“FORWARD CASTING” Important Dates - See you there!

April 29 (Sat) Kids Fishing Event (KFE); 8 am, Black Rock Mountain State Park Lake

(Rabun TU is supporting this KFE with a donation of $200)

May 6 (Sat) Betty Creek In-Stream Clean-up: 9 am, Driving north on US441, turn left into the first driveway past the Betty Creek Bridge as you enter Dillard. Bring loppers, saws, pole pruners, work gloves, waders, water bottle, etc. We will be in the creek clearing low limbs and preparing for the 2006 GA Trout Camp.

May 16 (Tues) Family Cookout 6 PM at Indian Lake on RGNS campus; Bring a side dish (Directions – go north on US 441, turn left at the Rabun Gap Post Office, go ¼ mile & turn left, go ¼ mile & turn right, go to end of road)

Fishing Mentoring of Clayton Boy Scout Troop (our guests) starts at 4 pm.

May 17-21 (Wed - Sun) Fishing & Camping Chattooga Backcountry with Camping at Cherry Hill C.G. (with hot shower, flush toilets & tables) Nice place, great fishing & fellowship. Location: Off SC Hwy 107, 1.5 mile south of Burrell’s Ford Rd intersection. Contact Charlie Breithaupt, he plans the menu and buys the grub: Ph 706 782 6954

E-mail knc615@direcway.com

May 23 (Tues) Board of Directors meeting, Location on a stream for the Green Drake Hatch

June 3 (Sat) Kids Fishing Event; 8 am, Tallulah River – Sponsors: USFS, GA WRD, & TU

(Rabun TU is supporting this KFE with a donation of $300)

June 7 (Wed) GA TU Council Meeting, 6:30 PM, Bass Pro Shop, I-85 North of Atlanta

June 11 – 16 (Sun – Fri) GA Trout Camp; RGNS; All Day & All Night; Need all the help we can get!

June 20 (Tues) Chapter Meeting, 6:30 PM, Clayton Presbyterian Church

Program: Mack Martin “Alaska Fishing Trips to the Dog Salmon River”

June 29 (Tues) Board of Directors meeting, Location TBD

FLY OF THE MONTH

by Terry Rivers

QUILL GORDON

What a great fly to have in the month of May. If the caddis aren’t hatching and the light cahills seem to be of a darker color; if the fish are rising and you are not getting the action you want, tie one of these on and see if it does the trick. I have experienced this and the results were great. Get ready - the best months are here. Let’s go fishing!

HOOK: Dry fly, size 12 - 16

TAIL: Wood duck flank feathers

BODY: Stripped grizzly feather quill

WING: Wood duck flank feathers

HACKLE: Dun or grizzly

"Advanced fly tying techniques aren't about knowing the obscure, they're about understanding the simple."
Neil Patterson

May Hatches

The Bugs Time of Month Time of Day Suggested Flies .

Cream Caddis Early M day to L pm 12-14 Elk Hair Caddis

12-14 Dark Cream Caddis Pupa

Small Dun Caddis Early L am to M pm 16-18 Gray Elk Hair or Deer Hair Caddis

16-18 Gray Caddis Pupa

March Brown Mayfly Early L am to M pm 12-14 Adams or March Brown Parachutes

(Important) 10-14 March Brown Nymph, Dark Hare's Ear, or Pheasant Tail

Speckled Gray Caddis All Month M to L pm 12-14 Dark Elk Hair or Deer Hair Caddis

12-14 Dun & Yel/Brn Caddis Pupa

Yellow Stonefly All Month E to L am 14-16 Yellow Stimulator or Elk Hair Caddis (Yellow)

L pm to dark 14-16 Yellow Stone Nymph

Giant Black Stonefly All Month E am 4–8 Black Stonefly Nymph

Light Cahill Mayfly All Month E to L pm 12-14 Light Cahill

(Very Important) 12-14 Light Cahill Nymph

Sulphur Mayfly All Month L pm to Dark 14–18 Sulphur Comparadun; Light Cahill; Cream Variant

(Important) 14-16 Sulphur Nymph or Emerger, Pheasant Tail

Golden Stonefly Late E am 4-8 Golden Stonefly Nymph

Brown & Slate Drakes Late L am to L pm 10-14 Adams, Blue Dun, or March Brown Parachutes

10-14 March Brown Nymph, Dark Hare's Ear, or Pheasant Tail

Green Drake Mayfly Late L am to L pm 8-10 Green Drake

(Important) 8-10 Green Drake Nymph

Coffin Fly (Green Drake Spinner) L pm to an hour after dark 8-10 Spent Wing or Parachute Coffin Fly

(Awesome)

Midges All Month All Day 18-22 Griffith's Gnat

18-22 Midge Pupa

TU Chapter ‘Website-of-the-Month’: http://www.kanookatu.org/

(Take a look at What is a Kanooka?)

The Third of a Series:

Traditional Southern Appalachian Trout Fly Patterns

GSMNP Special: Size 12-18 Smoky Mountain Forked Tail: Size 12-16 Smoky Mountain Forkey Tail: Size 6-10

Another set of 3 in the Smoky Mountain Series of Dry Flies

“I used to fish here every weekend and get 30 or 40 good’uns - - I don’t know what’s happened to all the trout” A Kellyism

Would you like to have the original receipt for any of these Traditional Southern Appalachian Trout Flies?

Do you have a favorite Traditional Southern Appalachian Trout Fly Patterns you would like to see featured here?

Just send an E-mail request to: edadams1@alltel.net

Rabunite Clay Hudgins has spent about 10 years researching, information collecting, and compiling a wealth of pictures and data on the Traditional Southern Appalachian Trout Fly Patterns.

Clay has given us permission to share the results of his hobby with the readers of TIGHT LINES.

50 YEARS AGO THIS MONTH

Does anybody know how this turned out?

Rabun County’s Fulton Lovell was the Director of the GA Game & Fish Comissionsion and Marvin Griffin was the Governor.

The Georgia Trout Season was only 6 months long,

from April 1^st through September 30^th!

(Except the Chattooga River, which was open year around)

Just take a look at these telephone rates!

That is $1.05 from Los Angeles to Klamath Falls, Ore,

Station-to-Station, after 6 pm, plus 10% Federal excise tax!

By today's standards, that may not sound like much, but to put this price into perspective, you have to understand that the minimum wage was 75 cents, gasoline cost around 27 cents a gallon, a bottle coke cost a nickel, and a regular hamburger would set you back two bits.

The USDA Forest Service has decided to open the narrow and shallow upper reaches of the Wild and Scenic Chattooga River to test boating trials – a signal development boding ill for the wilderness and special sensitive values of this very wild stretch of river corridor.

The self-styled “creeker” community – those who push the extreme sport of running small, fast waterways at times of heavy rain – is beside itself with anticipation and glee. Birders, photographers, hikers, fishermen, even some longtime river people and many others interested in the continued protection of this area, which had been closed to boating since Congress established the Chattooga as a Wild and Scenic River, are uneasy, to say the least.

The Forest Service decision announced in a news release of February 3, will permit “restricted public boater trials” on the stretch of river beginning at the Old Iron Bridge at Bull Pen Road and running past Burrell’s Ford to the Russell Bridge at Route 28. This stretch of road above Burrell’s Ford essentially bisects the Ellicott Rock Wilderness Area. Below, the river includes the primitive Big Bend Falls area as well as the near mythic wilds on both sides of Rock Gorge (an inventoried roadless area under current forest plans.)

The decision, it turns out, also permits such trials by “expert panels of researchers, boaters, anglers and other users” in the far reach of the river stretching from Bull Pen to Grimshawes on Whiteside Cove Road, according to John Cleeves, the principal planner for the Forest Service project. About half of that stretch runs through private property on both sides of the river.

The Forest Service was forced into conducting such trials after the kayak lobby group, the American Whitewater Association, headquartered in Cullowhee, N.C., successfully appealed the new Sumter National Forest plan, which had continued the current prohibition on boating these 17 miles of the Chattooga. As a result, the chief of the Forest Service ordered that further study be made.

For background on this legal issue, details of the Feb. 3 decision, and a lot of pro-and-con discussion of the topic from the public see: http://www.fs.fed.us/r8/fms/forest.projects/chatt.shtml.

It is the position of Georgia ForestWatch that the current ban has served this part of the national forests in three states well and that no good reason exists for opening this part of the Wild and Scenic River to further degradation and overuse.

ForestWatch also is concerned that any successful move to open the Upper Chattooga to private kayaking inevitably would lead to permitting for-profit classes and “creeking” by commercial outfitters. Anyone who has experienced the zoo atmosphere of the outfitter-friendly river downriver of Route 28 knows what that would do to one of the few remaining stretches of territory that provides a true experience of wilderness and solitude. Not to mention degradation to wildlife habitat, trails and put-in and put-out locations that would occur with a vast influx of new users.

Allowing “creekers” unfettered use of the Upper Chattooga would lead to direct user conflicts, would exacerbate damage to the outstanding resource values of the Wild and Scenic river corridor and the Ellicott Rock Wilderness Area, and make it inevitably more difficult for the Forest Service to properly manage this area in the future.

So, what’s next?

The Forest Service will spend the next few months developing a “work program” leading to the “detailed design” of the data collection and boater trials, after which the public will get another chance to comment on the Forest Service efforts. This effort will entail “gathering biological, physical and social information” about the river above Russell Bridge, and include use of focus groups, a “comprehensive, statistically valid user survey,” and review of existing studies and reports about similar rivers.

The boating trials will require special use permits, Cleeves said.

What can one do about this? For starters, file comments about the plan and the study (most easily done via the special website) and file copies of your comments with the three forest supervisors who are dealing with this issue, as well as your local, state and federal elected officials. Their names and addresses appear on page 3 and page 16 of this newsletter. http://www.gafw.org/

Be ready to attend the next public meeting on this issue, likely to be held in the Highlands-Cashiers area of North Carolina later in the spring. That is when the Forest Service is expected to disclose its plans for permitting boating trials on the river. ◆

Friends of the Upper Chattooga

Urge Review of Downstream Impacts

     The U.S. Forest Service should heed the lessons it learned downstream years ago as it considers opening the Chattooga River’s headwaters to boating, Friends of the Upper Chattooga urged today.
     That experience reveals an 800-fold increase in boating along the lower Chattooga from 1968 to the 1990s, a 500 percent increase in the 20 years after 1976, and a host of accompanying problems, according to the Friends, a new umbrella group recently organized to protect the river’s headwaters.
     “This kind of usage suggests the outstandingly remarkable values of the river will be at stake if the federal government opens the river above the Route 28 bridge,” said Buzz Williams, spokesman for the group.
     Members of the Friends of the Upper Chattooga recently filed a detailed three-page letter to Forest Service officials, along with accompanying affidavits from former Forest Service rangers Max Gates and Jim Barrett, which supports the original decision to allow boating only downstream.
     The group urged the Forest Service “to consider the mountain of evidence that lies just on the other side of the bridge,” in a plea to get officials to preserve the “unique nature of the Upper Chattooga, protected outstanding resource values, and the solitude experience that users so cherish,” the letter concluded.
     The Forest Service has initiated a multi-year study of the Upper Chattooga, in response to a legal appeal filed by a kayak lobby group and its Washington-based lawyers. The outcome of that study could lead to lifting of the current ban on boating on the upper portions of the river above Route 28. The Forest Service enacted that zoning measure decades ago in efforts to balance the use of the river by competing interests, as well as to protect the unique wilderness values of the river’s headwaters.
     The Friends of the Upper Chattooga include the Chattooga Conservancy, Georgia ForestWatch, various councils of Trout Unlimited, the Whiteside Cove Association and several private landowners along the upper corridor of the Chattooga, a Congressionally designated Wild and Scenic River. Members of the group, individually and collectively, possess decades of experience on this river.
     The primary goals of the group are to help protect the Chattooga’s wild and scenic values, to educate the public to threats to these values and assist the Forest Service in arriving at a reasonable decision that, above all, protects this river’s resources. The stretch of river at issue is a haven for hikers, hunters, naturalists, bird watchers, swimmers and trout fishermen. It includes the Ellicott Rock Wilderness area and Rock Gorge, among the few remaining wild places in the tri-state area that still provide high-quality solitude and wilderness experience.

For further information, contact any of the below signers;

Buzz Williams, Executive Director, Chattooga Conservancy

Alan R. Jenkins, McKenna Long & Aldridge LLP, Attorneys for the Whiteside Cove Association and Rust Family

Wayne Jenkins, Executive Director, Georgia ForestWatch

Joe Gatins, Tallulah District Leader, Georgia ForestWatch

Butch Clay, Advisor, Georgia ForestWatch, Author of Guide to the Chattooga 1995

Charlie Breithaupt, Chairman, GA Council of Trout Unlimited

Tom McInnis, Chairman, SC Council of Trout Unlimited

Art Shick, National Leadership Council Representative, TU

Doug Adams, Newsletter Editor for Rabun Chapter of TU & Forest Service Liaisons for GA Council of Trout Unlimited

***************************************************************************************************************************************************

Comments From Another Backcountry Angler, not a member of Rabun TU (10/27/2005) As a regular visitor to the Chattooga river up above the "Iron Bridge" I was horrified to learn that the USFS was considering opening it to boaters. My principle use of the river is fishing, and I have had several fishing trips spoiled by kayakers "poaching" a run though that section. Anyone familiar with that stretch of river knows that it is rather small and that there is not enough room to "share the water". The bottom line is trout fishing does not screw up kayaking, but a group of boaters will "put down" the trout for an extended length of time, turning a productive day of fishing into a bust. It has happened to me on several occasions. There is plenty of water downstream of Hwy. 28 that is marginal trout water at best where the boaters have access. Lets not spoil this pristine and beautiful fishery with a procession of kayakers every weekend. From: Belfield Carter III – Atlanta, GA (reprinted with permission)

Take a few minutes, tell the Forest Service what the Upper Chattooga means to you by sending your comments to: Project Coordinator - John Cleeves, E-mail jcleeves@fs.fed.us USDA Forest Service, 4931 Broad River Road, Columbia, SC 29212

For info on the User Analysis, click on: http://www.fs.fed.us/r8/fms/forest/projects/chatt.shtml

"There comes a time in a day's trout fishing when, standing in the ever-pushing water, you become aware of how tired you are. The dull ache at the back of your neck, your belt leaning heavy on your hipbones, toes cold and numb in the end of your brogues, fingers cramped, and eyes tired. Climb out, with your legs and feet as weighted as in a nightmare escape, and walk into the woods until the sound of the stream becomes background. There you will find a round carpet of pine needles, deep and sun-warmed, and a good broad trunk to ease between your shoulder blades. Now tobacco smoke pulled deep into your lungs, warmth coming through on your stretched-out calves, and quiet. If you wait long enough the quiet will pass and all the woods noises, stilled by your lumbering passage, will begin again. A chickadee will surely come close and stand upside down on a twig for you, and you will hear delicate foot rustlings like the fast sliver of a needle through dark cloth with the pause for slow-drawn thread. "

Sparse Grey Hackle (Alfred Waterbury Miller)

Dear Editor,

You are to be commended for your splendid newsletter which is both informative and pleasant reading for a chap such as yourself. Being from the UK one rarely experiences such hilarious jargon. Also being a staff writer for the Wessex Chronicle I am able to recognize and probably better appreciate your creative writing qualities.

I must say that my brief stay in the States has been most enjoyable, especially the jaunt I experienced at the “Delayed Harvest” section of your Chattooga River, thus I feel compelled to share with you my encounter with two of your local yokels, who seemed to be very nice… Well, at least the lady seemed to be nice! This is what happened……

I was making my way upriver along the trail enjoying the melodious sounds of the birds accompanied by the rushing of the clear water over the beautiful rocks, when this scene of serenity was rudely interrupted by the sounds of shouting, the breaking of tree limbs and the intermittent sounds of splashing water and a person gargling. As I nervously approached the scene of the apparent beginnings of the apocalypse, cautiously peering through the bushes, I beheld a most gruesome scene of what I first thought must be one of your American “backwoods baptism ceremonies”. However, the procedure the lady minister employed seemed quite unorthodox as she had the convert locked in a half nelson wrestling hold with one arm, and holding his head underwater, while soundly thrashing his backside with a large stick with her free hand.

I immediately found out the names of these two individuals as the former sinner gasped each time she would let him come up for a brief moment of air…”I’m sorry Weezie!!!!” Then she would reply… “It’s too late for that now … Yurhatte” (That is pronounced …YOU RAT!) This is a common Middle Eastern name; therefore I assumed that this man was a former Muslim who was unfortunately being indoctrinated into the ways of Western culture. I couldn’t be sure though, because there were too many bruises on his pointed head to be able to make out any distinctive characteristics.

I further surveyed the scene and quickly realized this was something more than your common evangelical outreach to redeem those hairy legged souls lost out in sin, as evidenced by the swath of destruction which began at a sandbar just upriver, and continued forty yards up through the laurel bushes and then culminated back down into the river with pieces of torn clothing and handfuls of white hair and beard all along the way to the point of the apparent exorcism of sins I was now witnessing.

With all the skill I could muster to craft a southern mountain accent, I announced my presence to the degenerates…Howdy Yallllll ~ Whatts goin on? The lady kept saying the same thing over and over, “He made me put it back!” However the varlet whom she had in her grip, (by the way I believe she could have dispatched with him at any moment, but seemed intent to prolong his agony)….seemed to have a story to tell, so I will relay that to you here,…in his own words:

I guess it sort of began back in ’66 when I was with Doug in Colorado. We were about halfway from (I.D.B.I.S.*) Park to (I.D.B.I.S.*) Lake when I talked Doug into putting a fourteen in cutthroat trout back into the creek. I waited a little while and went back and caught it myself, and I kept it!!! Just then I looked up and saw that Doug had seen me do this despicable act, and I could faintly hear the words “You Bleep of a Bleep” all the way back down the trail. I say “faintly” because the flopping sound in my creel seemed to drown out his comments. A few years later on (I.D.B.I.S.*) Creek he was trying to land a sixteen-inch brown trout (a cricket taker, by the way) and I offered my services to help him by netting the fish for him. GET OUT OF THE WAY YOU BLEEP OF A BLEEP! IF YOU MAKE ME LOSE THIS FISH……I”LL KILL YOU!!!….he replied.

Many years later Louise landed a beautiful fifteen-inch brook trout at the Nantahala DH section and I convinced her to release the trout in spite of her tears! As we walked back to the truck in the moonlight with the soothing sounds of the nice creatures blending with the sounds of water over rocks I spoke…”You know, there ain’t no way I would have put that fish back, iffin I had caught him! She replied…..WHAT!!!!!!

The rest of the way to the truck the night creatures were strangely silent, and the only discernable sounds to my ears were the soft rippling waters and the roar of her grinding teeth.

Late last fall I landed a fifteen inch brook trout just up river in this DH section. The sounds of the nearby waterfalls were supplemented by the sounds of the drool dripping from my gaping mouth as my head swiveled around several times to see if anybody had seen my good fortune. The thoughts of how this trout’s spawning colors would be greatly enhanced by the pine paneling walls of my living room were so loud that it made my head hurt. However, I released him and watched his beautiful colors fade through my tears as he slowly swam away.

Today, as we began to catch fish left and right, I was gripped by fear, and realized that I was totally unprepared for the situation that I was probably going to face. It was as bad as when the algebra teacher came in and said, “Close your books, take out a pencil and about a dozen sheets of paper. I knew then, and I knew now that I was totally unprepared! My mind began to wander, and I thought about… ”If I had only become more proficient with the martial arts training,” concentrating on the defensive moves and …

It was at this point that I interrupted his babbling creature and asked him “What the bleep are you talking about… Unprepared for what!” He replied, …unprepared for the bloody fight that I knew would take place if I tried to convince her to release one of these big fish when she caught it.

I had heard enough, so I decided to leave this mongrel to wallow in his misery, and as I walked away he asked me “did you see those cougar tracks down the river?” You know, I just remembered. I’ve seen this grisly character before. It was in upstate Michigan several years ago on a salmon run in the PM River. He was the smart aleck ”bleep of a bleep” that kept trying to bite the heads off those twenty-pound salmon. He also kept warning me to watch out for the wolverines!

I really enjoyed your beautiful Chattooga River. Maybe someday I’ll come back there again, then maybe I won’t. How many cougars do you think there are along THE RIVER? Hawthorne Rigsby

*(I.D.B.I.S.) = I Don’t Believe I Said

From: Duane Stalnaker

Sent: Wednesday, March 29, 2006 10:02 PM

Subject: one of those days you live for!

Today Terry (Rivers) and I went to the Upper Chattooga backcountry. From the time we got in around 10:00 am until we quit about 5:00, bugs were coming off and the fish were rising EVERYWHERE! The action never stopped. Twice during the day Terry had 2 fish on at one time. We had so many doubles I lost count. We ended up with about 70 to 80 fish a piece with a fat 14” brookie being my best. This wasn’t Nov. 1, but since a lot of the fish were caught on drys, I`ll rate it right up there with it! ◆

Brookie photo courtesy of David Armstrong – MBTU (SC)

From: “Jeff Durniak”

Sent: Monday, March 27, 2006 6:15 PM

Subject: Chattooga’s cold, but fishin’s hot! Fyi. You don’t have to believe it if you don’t want to, but there are witnesses....
     I spent Saturday with two folks in charge of Georgia TU’s Back the Brookie campaign (http://www.brookie.org/). Kevin and Alec took time off of “specks” issues to chase the river’s rainbows and browns with me on the Opening Day of Georgia’s trout season. Fleece-attired, we had a great day on an unnamed section of upper river, despite a cool 45F water temperature at the outset. Most fish were caught deep on woolly buggers, princes, and soft hackles.
     A nice hatch of mahogany mayflies happened at midday and fish rose all around us. Alas, I did not have a good match and we only fooled a couple fish on top. In my scorebook, it was Risers One, Dredger Zero. Man, that hurt.
     Still, despite the picky risers and cool air temps, it was a great day on the river. Both anglers caught a nice number of rainbows and a few browns, and enjoyed a streamside lunch on a sun-warmed sandbar. After returning home, I checked with local expert John Cross of Unicoi Outfitters, and he thought the flies were a #16 Quill Gordon.   I said to myself. “Self, if youda paid attention to that hatch chart in the Rabun TU newsletter, you woulda had lotsa surface action!”

Two of the reasons Back the Brookie (BtB) is doing so well in GA: Alex Watson - BtB Conservation Chairman

& Kevin McGrath – GA BtB Chairman

     That night, out of guilt and defeat, I tied up a half dozen #16 dark Hendrickson’s (with a dark wing instead of all those light ones in my Saturday fly box) in anticipation of a rematch that I hoped for, one day, some day, in the future.
     Early Sunday my friend called to cancel our planned firewood hauling session for that afternoon. Hmmm, what am I gonna do on this nice, bright afternoon that’s gonna be warmer than yesterday?
     The future is NOW. Yep, grab flies and make haste to said river.   Despite a full SC DH parking lot, only a few folks were fishing lazily. Once nice young SC dude on his way out said he caught only a few and showed me his “secret weapon” for the morning (if I told you, it wouldn’t be his secret any more, would it?).

Clayton Presbyterian Church (Located behind the Post Office) - Clayton, GA 3^rd Tuesday of the Month 6:30 pm – Social & Yarn Spinning 7:00 pm – Program & Meeting (you don’t have to believe the yarns - - if you don’t want to)

At every regular chapter meeting there will be a raffle for fishing or camping items to help pay the cost of mailing the newsletter to members without E-mail. Bring an item to donate and a dollar or two for raffle tickets - you might win something.