about before this late summer has been a little bit delayed, it seems like.
[4:20] The bugs, I should say the cicadas are really what I'm talking about this time of year.
They've been up in the trees for a better part of two, three months, just buzzing away.
And normally, it's within about a week of the first of September where I start seeing them actually on the water, dead or dying.
And then there'll be a couple of days, usually in early September, where they're spitting them up, the fish are that in a month.
When you're pulling them into the boat, and it's just real obvious that that's kind of a primary foraging event.
[4:59] But those suckers are still up there, they're still buzzing.
I've seen exactly one in a fish's mouth, and that was last Friday.
So it helps for the finesse approach when things things are still cold to have that pretty large forage base still there and coming, because that means that even though the water temp's pretty chilly, those bugs are actually gonna be there on the surface, and they'll be looking for them.
[5:38] And the nice thing about the bug, it's fairly versatile in terms of performing really well really don't have to move it.
And the sales pitch is basically the splat, and then the fish, kind of making sure it looks buggy and sucking it in. And so I'll say this morning, we kind of split the approaches 50-50 in the boat.
And first fish of the day was like an almost 19-inch fish that ate a bug in 68-degree water.
So when it was 74 the evening before.
And I think this morning was our coolest water temp in over a couple of weeks.
So take that for what it's worth, But that's kind of how I look at it.
Marvin:
[6:37] Got it. And have you been able to do any musky prospecting or are you just doing musky booking?
Matt:
[6:44] Uh, musky booking and musky dreaming, I guess. Um, it's, uh, man, when everything started getting cooler, especially since I've been smallmouth fishing for like eight months now, um, I, uh, I started thinking about some of those other fall winter time things that, Man, I'm all up on the smallmouth trip, so that's maybe three to four weeks with a couple of exceptions, and then we'll get on the muskie program, but I definitely have booked a lot of those days and am continuing to book them.
So definitely looking forward to switching gears here in three, four weeks to a month.
Marvin:
[7:28] Well, there you go. Well, I've got a muskie question for you from Brenner, and he wanted to get your thoughts on fly color combos for the fall.
Matt:
[7:39] That is a good question, and I would define fall or interpret fall in terms of water conditions, because that's really probably where color selection is going to matter more so than just the calendar season.
But for the most part, you know, the ball is going to be low and clear, potentially, unless, you know, the dream is to get a bunch of rain, you know, in October sometime, and have the rivers fairly full, and that makes things better for selling fish, big flies.
But for the most part, it's usually going to be pretty low and clear.
If you have days of sun, which we usually have a lot of in October, because it's a pretty historically low rainfall month around here, unless we get a hurricane.
[8:36] I tend to go pretty natural, so that means black or white are just pretty year-round staple colors for me.
And then when I say natural, I mean anything that imitates a sucker species pretty specifically or pretty closely, and that, you know, talking about hog suckers that are brown, gold, black, tan, olive, that kind of color scheme.
And then, you know, if you have red horse or, or, you know, fall fish or something like that, maybe work some like grays and tans and oranges and reds in there too.
[9:27] That's how I tend to run things. One thing that is worth thinking about is leaves, if that will absolutely be a factor in the month of October and maybe early November, probably early November.
If there's just a ton of leaves in the water, I sometimes think about like this blacks and whites, I I'd, you know, see a little bit more weeder time just because they're not tan or yellow or orange or the color of all the leaves rolling around in the 80s and, and slack water spots and, and, uh, you know, that, uh, that, that'll help you maybe a little bit and maybe the fish find those flies a little bit better too.
So that's, that's how I would think about it.
Marvin:
[10:19] Uh got it and you know folks we love questions at the articulate fly you can email them to us or you can dm us on social media Whatever is easy is for you And if we use your question I will send you some articulate fly swag you're gonna enter a drawing for some cool stuff from that at the end of the season and Matt before I let you go and I think the last time I was supposed to ask you if you've got all your show schedule Figured out right?
So uh Yeah, that is true.
Matt:
[10:42] You were um, I believe I believe, well, I know that I am not going to Doswell this year.
It's a great show. I just have basically two weeks surrounding that weekend booked.
And I may be, I may be headed to Cincinnati for a show Cincinnati for a show that I have not been to, but.
I think it's a potentially a good market for me. I know a few people up there and they certainly get down with some warm water, warm water fishing.
So I may be doing that one and then that is really it.
Otherwise, we're just hanging around and fishing and maybe sleeping a little bit.
Marvin:
[11:33] Oh, there you go. That sounds horrible.
I know there are a lot of folks like I know like the tuck fly shop guys.
I know Ian and Charity Rutter go up to that Cincinnati show, so I know it's really a popular place for Southwest Virginia, East Tennessee people to pull people down in our neck of the woods.
Matt:
[11:52] It's not very far.
Where I live and fish is really closer to a lot of other places, a lot of other states than the key population centers in Virginia.
You know, um, I have, I have, uh, several folks that come from Birmingham, Alabama, and it's crazy as it sounds, that's about four and a half to five hours from me.
So there's, uh, other places to be explored for sure.
Marvin:
[12:23] Yeah. Well, there you go. And before I let you hop, you want to let folks know where they can find you so they can book you and fish with you? Sure.
Matt:
[12:29] Yeah. The website is mottreilandflyfishing.com, and there is my email phone number on their social media channels.
Feel free to reach out however you feel best.
And even if you just want to pick my brain or talk about what you might potentially be interested in, it might take me a week to get back to you, but I will certainly send you several paragraphs of response, probably.
Marvin:
[12:59] Well, there you go. Well, listen, folks, I think if we get some water, I think we're gonna have a really good trout season in the Southeast and you owe it to yourself to get out there and catch a few.
Tight lines everybody. Tight lines Matt. Thanks Marvin.