I recently guided two of my regular clients, John and Cliff, for the day at the Catch and Release section at Bull Shoals Dam. I had fished there a few days before and had done well. I picked them up at the lodge they were staying at and headed for the river.

When we got there it was overcast and there was moderate generation from the dam (probably 10,000 CFS or three full units). This is a really productive level to fish this area. The water is deep enough to clear most obstacles but shallow enough to easily get the fly down to the bottom.

I took care and carefully rigged their rods before we launched my river boat. I started one with an orange egg under an indicator and the other I rigged with a hot fluorescent pink San Juan worm. If I am fishing two anglers, I always start them with different flies. Then, if one starts producing, I switch the other to the same fly. I keep in mind that one fish on a given fly is an isolated incident and two fish on a fly is a trend. We picked up a nice sixteen inch trout on the egg pattern. That was the last fish on that fly. After taking three nice trout on the pink worm, I switched the egg pattern, so that both my anglers were fishing the worm.

We motored up to the upper legal limits of the tailwater taking care not to enter the restricted area and then floated back down stream. My anglers cast their lines about twenty to twenty five feet from the boat. As we drifted down stream, the guys would carefully mend their lines to maintain a drag free drift and cast as necessary to keep their line in front of them. When the strike indicator went down, they set the hook. Fish on!

We caught some excellent fish, several fish in the sixteen to eighteen inch range and a couple of nineteen inchers. All of them were ridiculously fat and fought incredibly well. My clients were pretty happy. It was time for lunch. We motored over to the ramp and anchored the river boat.

We walked up the hill to my car and got the food out of my station wagon. For some inexplicable reason there are no picnic tables at this access or the one across the river in Marion County. I sometimes motor down to the State Park and use one of the picnic tables there but I decided to use the folding chairs and roll up table I keep in the back of my Volvo for occasions like this. We ate and relaxed for a few minutes. The lunch talk as always centered on the fishing. Did you see that big one that got away? I stowed away the gear and disposed of the trash. I saved the empty soda cans for the next time I passed one of the TU recycle bins.

We made our way back to my river boat. A fellow guide, Jeremy Hunt, was also anchored at the access. They had pulled the spider chairs out of the boat and had eaten their lunch on the bank. As is my habit, I asked how the fishing was going and what fly he was using. Though we were having success, I was interested in what he was doing so that I could include the information in my weekly fishing report.

Not all guides are willing to share. I am an open book. I feel that by improving fishing conditions for all we can improve the success for this fishery. Jeremy is a guide that shares his information and I appreciate that.

He said that he had been fishing shad patterns and had done well. Though the shad kill had been several months earlier, the trout will not soon forget the great surge of food that came through.

The shad kill is a natural phenomenon that normally occurs in the dead of winter. It generally requires cold weather and high levels of generation. When these conditions collide thousands of shad are killed and sucked through the generators. This results in a feeding frenzy in the tail waters below the dam.

When we returned to the water, I switched my client’s flies to shad patterns. We started having immediate success. We nailed a fat nineteen inch rainbow on the first drift. Jeremy had suggested drifting the shad pattern down through the center of the river. We had been catching most of our fish on the right bank and I continued drifting down that bank. We caught trout after trout and nothing less than seventeen inches long.

John hit a really good fish. I could tell by the way it was hugging the bottom it was a big brown trout. He had a really good quality rod and reel. This is where a good reel earns its keep. He kept steady pressure on the trout. Every time it took a good run you could hear the high pitched whine of the reel. Cliff cranked his rig in so that it would not get tangled in the fight.

John slowly eased the brown closer to the boat. He was doing a masterful job. Just then the brown surged under the boat. I was concerned. I had a good fish wrap the chain the week before and we had miraculously landed that one. This one was too big for that. It came out from under the boat and John eased it close. I slipped the net under it and quickly raised it out of the water. The fight was over and we won. We took a few photos. We never removed the brown from the net and released it carefully.

We caught a few more but nothing like that. The day ended an hour later. The hot action had taken a toll on my anglers and they were anxious to return to the lodge and tell their tales.

BY JOHN BERRY

The shad kill is a natural phenomenon that usually occurs every winter. Threadfin shad are drawn through the generators on the dam and are released into the river below. The conditions have to be just right. The water temperature must be a chilly forty two degrees and there must be high levels of generation. Though it occurs on the Norfork River, it is more identified with the White River below Bull Shoals Dam. The Catch and Release section below Bull Shoals Dam has just reopened following the brown trout spawn. This creates an incredible fishing situation, large numbers of hungry fish coupled with a high protein food source. This is one of the best opportunities to land a trophy trout. Local anglers and others from the surrounding area flock to Bull Shoals to try their luck.

Catching the shad kill is a tricky proposition. The perfect nexus of the cool water temperatures and high level of generation are hard to precisely predict. Seasoned anglers carefully watch the seagulls. When the gulls start keying in on the shad coming through the generators, the shad kill is on.

One thing is constant, if conditions are right for the shad kill, it will be brutally cold outside. The water will also be high and wading in this area will be out of the question. You must be in a boat. With water this high, you should not drag a chain to control your drift. Not only is it unsafe as the chain could catch the bottom and swamp the boat, but the chain could cause damage to the brown trout redds. This could eliminate this year’s population of wild brown trout.

The best flies to imitate the shad are marabou jigs and white woolly buggers. Sometimes the shad come through so heavily that the trout will key in on floating chunks of shad on the surface. Many anglers tie floating shad patterns in white.

Two of my best regular customers Erik and April called me at the last minute. They were coming into town and had checked the conditions. Wading was not an option with the high levels of generation and they wondered if I was available. I said sure and we negotiated a start time.

I picked them up at 9:00 AM. The sky was over cast and it was below freezing. April’s Dad was to accompany us. It should be noted that, April had given birth to their first born son eleven weeks before. Aiden was to stay in the cabin with Grandma. We drove to Bull Shoals Dam and launched the boat. They were generating seven units. To say the water was high is an understatement.

I rigged the rods for high water. This meant long 4x tippets (the leader and tippet were a combined length of twelve feet), an AAA split shot, a huge strike indicator and a heavily weighted fly. I chose three different patterns with the idea of zeroing in on the most effective. April got a large white marabou jig, her dad got the same fly in a smaller size and Erik got a white zonker.

We motored up stream getting as close to the power house as we could with out entering restricted water. We began drifting backwards. I sat in the back and controlled our drift with a paddle. My clients began casting. They were all accomplished casters. With three in a river Jon boat that is critical. Casting a fly line with that long a leader and that much weight is at best a challenge. The difficulty is increased when you put that many fly casters in such close proximity to each other. We would drift down to the bottom of the Catch and Release section and then motor back up and drift through it again.

April hooked up almost immediately. It was a fat sassy fourteen inch rainbow. This was to be repeated several times that day. In fact we caught at least one fish on every drift with one exception. The several drifts where we picked up two or three trout more than made up for it. April hooked up several more times. I changed her dad’s fly to one exactly like hers to see if he could do a bit better.

A couple of minutes later he got a huge hit. The strike indicator disappeared and he deftly set the hook. The trout responded by diving under the boat. When it jumped on the other side of the boat, I got a good look at it, eighteen inches long, fat and vividly colored. Dad applied good pressure and carefully coaxed him from under the boat. I was relieved when the trout surrendered to the net.

Erik was in the front of the boat standing while he fished. He had switched to a white beadhead woolly bugger and was beginning to pick up fish. From his vantage point he could see the dam much better than I could. He noticed that the gulls were getting active. They were feeding on something coming through the generators. Shad were coming through!

We raced up stream to the dam and began our drift. We concentrated on the upper section of the Catch and Release but the action was pretty much the same as before. The shad came through for about fifteen minutes and suddenly the gulls stopped feeding. The shad kill stopped as quickly as it had started. We caught fish steadily all afternoon but there was never a feeding frenzy. The fish we caught were all stout if not fat, well colored and strong. Every fish struggled to their max.

Late in the afternoon my clients were ready to pull the plug. There had been plenty of action but the cold was unrelenting and they had other things to do. We said our goodbyes and I drove them to the cabin. It was their first experience with the shad kill but I doubt it would be their last.

BY JOHN BERRY

Almost three decades ago, my brother, Dan, taught me how to fly fish. We have fished together ever since then. Over fifteen years ago, we started our business, Berry Brothers Guide Service. While we started as a guide service, our initial concentration was in teaching fly fishing and fly casting. Dan was the first Federation of Fly Fishers Certified Casting Instructor in Tennessee. Over the years, we literally taught thousands of people to fly fish and cast a fly rod.

Over time, I grew to prefer the guiding portion of the business. Almost nine years ago, I moved to Cotter to do just that. Dan stayed in Memphis and concentrated on teaching casting and developing his commercial photography business. While we occasionally get together for special projects, we just do not have many opportunities to fish together like before.

This past year has been the worst ever. The high water did not appeal to Dan. He prefers wading in gentle water, light tackle, long casts and tiny flies. Fishing from a boat with eight generators running at maximum capacity and heaving heavily weighted flies with serious meat sticks is just not his cup of tea. Oh, we went out a couple of times and he caught some decent fish but it was just not his thing. I, on the other hand, have come to embrace high water. It is not the genteel essence of fly fishing like in the fly fishing magazines. It is, for me, a viable fishing strategy that allows me to fish challenging conditions and produce trout.

Now that we have had some reliable low water, I have been calling Dan and trying to lure him here to fish with me. I told him tales of large fish on low water. In a final act of desperation, I reminded Dan that we could begin the day with a hearty breakfast at The Sands. There is nothing that flips his switch like a two or three of the Sand’s homemade biscuits swathed in sausage gravy. He finally agreed and asked a friend, Gary Powell to accompany him. He made it up on Saturday afternoon and they headed directly to the Norfork.

Dan and Gary waded up into the Catch and Release section. Dan migrated over to his favorite spot, the ring of rocks. This spot is a glass smooth pool with a gentle current running across it. There are always a fish rising there. The key to success here is a seventy foot cast and size twenty four or smaller flies. He rigged his rod with a long 6X tippet and his signature fly, Dan’s turkey tail emerger. He expertly cast to some large rising fish. Though his casts were perfect, he was unable to set the hook on most of the takes. Dan managed to land a few but he felt like he was off his game. Gary fared no better and only landed a couple.

I called Dan early the next day and we agreed to meet for breakfast and then fish at the Narrows. I arrived at the Sands first and drank a cup of coffee while waiting. When they arrived, we ordered breakfast. Tragedy struck. They were out of sausage gravy! Gary and I were OK. We ordered something else. Dan was inconsolable. After studying the menu, he finally ordered oatmeal and toast. When it arrived, he picked at it but did not eat. It was not his beloved biscuits with sausage gravy.

We left the restaurant. I stopped by the house to pick up my yellow lab, Ellie. Dan stopped by a gas station to get some peanut butter and crackers. We met at the pull out and walked through the cane break to the river. There were a few anglers there that had motored up in their boat but there was plenty of water to fish. We spread out and vainly tried several flies. We caught a few trout but it wasn’t happening. In desperation, I suggested a move to Wildcat Shoals a few miles down stream.

We parked at a friend’s house and walked through his yard to the river. There was no one there. We could see over a mile of river before us. It was on the bottom. With a sunny windless sky, the conditions were perfect. Dan hadn’t fished there in a while so I pointed out the most productive water for Gary and him to fish. I went upstream to fish some water where a client had done well a couple of weeks before.

Gary wanted to observe Dan’s technique so he located near him and just watched. Dan rigged his rod with a long 6X tippet and a partridge and orange soft hackle. On the second cast he landed a fat nineteen and one half inch rainbow. Two casts later he landed an eighteen inch rainbow that was fatter and fought better than the first fish. He was getting his mojo back. His reflexes were sharpening and he was definitely enjoying himself.

Gary got the idea. He rigged his rod with a long 6X tippet and a Dan’s turkey tail emerger. He located down stream from Dan and began picking up fish immediately.

The spot I was fishing was not producing much. I landed a couple of small fish but nothing like Dan’s. I stopped what I was doing and waded to a spot upstream from Dan. I rigged a partridge and orange soft hackle on a long tippet and began working the water before me. I picked up a few fish but I quickly realized that fishing behind Dan was not a great career decision. He was vacuuming the good fish from the water and leaving me a few runts. I moved far downstream below Gary to find some productive water.

By now, it was time for Dan and Gary to head back to Memphis. Dan’s success in the afternoon had renewed him, Gary had learned a new technique and I had been able to fish with my brother. The only thing that would have made the day better was some sausage gravy and biscuits.

It was a busy year (my busiest ever). The holidays and some very brutal weather have conspired against me. I have been able to catch a day on the White but I had not been able to fish on the Norfork for quite a while. Yesterday I saw my chance. The temperature was in the fifties, there was a light wind from the west and the sun was shining. The river was on the absolute bottom. I knew that all of the out of towners would be leaving the river early in the afternoon.

After lunch, I gathered up my wife, Lori, and my yellow lab, Ellie. We drove over to the Norfork. When I arrived at the Ackerman Access, I noted that the parking lot was full. I noticed there were several anglers wading back to the access to head home. We finally got a spot to park the car. We hopped out and carefully donned our waders, strung our rods and let Ellie out of the car.

We waded far upstream and found some great water to fish. Lori started fishing woolly buggers and had some quick success. I located myself a bit upstream from Lori and started with a worm brown San Juan worm. It took several casts before I landed a trout. The going was slow. I had been watching another angler fishing a favorite spot and saw him walk away. I cranked up my rod and headed up stream. Ellie had seen me put some dog biscuits in my jacket when we were packing up for the trip at home. She followed me with the idea of collecting those treats.

This spot was greatly changed since the flood. It was scoured out and the footing is tough. It still holds some really nice fish. I decided to spend some time there. In my haste to begin fishing, I had left my polarized sun glasses in the car. I was wearing my beloved cowboy hat, which provides a lot of shade from the sun, but doesn’t help much with glare on the water. I could only follow my strike indicator for a few feet before I lost it in the glare. I carefully waded up stream and then across the run. Now I had the sun on my back and could easily watch my strike indicator.

My first fish was a fat sixteen inch rainbow. I released it and continued fishing. It was one of those days when the trout could not decide what they wanted. I caught six more fish on six different flies. I took fish on red San Juan worms, sowbugs, olive scuds, black zebra midges, Y2Ks, and copper johns. I tried a few other flies but they did not produce the desired results.

I decided to walk back to where Lori was fishing. She had taken several trout on the woolly bugger and was now fishing a Dan’s turkey tail emerger. She caught a couple while I was talking to her. I studied the surface of the river for a while and saw a small caddis hatch coming off. I didn’t have an elk hair caddis that small. I searched my fly box and came up with a small partridge and orange soft hackle. I tied on a fresh 5X tippet and the fly. I moved up stream and started working my way down. I picked up four or five fish. I had caught enough trout.

I cranked up my line and waded over to the bank. I found a nice clump of grass at the water’s edge and sat down. Ellie came over and sat beside me. I fed her a couple of dog biscuits. We just sat there and watched Lori fish. Ellie hasn’t been out with us much this year because of the high water earlier in the year.

She lost the vision in her right eye. She developed glaucoma but luckily it has now been stabilized. I have the same thing. In fact, we take the same prescriptions. Her vision has slowed her down a bit and she doesn’t terrorize the trout as much as she used to. She still lives for a day on the water and is always ready to go.

As we sat there, I thought what a perfect day it was and how lucky I was to be there. Lori fished for another hour and caught plenty of fish. I was in no hurry to leave and she was content to nail a few more trout. As the sun set, we walked out hand in hand with Ellie leading the way.

By John Berry

One way to improve your catch rate is to fish more than one fly. When I first took up fly fishing, lo these many years ago, one of the first things I learned was to fish a dropper. Back then it was a popper on top and a bream killer below. We would cast the rig into a bream bed. If we did not get any action immediately, we would gently twitch the flies and would be immediately rewarded with a strike, usually on the bream killer but sometimes on the popper. From time to time, we would get a bream on both. Now that was exciting. One bream would go one way and the other would head in the opposite direction.

I found that the same technique also worked for trout. I found droppers to be especially effective when fishing soft hackles. To rig them up, I would start with a seven and one half foot 4X leader on a floating fly line. I generally prefer a nine foot four weight fly rod for this type of fishing. I tie on a one and one half foot section of 5X tippet to the leader with a surgeons knot. I then tie on a two foot section of 6X tippet to the 5X tippet using a blood knot. I make sure that the tag ends of the blood knot are at least four inches long so that I will have plenty of material to work with. I trim off the 6X tag leaving the larger 5X tag. I tie a soft hackle (lets say a partridge and orange) on the four inch long 5X tag. I tie another soft hackle (a green butt soft hackle) to the end of the 6X tippet. I could conceivably tie on additional sections of tippet and additional flies.

I fish this rig basically the same way that I would fish a solitary soft hackle, except that when the fly hits the water and I strip a bit of line to sink the fly into the film, I do so with a bit more pressure to ensure that both flies sink. I never know which fly the will take and occasionally the take both resulting in a double.

Another way that I fish droppers is below a large dry fly. I was introduced to this technique several years ago when floating the Madison River in Southwestern Montana. We banged the bank using a hopper with a dropper. We tied the grass hopper on to a nine foot 4X leader with a simple improved clinch knot. We then tied a two foot section of 5X tippet to the bend of the hook. To finish off the rig, we tied a small pheasant tail nymph to the end of the 5X tippet. We set the hook any time the hopper sank or moved unnaturally. All of the fish seemed to take the small nymph. I do the same technique here. I prefer to use large foam hoppers as they float like corks and do not require dressing. To fish larger flies like grasshoppers, I prefer a medium fast six weight nine foot fly rod with a weight forward floating line.

The final way that I fish droppers is with nymphs. I am particularly fond of them in high water. I think that they significantly improve your chances of catching fish under these conditions. I rig them much like I do when fishing hoppers. I tie a two foot 5X tippet to my normal high water fly (usually a brightly colored San Juan worm). I tie a brightly colored egg fly to the other end of the 5X tippet. My regular leader tippet combination for fishing San Juan worms in high water is twelve feet long. This additional two feet makes it quite long. This length not only complicates landing the fish but makes the rig a bit more difficult to cast. The rewards can be great, however. This is a killer technique that has accounted for a lot of great fish in high water.

The problem that I encounter with fishing with droppers is that they are illegal in Catch and Release waters in the state of Arkansas. I have never really understood this law. I sometimes think it was an attempt to outlaw treble hooks in Catch and Release waters. They now allow trebles in the Catch and Release section below Bull Shoals Dam but no droppers. It is not logical. Droppers cause no more harm on trout than a single hook. As a member of the advisory board for the Trout Management Plan for the White and Norfork Rivers, I brought this point up but have heard nothing back on allowing droppers in Catch and Release areas. Therefore be careful and legal and do not use droppers of any kind in Catch and Release areas.

When fishing in non Catch and Release areas, try using droppers. It will double your chances of catching fish and double your fun catching them.