Mountain Trout Streams Fly Fishing Report - April 21, 2022

Presently there are many hatches occurring on the native brook trout streams in the Shenandoah National Park such as Blue Quills, Little Yellow Stoneflies, and Caddis and a few March Browns. We have been doing well with a Mr. Rapidan Dry size 14. Often the March Brown nymphs make a mini-migration to the sides of the streams to hatch and the trout feed heavily on these nymphs as well as the adults. A very effective tactic is to fish a Mr. Rapidan Brown Soft Hackle size 16 on an 18 inch 5X dropper below the Mr. Rapidan Dry.  Other flies to match the hatches are Little Yellow Stonefly Dry size 16, Mr. Rapidan Delta Wing Caddis, Black size 14, and Bead Head Hare's Ear size 14 on a 5X Classic 7.5ft or Mountain Leader 6ft. 

There is still some snow in the higher elevations on the Shenandoah National Park but all of the Skyline Drive is open again.  So you can access the streams by either coming in from the top off the Skyline Drive or from below on the boundary accesses. The water temperature has been around 48 degrees.  For more information on how to access these streams, see my book Trout Fishing in the Shenandoah National Park or download my video.

The local native brook trout streams in the George Washington National Forest are in great shape as well.