UO Fishing Report - 10/2/26
Unicoi Outfitters Fishing Report - 10/2/26
Hello October! Trout streams are real skinny, but welcome rains are thankfully on their way. You may have a chance to sneak in an AM trip tomorrow before the storms settle in for the rest of the weekend. Use your drought techniques before the storms hit and your high, stained-water bugs and techniques when storms pass and the waters begin to recede.
Don’t miss our new beginner’s guide to stream trouting, in the Fishing Reports tab on our home page.
Tailwaters are still fishing well. Get up close to the dam to fish clear water before downstream tributaries pump mud into the mainstream.
River bassin’ could be good in the morning, but will likely die with any muddy stormflows.
Ponds are always a good bet when streams and rivers are chocolate milk. Area reservoirs are waking up. It’s mainly bass right now, but stripers should start showing up after another week or two of cold nights to cool off surface waters.
Come eat free pizza with us tonite in Sautee as we learn to tie some hot fall dries.
Check out all the details in our full report, here:
https://www.unicoioutfitters.com/fishing-reports
Unicoi Outfitters: Friendly. Local. Experts.
www.unicoioutfitters.com
Sautee: 706-878-3083. Open 8-5 daily. (2454 GA Hwy 17, Sautee-Nacoochee.)
Clarkesville: 706-754-0203. Open 8-5 from Monday thru Saturday.
Wes’ Hot Fly List:
Dries: October caddis, orange stimmy, parachute ant, para Adams
Nymphs & Wets: frenchie, sunken ant, prince nymph, pheasant tail, root beer midge. Mops and squirmies in high, stained water.
Streamers:
Olive woolly bugger, mohair leech, sparkle minnow, mini gulp sculp.
River stripers:
Mop tail changer, bangtail, clouser.
River bass:
crittermite, hairy fodder, black bugger, clouser, stealth bomber or Boogle bug in afternoon.
Bream & Carp:
Hybrid worm, carp it bomb, gill scorpion, amnesia bug, mini jig bugger.
Headwaters:
While skinny, they’re cooling off and the topwater action is heating up.
Rabunite Gabby hit a small Smokies stream this week and reports: “Creek still low, so I did a lot of wading upstream and prospecting with a 3-wt with good results on wild rainbows from 5-9 inches. Water temps low 50s. Air temp 45 early morning and they wouldn’t take anything on top or below until the sun started warming the water. Then they were all over the small (#16-18) October caddis dry. I needed Ibuprofen before and after!
Stockers:
Except for 1-2 fall dumps and the DH streams, trout stocking season is over in GA. Your best bets for summer leftovers are the two tailwaters and the remote sections of larger, heavily stocked mountain streams like Cooper, Tallulah, West Fork Chattooga, and the Tooga way up high.
Rabunite Gabby hit the Tallulah this morning (2nd) and just texted this report: “Caught very small wild rainbows on a size 16 October caddis. Also couple of stockers on a micro-chubby — best was a 12- inch brown.”
Private Waters:
We’re back open for business!
UO-Helen manager Wes had a guide trip this morning and said Rainbow Point fished really well in the cold dawn hours. He and fellow guide Joseph dead drifted squirmies, swung soft hackles, and bounced small buggers on the bottom for their two clients, who had a big time.
Tailwaters:
Lanier Tailwater fan Mo: “The pea soup seems to have reached peak turbidity. I hope it doesn’t get any worse as wading is still manageable. Brown trout have been very active and good drifts are rewarded with hook ups. There were a few nice 12-14” browns and rainbows in the mix last weekend . The tan mop was once again responsible for bringing about two dozen fish to hand.”
https://www.unicoioutfitters.com/guided-trips
Delayed Harvest:
The GA DH program resumes on Nov 1. Recall from last week’s report that NC DH regs started on Oct 1, but the agency is delaying stocking until November. Many of the NC streams still have wild fish in them and could be worth an October trip, with few crowds.
Warm Rivers:
They’re low and clear and cooling off. The Hooch at Hwy 115 was 68F at 1PM yesterday. Tomorrow morning could be good on streamers and bottom bouncers, but the expected rains will likely blow them out for the rest of the weekend. Make sure you have a quick exit plan in case a sudden thunderstorm catches up to you.
UO buddy MD: “The rivers are looowww in and around Athens, but you can find fish in the holes and the “channels” and they will eagerly take poppers. My son Henry is a junior at UGA and is renting a house that borders one of the local Oconee watershed waterways. We had a great time Sunday evening catching spotted bass with maybe a little Altamaha bass sprinkled in (“mutts”, according to Athens Jay). About as much fun as you can have with a 3 weight.”
Ponds:
Still a good bet, especially when our favorite streams and rivers are to high and muddy.
UO regular reporter Athens Jay: “Paddleboard pond fishing this week. Bass were not super aggressive, but I fooled a few. Small articulated streamer on a jig hook fished slow worked best. It is a bass-heavy pond, so I did my fish management duty and culled a few for supper.”
UO buddy Rodney has returned from his Michigan salmon trek and sent this local report: “Floyd County’s Rocky Mountain PFA in NW GA is unique for our area. There are two large lakes on this property. One of them, Heath Lake, is managed for trophy largemouth bass. This lake is open for the first 10 days of every month. This morning, Thursday, October 1st, my neighbor & I fished it for a few hours. The fishing and scenery were great but the catching was surprisingly slow. Weather & time permitting, I plan to fish it a couple of days next week. Popper/dropper rigs typically work well along the banks & standing timber. Full disclosure: the bass picture was from an earlier trip, not this week.”
Lakes:
UO Lanier guide Joseph: “Reservoir fishing has had a slow start this fall season but with cooling temps the bite should only get better.
I haven’t seen any schooling stripers on recent outings however the bass fishing has started to pick up tremendously. Over the past two weeks we’ve had some great fishing both up shallow and on offshore structure. On the shallow fish I mostly utilized big swimbaits, however many other tactics will work. As for the offshore bass fishing smaller presentations such as zoom superflukes, seabilles, and topwater walking baits were all major players.
Fall is officially here and the striper fishing will begin to fire off very soon. I still have a few days available on my calendar but moon dates are starting to fill up quickly.
To inquire or book visit www.josephclarkflyfishing.com or call the Sautee store at (706)-878-3083”
Afar:
UO buddy Myles: “Once my Montana fishing expeditions were over, I headed to Colorado to meet my parents and brother, who were all flying into Denver. I arrived just before they did, and what better way to pass the time than to go fishing! I caught some very nice rainbows and browns throughout week I was there. We fished a number of local waters and had some great success. Some streams were tougher than others, with fish very finicky and unwilling to cooperate. Nevertheless, we made the most of our efforts. The small flies that have worked locally in GA have worked throughout all of the western streams I fished, though I did have to use some heavier ones in certain places. “
Kudos:
Congrats to our own RSquared for his Trout Unlimited National Award for Youth Education!
Thanks and congrats to Rabun Trout Unlimited and the GA Tech 5 Rivers club for last Saturday’s repairs to two dozen old trout stream enhancement structures on Sarah’s Creek!
Bucket List Trip:
Reminder: Hop aboard a plane with Jimmy next February and hit Argentina!
Events:
Come and join us in Sautee tonite for October’s “First Friday” gathering. These monthly get-togethers of UO staff and friends are a lot of fun. I’ll be teaching and tying some of my favorite fall dries.
Jimmy and Kathy had a fun reunion with friends last night at the Casting for Recovery fundraiser at Sweetwater Brewery. We all look forward to guiding the CFR guests at the next retreat in November. There is still time to donate to this worthy cause, as October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month.
A CFR retreat guest’s tale:
Our nights are cooler and the higher elevations are starting to show off their fall colors. And the Braves advance, too! It’s shaping up to be a very good month. We will welcome this weekend’s stream recharge and especially the cool weather to follow. Fall fishing is about to take off. Are you ready? Let us help. Here you go: a free beginners guide to flyfishing for stream trout!