[gentle orchestral fanfare] - [Andrew] I'm gonna let you hold that net on there.

That's a nice fish, there.

- [Steve] Boy, these things are fighters.

- [Andrew] He was up in that dead water.

- [Steve] Yup.

Okay, he's getting in here.

Yeah, that's what we come for, come on buddy, come on here.

Can't even get him in my little old net here.

- [Andrew] He won't fit in there!

- [Announcer] The production of Carolina Outdoor Journal is made possible in part by: - [Female Announcer] Wildlife in North Carolina Magazine.

ncwildlife.org/winc.

- [Male Announcer] And by EZ Bait & Tackle, family owned and operated.

We fish from fresh to saltwater.

We provide fishing supplies and advice to every type of angler.

For all your fishing needs, EZ Bait & Tackle.

[light instrumental music] ♪ - Hello, welcome to the Carolina Outdoor Journal.

Well, today we're headed to the Pisgah National Forest we're gonna be trout fishing today.

- That's right, we've got a great show today.

We're gonna be up in the Pisgah National Forest fishing at the delayed harvest stream, and that's a stream that's managed by the Wildlife Resources Commission where they stock the stream and allow you to go and catch the fish, catch and release for a period of time, and then after that they open it up for harvest.

We'll go into a little more detail as we get into the show.

- We'll talk about that in time, how to catch these fish, and light is always better in this particular situation, I'll say.

- That's right, all fly rods, and the one thing we wanna stress [Unintelligible] is having a good selection of flies, knowing how to read the stream, that's real important, and the gals will share that with you today.

- Now if you're gonna be in the mountains you gotta be camping somewhere along the way, and Donna's got cooking while camping tips for us today.

- That's right, how to pack if you're gonna go on a camping trip, what you need to bring with you to make the experience even better, and she'll share those tips with us.

- Alright, so we're going camping, we're going to the Pisgah National Forest, we're gonna be catching some trout.

That and a whole lot more here today, on the Carolina Outdoor Journal.

- Mallory, I've really been looking forward to coming out here in the Pisgah National Forest and try out some of this late harvest water.

I know that's really been a wonderful addition to the fishery resource we have here in western North Carolina.

I know you've been a big part of it, and I'm really looking forward to fishing with you today and letting you tell me a little bit about the hatchery program, and hopefully we're gonna catch some fish today.

Had a little bit of wind blowing here earlier, here it is, the latter part of May you've gotta expect that, but anyway, how do you think the day's gonna stack up?

- Well I think we've got a good opportunity today.

The weather's good, we're out here it's a good spot, and this is one of our delayed harvest streams which has been a very popular program for us.

It's part of our hatchery-supported trout waters program where we're stocking catchable-sized fish and they're under catch and release regulations for eight months of the year.

It's catch and release now, on this particular stream, and it provides a lot of good fly fishing, sometimes some dry fly action, and hopefully we'll get into some of that today.

- Well, let's give it a whirl, I'm going to give you first dibs at 'em.

- Alright, appreciate it.

- Have at it, I'll be right behind you.

- Alright!

- I can already see a fish rising ahead of you up there.

- Ease on just a little bit and see if I can get in this run.

I'm fishing a dropper today, and sometimes it's a little difficult to cast.

- [Steve] Particularly on a small stream like this.

- It's not like classic fly casting, do a lot of roll casting and a lot of quarter casts.

- [Steve] I'll say, I think that's probably going to be the catch of the day right there.

Good man!

He nailed it too, didn't he?

- [Mallory] He did, hit the beadhead, the dropper.

- Get over here and put the net on him.

Boy, this colored up real nice.

Look at the gold belly.

- Oh yeah, nice colors on there.

That's a male.

- He took the dropper didn't he.

- Got the beadhead there, and that's - - Isn't that a nice fish, got a good body to him, a good color?

Come out of here, buddy.

Well that's a nice fish.

- [Mallory] Nice looking little brown trout.

- [Steve] Yeah buddy, beautiful fish.

Well good deal!

That's what I call quick action!

We may have spooked him.

Whoops.

Hmm.

I'm gonna ease right on up here, just a little bit.

I finally got one to come to the top.

Not a bad fish, either.

That's one I'll take, yeah.

Looks like a rainbow, maybe?

- [Mallory] What is that Steve, a rainbow trout?

- I believe it's rainbow.

- [Mallory] Good.

- Good fish, too, yeah.

I tell you these guys, no, he's a brooky.

He's a brooky, nice brooky too.

- [Mallory] Oh yeah.

You got the net, or you want me to get him?

- Yeah, if you don't mind just reaching down - - [Mallory] Good lookin' fish right there.

- [Steve] That's a great lookin' fish.

I'll tell ya, those guys are healthy.

You guys do a great job in that hatchery of raising those fish, I mean, they are beautiful.

- What did you have on there, Steve?

What are you using?

- I've got a blue winged olive imitation that I'm using and it's a lot of fun, get over here and get one of these.

There's several other fish in there feeding.

- Let's see, I'm gonna put a little sneak on 'em here.

See if I can get that [Unintelligible] in the right spot.

[both exclaim] - You did put it in the right spot!

- [Mallory] That looked good.

- [Steve] That's a good fish too.

- [Mallory] There's nothing more fun to me than dry fly action, trout fishing.

This guy's pretty strong, too.

Get over here where I can land him.

- Want me to lay the net on him?

- That'd be good, if I could ease him in.

There he is.

Whoa, he jumped out of the net!

- Well, I got my net all tangled up there.

There we go.

- There we go.

Let's get the stats on him.

- That's a good sized brooky there too.

- Do an easy release.

There we go, there we go.

Got the lure in the net, but oh yeah, nice little brook trout.

We'll let him go, a little quick release there.

There we go.

Appreciate that.

- Good job!

- That was a lot of fun, we trade back again?

Is it your turn?

- Nah go ahead, I wanna see if you can catch another one.

You laid it right on top of that one.

- He's still - - He's trying to find his way out, there he goes.

- There he goes.

Alright, well we'll see if we haven't spooked this whole - try 'em again.

[upbeat music] - I sure am excited about doing a little fishing today.

I mean, gorgeous day.

Beautiful sunshine, hope there's gonna be a little bit of hatching going on here.

We've got some delayed harvest water to fish on here.

I know you do some guiding on this water up here so I'm expecting you to put me on some fish today, you think you can do that?

- I think we can make that happen.

- What do you think we oughta be using today?

- Um, I think this hole over here, to our left, I've seen a couple fish rising.

And I know in this faster pocket water up here we might be able to bring a few up to the surface.

But I like to drop a little beadhead fly behind it, especially in that faster water.

It increases your odds of catching fish.

- But you know me, I love a dry fly.

- You like a dry fly, that's why I thought that'd be a great little spot over there for you to start out in, because I know I know one will rise in there.

- But I'm expecting to get us some good tips from you today, I know you've been very successful on this water up here.

- Uh huh, this is a great stream for fishing.

These delayed harvests are, they give beginners and experienced anglers the opportunity to catch fish.

- Oh man, that's a good fish!

- [Andrew] That might be a brown trout, I don't know.

- [Steve] Oh, yeah.

- [Andrew] It's staying down.

- [Steve] Get him on the reel there, I'm gonna have to use that!

- [Andrew] Nice fish.

That's a brook trout.

- Is it brown?

- It's a brooky.

- Brooky, okay, yeah I see the fins now.

- You can see those white tips on his fins.

- Oh yeah, oh man.

I love the tug!

- You want me to get the net?

- I like that tug!

- [Andrew] I'm gonna let you hold that net on there.

That's a nice fish, there.

- Boy, these things are fighters.

- [Andrew] He was up in that dead water.

- [Steve] Yup.

Okay, he's getting in here.

Yeah, that's what we come for.

Come on buddy, come on here.

Can't even get him into my little old net here.

- [Andrew] He won't fit in there!

There you go!

- [Steve] Okay, yeah, I think that's catch of the day!

- [Andrew] It's a start.

- [Steve] Here, let me get him out of there.

Oh, gosh, that's a hefty fish.

Come on, come on, yeah.

- [Andrew] That's a nice fish, there.

- [Steve] Oh, and there he goes!

Alright, nice fish, nice fish.

Reckon there's another one in there?

- I don't know, probably, very well could be.

That was two strikes you had in there.

- I'll tell you Andrew, you put me on those fish over there, I'm gonna let you take a turn.

- Oh really?

- Let's go up here to the next hole.

- Yeah let's walk up above this stuff here.

This big rock wall, oughta be some fish sitting up in there.

- Oh yeah, that looks like that oughta hold a number of fish.

Need a net?

- I think I can get 'em.

- [Steve] Is it a brooky?

- Uh huh, I'm gonna get up here.

Yup.

- [Steve] Let's seem him there, Andrew.

- Pretty good, he got that dry fly in that fast water.

- [Steve] Brookies, they kinda like those dry flies.

- Yeah they're opportunistic feeders, that's for sure.

- [Steve] Yup alright, good deal.

- Joe that's about as much fun as I've had in a long time, we caught a lot different types of fish, it was good data.

- That's right, all three species we catch in our North Carolina mountains were present and there were some bigger trout in the stream, we saw some that day, we just didn't have any takers, but that delayed harvest program really works.

It gives you the opportunity to fish streams with a lot of good fish in it, good populations of fish, and then at a certain time they'll open it up to harvest and then you can go in and harvest.

But that stream was way up in the Pisgah National Forest, remote, just had a lot of fun.

- Sure did, now, we talked about catching three different types of species there.

What we need to do now is get some information about how you can do the same thing, let's go to Gear Time.

[upbeat music] - Well Andrew I really appreciate you bringing me over here and showing me this water today.

I know you bring a lot of folks over here in your business, and treat 'em to some excellent trout fishing, you gave me a good sample of it today.

I'm very pleased, you know we caught all three species and had excellent activity all day long.

It's a beautiful day out here, but I'm sure the folks would like to know a little bit about what kind of gear and what kind of flies and that sort of thing they need to think about and fishing waters like this, you got any advice for them?

- Should we tell them what flies, really?

- Sure, yeah!

- Well, I see you've got a shorter rod than I'm using, how long is that?

- [Steve] Seven and a half.

- Seven and a half to eight and a half foot rod is probably ideally what you'd wanna use down in here.

Three weight to five weight line is probably sufficient.

Some people will go smaller, I think four weight's probably a good all-around small stream rod.

As far as the flies go, we used a number of flies today.

I think you used strictly dry flies, which produced numbers of fish.

I personally like to fish a dropper on my dry fly, just cause I like to fish that faster water.

So, I drop a little beadhead nymph about 14-18 inches depending on the depth of the run, off the back of the dry fly so that way you kinda increase your odds by 50%.

Because with that dropper underneath you'll catch twice as many fish, usually.

- What kind of patterns do you recommend for the drys and the dropper?

- I like the caddisflies, work well, the parachute Adams, or a regular Adams, I think you were using a regular Adams, which imitates a mayfly, and there's a number of mayflies hatching right now.

This one's kind of got an olive body on it, and olive seemed to work better than the gray-bodied one, which is understandable.

The caddisfly produced a number of fish, I didn't really see any today, I saw some stone flies and a caddisfly kind of imitate a stone fly in certain situations where the faster water, they'll come up and hit it thinking maybe it's a stone fly and then dropping the beadheads, the pheasant tail nymph works well, the prince nymph is probably my favorite, the beadhead prince nymph, then you get into your copper johns, and brasses, there's a number of different droppers, but the caddisflies, the prince nymphs gonna represent a caddis nymph, or a stone fly nymph, the pheasant tail's gonna represent your mayflies, those are pretty much the two insects that are hatching right now so that's a good idea, to stick with what's on the water, that's what the fish are eating.

- But the main thing is we were catching both surface and underneath.

- Oh yeah.

- And that made for a real exciting day.

- Saw a lot of fish hitting on top, middle of the day it seemed like, around noontime, had a good little hatch going on.

Midges, mayflies, stoneflies, fish were looking up.

That's kind of tapered down now, it's late in the day, but it was definitely a productive morning.

- Well, I really appreciate again bringing me over here, and hopefully we can do this again soon.

- It's my pleasure, I'd be glad to take you out anytime.

- Appreciate it.

- Alight.

- Well that's some valuable information.

We hope that you can use it the next time you go trout fishing in the mountains of North Carolina.

Joe, the different flies, so important.

- They really are, because each stream has different times when there's different flies coming off different hatches, different situations for the fish, fish are all [Unintelligible] Every trout fisherman that I know up there that fishes a lot carries a good variety and really knows how to read the stream.

That's so important to success up in the mountains is to be able to get that stream, look at it, determine what's going on at that particular moment, and then match that hatch or match what's going on, and it'll make a lot of difference on what you catch that day.

- Right flies and local knowledge.

- That's right.

- Okay, let's catch up with Donna!

She's going camping and she's got some tips for us as we continue on with the Carolina Outdoor Journal.

[upbeat music] - Hi, today we're gonna be talking about ways to pack for a camp out.

And the main thing you want to worry about, or think about, when you're doing a pack or packing your cooler for a camp out, is: Is everything that you're packing gonna stay safe, and at the right cool temperature?

And also, the weight.

You don't wanna pack a heavy cooler that weighs a ton before you even begin cause you're gonna fill it up with all kinds of yummy things.

So I would suggest using, perhaps a collapsible cooler.

They're a little bit lighter in weight, plus on your way back, you can just put all your waste in it, or if you have nothing left you can just fold it up and it's easier to carry.

And this one has a nice handle that adjusts so if you want to carry it with your hand, or if you wanna put it over your shoulder you can do that as well.

So when you're also packing for your camp out, if you're gonna be gone two or three days you wanna think about what kind of items you want to go with your fresh catch.

So if you're gonna do, if there's lots of ingredients that your family likes, plan menus that are similar so you don't have to pack a whole lot of different ingredients, which takes up a lot more space and is just a lot more trouble.

So also you wanna try to freeze everything that you possibly can.

If you're taking cheese, or if you're taking vegetables, try to go ahead and freeze those.

That way it will help keep everything cool and you won't have to put as many ice packs or ice bags in there.

And speaking of ice packs and cool packs, you wanna make sure that you do use some ice packs.

These do weigh a lot, and they do cause waste because then you have to take them back home with you.

So if you can, freeze some ice and this crushed ice works really well, and it may have melted by the time you get to your camp area, but you can also use it for drinking water or you can use it to wash your hands with, which is nice as well.

So those will all stay, keep all your items nice and cold.

And you wanna make sure that your cooler is packed full.

A fuller cooler will stay colder than a half-packed cooler.

So if you're gonna carry it you might as well fill it to the rim anyway.

You want to make sure that you take some newspaper with you and some matches or a lighter in a waterproof container so that if your campsite has gotten a little damp or is a little bit wet, the wood, this will help jumpstart your fire for you.

You wanna make sure also that before you begin to cook on your campfire, you wanna make sure that your coals, when you blow on them are a nice red color and all your flame has dissipated.

Then you can put your grate onto your coals, and you can use, if you're gonna cook directly on the grate I would suggest just bringing some of these non-stick sheets that way it helps with cleanup and you don't have anything that'll stick to your grates and you have to clean that up, and also this will help so you won't have to bring any oil or nonstick spray too, cause these already have a nonstick coating on the sheets.

A great way to cook though, if you don't want to bring a cast iron skillet, which a lot of people carry their cast iron skillet to fry their fish that they've caught, those weigh a lot.

As well as you have to clean them up.

So what we're gonna do is, we're gonna use some nonstick foil that's heavy duty, and we're gonna put our fish on that.

We have some fresh catfish that we've caught, and we're gonna sprinkle that with some bell peppers and some onions, maybe some dill, and some tomatoes to add a little bit of flavor.

We're also gonna use a breader with that.

We're gonna use a spicy hot breader with that.

And you're gonna sprinkle that on top, it will add some flavor and some texture to your fish, that way you don't have to bring a whole lot of ingredients or spices with you as well.

You wanna make sure that you're using long handled utensils as well.

So I hope I've given you some great tips for your next camp out, and that's Simple Cooking here on Carolina Outdoor Journal.

- Thanks Donna, we hope that if you're going camping you'll find that information, those tips, helpful.

Let's go back to the stream, the late harvest, so important.

- Great program that the Wildlife Commission has been administering for a number of years.

Allows you to go fish streams that have a good population of fish for a certain amount of time during the year.

Again, we caught browns, we caught brookies and rainbows that day, we didn't catch any big fish that day but they were there, we saw some and the guys fished 'em, but just never had any takers.

But that's a great program administered by the commission.

Also if you've never done that before, going with a good guide, and Andrew, we've worked with him several times, he knows that area in the Pisgah National Forest, he knows a number of different streams to fish.

And if you've never done it, you owe it to yourself to give him a call and go try it and have a lot of fun.

- Let's see if I can get this now.

If you've got the right flies, use the late harvest, got a good guide, you can catch some fish most of the time.

- Most of the time, in our mountains, yeah.

Because those streams do have fish in 'em, and again, the Wildlife Commission, a part of your dollars that you spend every year on hunting and fishing licenses goes towards these programs that the commission administers and they're very worthwhile and again, last count I think we had over 4,000 miles of streams, trout streams in our mountains, so you need to take advantage of that and go up and have a good time.

- If you don't catch the big ones that gives you a reason to go back again.

- To go back again, but you'll catch fish, and a good variety of fish, too.

- For Joe Albea, I'm John Moore, thanks for joining us today on the Carolina Outdoor Journal.

- [Announcer] Make sure to visit our website for more information.

- [Announcer] The production of Carolina Outdoor Journal is made possible in part by: - [Female Announcer] Wildlife in North Carolina Magazine.

ncwildlife.org/winc.

- [Male Announcer] And by EZ Bait & Tackle, family owned and operated.

We fish from fresh to saltwater.

We provide fishing supplies and advice to every type of angler.

For all your fishing needs, EZ Bait & Tackle.

[light instrumental music] ♪