Lightning Bugs at Dusk

Written By: Kirk Dornbush | Issue: 2021/08 – August

One of the silver linings of the Covid pandemic is that I have had an opportunity to explore the abundance of local trout waters in the mountains of Western North Carolina, all within 1.5 hours of my house.  My jet-black, English cocker spaniel, Minuit, and I have hiked many a mountain stream in the last 18 months. 

The fishing around here is mostly nymph fishing, which I’ve really learned to enjoy, especially using a Euro-Nymph set-up (the locals call it “tight lining,” if you utter the words “Euro Nymph” to a local, they’ll shoot you a funny look, then dismissively laugh while shaking their heads with pity).  

But there is some dry fly fishing in the months of May and June and given the dearth of opportunities to fish an Adams, it’s an experience to treasure.

My local fly shop is called Brookings, where I have happily spent too much money in the last 12-18 months.  Recently, while “provisioning” in the shop, the owner pulled me aside and rhetorically whispered “Want to know a place to go for rising fish at dusk?”  

After giving him a “Do Black Bears Live in the Woods?! Look,” he proceeded to tell me about a few pools in the Pisgah National Forest, near Brevard, that are as calm as glass, right up until about 8:00 P.M., the point at which the Fishing Gods ring the dinner bell and these pools start to boil.  Fish start working everywhere, mostly chasing emergers, but there are some sippers, too.  Yellow Sallies, Sulphur and Caddis Hatches turn on and it’s pandemonium until dark (about 9:15 P.M.).  They’re all wild trout, mostly 10”-12”, but there are some 18”-20” chunkers lurking in their depths.

Like a moth to light, I had to try it.  It takes 1.5 hours to drive to these pools, working out to be three hours of driving for 75 minutes of fishing.  There is a local joint called the Riverside Bar, owned by a British couple of Indian descent, within 10 minutes of these pools.  It’s the Western North Carolina mountains equivalent of the Grizzly Bar and Grill (a Montana haunt, located near the banks of the Madison River in Cameron, Montana), except you stop for beer and dinner before you go fishing.  Mom’s lamb curry is to die for and the local IPAs from Ashville are great, so I make an evening out of it.  I’ve fished these pools a lot this summer.  I have only seen one other angler at this time of the day.  There is a resident muskrat that comes that keeps me company, but other than that, I’ve had the spots to myself.

The challenge of these pools is they get the stuffing banged out of them during the day (they are 100 feet from the road), so the fish are super spooky and leader-shy. 

In my first four trips to the pools, these fish so thoroughly whipped my butt, you could hear them laugh at each cast.   

Determined to solve the mystery, I visited a local fly shop in Brevard to see if they had any recommendations.  I pulled into the parking lot about noon, right as the half-day trips were ending.  As I got out of the car, a Grizzly Adams of a guy came up to me and said: “I love your bumper sticker.”  He was pointing at my Steal Your Face decal; another Dead-head, fly fisherman, just what the world needs.  We instantly bonded.

As you’ve probably guessed, this guy turned out to be a local guide.  I told him my dilemma, namely, I was getting skunked by some wily wild trout.  Like any good guide, he first asked a few questions and immediately diagnosed the problem: I’d been fishing size 16 dries on 6x monofilament, when I needed to fish dries no bigger than 18, with droppers no bigger than 20-22 on 7x-8x fluorocarbon.  

Uggghhh.  

At 60, my eyes don’t work as well as they used to, so the prospect of tying size 22 midges at 8:45 p.m. seemed aspirational, but I’m nothing if not determined, so I loaded up on the recommended accoutrements and headed back for additional punishment (queue Mark Lester’s iconic line in Oliver). 

How’d I do?  I’m now 0-5.  One fish rose to a dry; one fish hit my nymph.  

I whiffed on both, of course.  

At this point, even the muskrat was laughing.  

There was one consolation, however, that right-sized my assessment of the evening’s shutout. As I was reeling in the remnants of my last failed cast, the lightning bugs put on a show. Hundreds of yellow fluorescent tails, blinking in unison, lit up the riverbanks; tree frogs scored and provided the musical accompaniment.

I sat, watched and listened until well after dark, leaving just before I succumbed to a riverside catnap.  As I walked to my car, I swore I saw Robin “Puck” Goodfellow fly away in disgust.  The opportunity to sprinkle his “love-in-idleness” tincture (leaving me to explain to my wife of 35 years why I was leaving her for the muskrat) foiled.

 It was one of those truly magical fly-fishing moments that reminded me that catching fish, as I’ve realized after 40 years of counting fish, is just the cherry on the sundae.