Currently browsing… virginia
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Terrestrial bugs offer great dry-fly fishing on small creeks
Late summer and early fall offer some of the season's best dry-fly fishing on small creeks in the east. This isn't hatch-matching fishing. It's terrestrial season
Most years, Virginia’s small mountain trout streams have become unfishable trickles by August. This year has been a bit different. Massive rains in May and June meant the streams were in great shape heading into summer’s peak, which was a good thing because July brought record heat and a strange lack of the almost-daily thunderstorms…
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Summer is for sun(fish)
Before trout came bluegills.Not in a biological evolutionary way, but for me in a fly fishing evolutionary way.I grew up in trout country in Southern Oregon but wasn’t a fly angler. My trout rod was a little Eagle Claw ultralight spinning rig, my tackle box full of Pautzke Balls O’ Fire Salmon eggs, Velveeta cheese,…
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TU and Forest Service team up to reconnect trout stream in Virgina
By Dylan Cooper An important historical site in Virginia got a long-awaited face-lift after more than 70 years of being hampered by the presence of man-made barriers to aquatic organism passage. Bob Downey Branch, a Class III wild trout water, is once again open for trout thanks to efforts by Trout Unlimited and the George Washington…
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Finding a balance between teaching and fishing
By Mark Taylor Beck had just made a nice cast, his lure landing in a shady spot next to the James River’s bank, when he did something you don’t expect from a 15-year-old. He admitted he was clueless “When I go to a store and look at all the fishing lures, I have no idea…
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Virginia Trout Slam a surprising, and fun, challenge
The cast was too good. The drift was too good. There was no way this was not going to work. And it did. A trout dimpled the surface as it slurped in the little olive Stimulator. It wasn’t a big trout, but I played it carefully in the fading light of a sultry Virginia May…
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Long-awaited raft a fishing game-changer
By Mark Taylor As we made our way through the final riffle, I dug the oars into the cool, green waters of Virginia’s Jackson River and aimed the stern toward the boat ramp. “Have I told you that I love this thing?” I said to my fishing partner, Sam Dean. My memory isn’t as good…
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Beer boost: Team effort improves habitat on Virginia’s Beaver Creek
By Mark Taylor A team approach is helping improve trout habitat on a popular fishing stream near Harrisonburg, Va. Trout Unlimited’s national staff partnered with the local TU chapter and a property owner to improve a section of Beaver Creek, a spring-fed stream that runs through private land but that is open to public fishing through a unique cooperative program. The…