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Welcome to the Fishing Report from Townsend, Tennessee in the Great Smoky Mountains. At 5:41 am, the temperature outside is 38.8 degrees.

The wind blew all day yesterday like you would not believe. Some roads in the Park were closed due to fallen trees. They include, Laurel Creek Road and the Cades Cove Loop Road. I think US Highway 441 (Newfound Gap Road) is still closed. I found a story on the WBIR website about yesterday’s problems in the Park, because of the high winds and the lack of staff to keep roads open. You can see the story by CLICKING HERE.

Then, the rain started late yesterday. The Knoxville Airport reports .94 inches fell. Townsend got .72 inches.

Showers are likely today, but not much rain is expected. It will be cool today and cold tonight. Snow is predicted in the higher elevations in the Park. It will be windy again today, especially in the higher elevations, but not as bad as it was yesterday.

NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE PREDICTED HIGHS AND LOWS TODAY

Heavy rain swelled the streams in the Park and elsewhere.

Little River is flowing at 1,620 cubic feet per second (cfs) or 4.53 feet on the gauge. Median flow for this date is 318 cfs. The water temperature is 48.9 degrees.

Little Pigeon River is flowing strong at 4,810 cfs or 5.55 feet on the gauge. This is a record for the date, formerly set in 1971 at 3,620 cfs.

Oconaluftee River is flowing high at 3,830 cfs or 4.9 feet on Birdtown Gauge. This is record flow for this date, last set in 2002. The water temperature is 45.3 degrees.

Tellico River is flowing at 1,500 cfs or 4.26 feet on the gauge. Median flow is 341 cfs.

Cataloochee Creek is flowing at 592 cfs, 3.9 feet, which compares to median flow of 138 cfs. The water temperature is 45.0 degrees.

Fishing will be slow today due to high water. To add insult to injury, the water temperatures are fairly good. They will begin falling today and tonight.

Lately, fly fishermen can’t get a break, in the Smokies, lowland rivers and on the tailwaters. TVA has been sluicing and generating to lower the lakes, making for capacity when the Spring rain comes. We have had a few days of decent fishing in the Smokies during the past two months, but often, the water is too cold or too high. We have had around 11 inches of rain in the area since December 1st.

Now, it is gong to be cold again for a few days.

Surprisingly, our business is up significantly from last year. December was good too. Last year, January sales were lower than they were in 2017, but not by much.

I hear it from customers and friends every day. “Nobody is fishing”.

Fly anglers are tying flies. I ordered to completely re-stock the fly tying department again this week. I ordered from Gamakatsu, Wapsi, Hareline Dubbin, Whiting Farms, Renzetti, Umpqua and Metz.

Today I am going to work on adding more fly tying tools to our online store.   

We are holding our usual Free Saturday Fly Tying Demonstrations and that gets fly fishermen out of the house. Will Davis and Tradd Little will be tying and talking about fishing Saturday, from 10 am until 2 pm. All you have to do is show up. This event is free. These guys are young and they are excellent fly tyers.

You can see our Winter Fly Tying Demo schedule by CLICKING HERE.

Have a great day and thank you for being here with us.

Byron Begley
January 24, 2019

Fly Tying Classes January, February and March 2019 Taught by Walter Babb and Brian Courtney Beginner to Advanced CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE

Respond to: byron@littleriveroutfitters.com