Tenkara Smallies - Small, Low, Flow

[DanMarino]

I returned to my favorite local small flow yesterday. The conditions were perfect. Exactly my favorite time of year to wade. Low, clear, water that is warm enough to wade in shorts.
Beautiful day. Sunshine with shade from the trees and forest that overhang the moving water. Just the slightest hint of a breeze every now and then. No other humans fishing this flow within miles around me.
I hike through the woods and down to the river. I pause and stand still about 10 feet above the river bank. The water is clear. This pool is about 50 yards long and I know it holds fallfish, sunfish, smallies, and some from of zebra striped suckers that I've never caught, but see moving around.
I observe some smallies and fallifish moving around in the water below.

I walk about another 20 yards down river to the end of the pool where it becomes shallow and drops through some faster water.

Using my Tenkara rod I proceeded to fish the next 2 hours. I advanced very slowly and enjoyed the time. I caught some sunfish and fallfish on both black and olive wooly buggers.
The smallies would follow my offerings but not take them. The larger smallies would swim near and past me and get spooked when my fly landed near them.
I also caught sunfish, fallfish, and this tiny smallmouth on soft hackle looking buggy flies.

I thoroughly enjoyed the fishing. Near the end of my wade a beaver glided to my left silently underwater and looped around the head of the pool and back down stream.

Plenty of fish in this little stretch of river. I have yet to figure out how to catch the larger smallies. They are not interested in top water poppers. They spook easily if I wade too close. I have caught a few in the 10 or 11 inch range on wooly buggers, but none of the larger smallies. They are wary of me and what I toss their way.
I doubt I will ever see another person fishing this 100 yard pool of river. If I don't see anyone else next year, I will claim this pool as my own. This is my second or third year of fishing it and is the best smallie habitat I have found within a 10 minute drive from my house.





I didn't keep an exact count of fish caught for the trip. The sunfish were beautifully marked. I probably caught about 6 of them all about the size of the one in the photo. I caught about 5 fallfish, with the biggest measuring almost 12 inches in my measure net. It was a solid fallfish for this size flow.

The smallie was a tiny one, but it made my day.

Such a great trip. Probably my favorite solo fishing expedition of the year.

[Red_Beard]

Great report! I love wet wading smaller rivers and streams in the summer time. I got into some nice redbreast and smallies wet wading myself on Sunday. I was using lite action spinning gear with a Roostertail though. The biggest smallmouth I've ever gotten on a fly was about 3 pounds, and came on a popping bug on the Potomac. I was using a regular fly rod though, which allowed me to cast it out further. The big ones can spoke real easily in clear water, and I have to wonder if the Tenkara outfit isn't allowing you to make long enough casts to avoid that.

[DanMarino]

You might be right about the Tenkara gear limiting my ability to do long casts. I am anxious to return to "my pool" with an ultralight spinning rod and see if I can do any better. Part of the problem is that this stretch is unfishable from shore. To fish this pool, you need to wade and stand in the river. I tried to counter-act that by standing very still and advancing really slowly up the river over a 2 hour period. I'm also curious if the smallies are focused on crayfish vs. minnow prey.

[Red_Beard]

Yeah, catching smallies in these small streams can be real difficult when the water is this low. I do better for them earlier in the summer when its a bit higher. The only decent ones I got this past weekend were caught when I could disguise my approach a bit. Two came from a rocky pool on the far bank in one of the widest spots of the stream. I could actually see the second one, and disguised my cast by dropping it in front a bolder he was behind. When my spinner came from behind it, he charged 3 or 4 feet to take it.

[Mark]

Nice catches Tom.

Small streams are enticing but they do pose a casting issue for regular fly rods because plant growth on the bank and beyond can catch your backcast. Tenkara is one way to avoid that. Some small stream fly anglers with regular gear don't really cast in the traditional way. They flip or roll cast or the really skilled ones use a bow and arrow technique.

One of many nice things about kayak flyfishing is that the vast majority of the time, I can position my boat so my backcast lanes are unobstructed.