re: Fishing smoky mountain national park

Not in Tennessee but just south of Cherokee NC there is a cable bridge across the Tuckasegee River. This is a very popular area for those coming from Cherokee and headed south, the bridge is almost a must stop and see type situation. What is not so well known is that there are some MONSTER hold over browns in that stretch of river, particularly in January and February. I imagine it may not be legal now and may not have been when we were doing it regularly but we would catch a bucket full of suckers, slide a 12 foot jon boat down the bank at that bridge and float down the river to the downstream side of the island that the bridge connects to both banks. Where the water comes back together after splitting around that island there is a hole about 20 feet deep...probably the deepest hole in the entirety of that river. We would flat line a 6-10" sucker unweighted unless the water was high from the bank to the far end of that hold and catch MONSTER browns and some nice rainbows as well. We would make bait during the day, get to the island around 3-4 PM and stay out there as long as we could stand it past dark, usually around midnight...and wear the damn fish OUT.

When we were done we would drag the boat to the upstream side of the island and float back down to the bridge. I have tried to do this in the summer and caught fish but not as many and not as big. I have no idea where those big browns go in the summer but they are probably in that deep hole and just not feeding like they do in late winter / early spring.

We used to do nearly the exact same thing on the Chattahoochee River in Atlanta and north of Lake Lanier when I was a kid....except we could catch big browns and nice rainbows year round on the 'hooch. I am not sure you can flat line a bait fish for trout on the hooch anymore but it was legal in 80's because we would get checked at least once on every trip.

There is a reason fly fishing is preferred for trout fishing...its because the damned things are EASY to catch with anything other than a fly rod LOL...they are not overly selective nor very smart. The wilder they are makes them a little more difficult to catch but flat line a night crawler out west and you will load a drift boat while the long rod will catch 15 or so a day. Flat line whatever native bait fish they are feeding on and they don't hesitate to chow down....