July 20 To 25 Report

[steve l]

Put on Sunday about 11:00 at Greer & took off Friday morning at 142.

Blue ribbon area fished well. Action was not as good as last year, but better than generally seeing over the years. Was using black spinners and jigs, and either Husky Jerks or Rebel Craws. The fish are fat & happy. Draw back was the sheer number of jet boats on that stretch. Had probably 12-15 go zipping by. Even had one group at a gravel bar w/the vodka bottle out, loud & happy. Considering that is over what, 5 miles of river you can do the math. Quite simply it was awful, unless you like the whine of the motors from however far away it is you can first hear them & the lingering smell of exhaust.

White ribbon area did not do as well with the fish. Some of that is most likely just not getting deep, as I have never done well in that stretch. Jet boats again an issue coming up from Whitten. You know, between the corn dunkers, doughball tossers & Powerbait chunkers hitting every hole over & over I'm surprised there are any trout in that stretch at all.

On the bright side it appeared that the jetboats couldn't get passed a section a little below Whitten (which may have explained the number we saw up river), so once we got down there it was a quiet river. Some trout here & there, and an occasional smallie begins to show.

I had problems with jigs breaking off, probably need to find a better knot. But I started jigging the spinners. If I was patient enough to get them deep before starting the jigging action I did catch trout. This was the pattern that worked best of all. Didn't glom onto that until later in the white ribbon area though, so will be curious to see how it works next year over the entire trout area.

The stretch from 160 to 142 is always quiet, and I always enjoy it. The wife & I saw no one all day. No hits at all until we got below what I call the S-turn. No idea what it's called, but it's an S-turn left & then right with farm land to the right. Not a lot of fish, but enough to keep us happy. Got one nearly 2 lb (1:15) smallie in the exact same place I have caught one the last three years. Plastics, Husky Jerk, Rebel Craw.

Boy, the floods sure did a number on the river in some areas. Stretches where banks were stripped clean of all trees, runs where there were not runs before, the rock at Mary Decker that made it tricky gone. Some new gravel, some old gravel cleared out. Even the dam at Boze had some damage that I don't remember being there.

I always enjoy floating the 11P, and will be looking forward to next year's float come about the end of January or so.

[Brian Sloss]

I know what you are talking about last Sunday at Greer. I've never seen so many John Boat trailers there. Luckily on of them was the game warden, as we had a little poaching on Sat that they wanted to squash on Sunday. Did you get checked? I know he checked a lot of people that day.

[steve l]

We saw the ranger, but did not get checked. He was hidden in a very nice spot to view the river. As soon as I saw it was a ranger pointed out we had on spinners & other lures. May have been why we were not checked.

He did ask if were catching though. Must be a training thing, as the first question I ever get asked by the rangers is "How's the fishing - you catching anything?"

Hmmm, just thinking about it, maybe that question and then your answer establishes that you are fishing so that they may check you out.

[superfly]

The US forest service should ban motorized boats in the blue ribbon section. Motorized boats sure are not Wild and Scenic.

[vandelay]

I agree Superfly. Nothing like a calm day on the water with a fly rod in your hand when you have to run for shore because some drunk jack @ss buzzes by you in a john boat.