Fly Fishing in September Podcast by Harry Murray

Trout Fly Fishing

The rains we received throughout the summer have been great for our mountain trout streams. The heads of the streams and small feeder branches that can be reached by coming in from the trail heads on the Skyline Drive and national forest roads are giving us great dry fly fishing. You will want to use what I call my change of pace fly series:  Moth, Housefly, Horsefly, Flying Beetle, Inchworm, Little Dark Stonefly Dry all on a 6X leader.

I am finding many of the trout in these mountain trout streams either in the corner of the pool or in the lip of the pool.  If you have my book Trout Fishing in the Shenandoah National Park, see page 31 for more information on identifying these feeding stations.

Handle these trout carefully when you return them to the stream because they will start spawning in October.

Bass Fly Fishing

I believer the off and on discolored water will give us excellent smallmouth fishing in September.  If I am standing in knee deep water and I can see my feet then I consider the river fishable.   Plan on carrying a sinking tip line for your rod as well as your favorite floating line.  I recently caught a very large smallmouth on a Murray’s Heavy Black Hellgrammite size 4. However I would plan to carry a variety of flies to meet the ever changing stream conditions.  My five favorite flies (in addition to the Hellgrammite) are:

*  Magnum Hog Sucker size 4

*  Magnum Darter size 4

* Murray’s Crayfish size 6

* Tungsten Cone Head Marauder, Olive size 4

* Shenandoah Blue Popper size 4

You will just have to experiment because one fly might work well one day and then not work the next day–it just depends on the conditions.

This month I am starting my 2-hour fly fishing workshops in the fly shop in Edinburg, VA.  I will be conducting some fly casting classes this month and will continue on throughout the fall and winter with some other topics.  For a complete list of workshops visit our website.