Little River Chapter of Trout Unlimited

Our Chapter is fortunate to have some really good Fly Shops in our area. All of the fly shops has help us with donations to Troutfest and with our other projects.

Little River Outfitter  address 106 Town Square Drive  Townsend, TN.  Byron and Paula Begley &  Daniel Drake are always there to help you with your needs. The store is large with a huge line of fly fishing gear and a online store with free shipping.

Smoky Mountain Angler address 466 Brookside Village Way
Gatlinburg, TN. It is just off hwy 73 above Papa Johns Pizza. Harold and Nancy Thompson are the owners. They have five fishing guilds working out of the shop, A large selection of flies. Plus lots of other fly fishing gear.  One bonus that I have found is that they keep Redington Butter Stick and Echo Fiberglass Fly Rods in stock. P.S. Let then know that you are a Little River Chapter member.

Orvis Retail Store address 136 Apple Valley Road  Sevierville, TN. Kris Maurer is the Store Manager and Dave Carson is the Fishing Manager. Orvis has free Fly Fishing 101 classes going on where you can learn fly-fishing basics that is perfect for beginners of all ages and the course includes free lessons on fly casting and outfit rigging. The store has a large selection of clothing and all of the Orvis fly fishing gear.

If you are in Knoxville do not forget to checkout 3 Rivers Angler. address 5113 Kingston Pike Knoxville.

Good fishing

Joe <((((<

President’s Corner
Mike Bryant (mjbryant1954@hotmail.com)

Newsletter

WOW!! I’m still totally blown away over how successful our 2014 Troutfest Banquet & Auction was on April 25. The food was great! The facility and services were great! The donated prizes were phenomenal! Everyone had a great time.We awarded the 2013 Eddie George Award to James Locke. We honored Steve Moore’s long and successful service with the Park by establishing the Steve Moore Youth Education Fund. And, oh by the way, did I mention that we raised in total about $20,000!!!!  Wow, amazing!  What a great time!

The Troutfest team, led by Chairman Joe McGroom, did an incredible job.  Donation Chairman Chuck James and team did an outstanding job at soliciting donations. It never ceases to amaze me how giving and supportive folks are here in east Tennessee where we call home.

Thank you to everyone and every business that provided donations.  Thank you to everyone who attended the banquet and participated in the auction.  And thank you to all of the volunteers who gave their time and talents to making this a successful event.

If you were able to attend Troutfest this year, many thanks for coming and supporting our efforts.  I hope everyone will consider attending next year.

On a personal note, as much as I enjoyed Troutfest this year, I’m happy it’s behind us. It’s time to focus on fishing. This is my favorite time of the year. Warmer weather makes for happy bugs making for happy trout.  I’ve been fishing mostly the smaller mountain streams lately.  Water flows for the most part have been good. Bugs are coming off the water.  Seems early, but I’ve seen yellow sallies and yellow mayflies already.

Remember, the May 22 Chapter meeting will be at Calhoun’s in Maryville. Social hour and dinner starts at 6:00 pm.  You do not need to order dinner to attend.  Our May program will be something a little different. Dr. Dave Unger will present a program on black bears.  The program will interest anyone who spends time in the national parks or other wild areas, including hikers.

Our future will have its challenges, but I’m more confident than ever that we will continue to proactively work together to conserve, protect, and restore our natural resources.  I hope to see you at the May meeting!!
Thanks,
Mike

Just the place to spend a hot summer day.  The deep water from Fontana lake keep Cheoah, Calderwood and Chillhowee lake cold thought out the summer,  making them a great place to beat the heat doing the hot days. Brookfield Smoky Mountain Hydropower manges the lakes and has done some improvements by adding  five Canoe Campsite on Calderwood lake and Canoe Portages on all three of the lakes. Calderwood lake is stocked with 7,015 Rainbow Trout from Tennessee and another 7,000 Rainbow Trout from North Carolina.  You can fish for Trout with licenses by either state in the entire reservoir as long as you are in a boat.  So get out your Kayak or Canoe and spend a great day fishing.  I have added some links below to some maps to help you get around and the article Dixie’s Fabulous Finger Lakes that was in South Trout Magazine.

Canoe Portage and Campsite Locations

Recreation sites – Calderwood and Chilhowee Reservoirs map

Dixie’s Fabulous Finger Lakes

Good Fishing <((((<

Joe