Latest / The Articulate Fly / S6, Ep 29: Casting Angles with Mac Brown

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S6, Ep 29: Casting Angles with Mac Brown · The Articulate Fly

• 0:03
  Marvin: Hey folks, it's Marvin Cash, the host of the Articulate Fly,
• 0:06
  Marvin: and we're back with another Casting Angles with Mack Brown. How you doing, Mack?
• 0:11
  Mac: I'm doing great. How are you doing, Marvin?
• 0:13
  Marvin: As always, just trying to stay out of trouble. And, you know,
• 0:16
  Marvin: it's kind of funny, we got spoiled, I guess, this past week,
• 0:20
  Marvin: had temperatures well up in the 70s. And I mean, we've got a freeze warning
• 0:23
  Marvin: tonight, and they're talking about 30 and 40 mile an hour wind gusts.
• 0:27
  Mac: That's what we had we had a lot of wind today on the river and and yeah it's
• 0:31
  Mac: a lot colder yeah at least it makes it feel a lot colder yesterday i think we
• 0:36
  Mac: were 72 i think today it was 42,
• 0:40
  Mac: with 30 mile an hour winds floating we got about blown back to webster from
• 0:45
  Mac: bryson city so yeah it's brutal when it's that kind of wind all day in a boat
• 0:49
  Mac: i got a little bit of wind burn yeah Yeah.
• 0:52
  Marvin: You know, the interesting thing is we're kind of like, as we ease and we're
• 0:54
  Marvin: almost officially to spring is that, you know, the conditions bounce all over the place.
• 0:59
  Marvin: And so one of the big takeaways is I think you have to be a little bit more
• 1:03
  Marvin: nimble as an angler, right.
• 1:04
  Marvin: To really focus on taking what the river gives you. Cause you can't go out with
• 1:08
  Marvin: a mindset that you want to do one thing.
• 1:09
  Marvin: And if the river is not willing to give it to you, you're gonna have a really bummer day. Right.
• 1:14
  Mac: Oh yeah yeah we saw that in webster and we just wrapped up a school yesterday
• 1:19
  Mac: and um yeah it was real obvious you see a lot of boats there was a lot of boat
• 1:23
  Mac: traffic up the day we went to webster,
• 1:26
  Mac: and it's kind of funny and some of them are banging the big five inch streamers
• 1:31
  Mac: to the bank and hoping for the best and others are golf ball size indicators
• 1:35
  Mac: doing the same thing the whole float it's just funny how many i mean you get
• 1:40
  Mac: just the right thing it's like we did a wet fly game,
• 1:44
  Mac: for the um students in the school it was every cast for 30 minutes every cast
• 1:50
  Mac: boom fish fish fish and then you watch all these people float by till they're
• 1:54
  Mac: out of sight and they got a certain,
• 1:56
  Mac: i think that's what happens i mean people have preconceived notions and once
• 1:59
  Mac: you're on the right thing you stay with it till it quits work and then you get
• 2:02
  Mac: to go figure it out again but But I think a lot of people try to force things this time of year.
• 2:07
  Mac: Yeah, there's a lot of fish in the DH, but when they show up and try to force
• 2:10
  Mac: their technique, with that, as you said, being nimble, I think that can definitely
• 2:15
  Mac: backfire on people real quick.
• 2:18
  Marvin: Yeah, because, you know, we look at colder water temperatures,
• 2:21
  Marvin: and you and I were talking, it's like if you walk out and you don't see fish
• 2:24
  Marvin: rising and there are no birds, right, and you don't see any insects,
• 2:28
  Marvin: you probably may want to skip the dry fly, dry dropper action for a while.
• 2:34
  Mac: That's right. I mean, yeah, and it's tricky.
• 2:37
  Mac: Like today we had an epic Granum and Hendrickson hatch, but you got fish that are relatively new.
• 2:44
  Mac: I'm not sure when, because I hadn't even looked at it. I don't look at it.
• 2:47
  Mac: I just know, you know, the DH, they're back in March, April, May.
• 2:52
  Mac: As far as adding to the replenishing what's in there, and it's like you got
• 2:58
  Mac: fish like today with literally thousands of dries on the water that totally
• 3:01
  Mac: got ignored. So go figure.
• 3:04
  Mac: I mean, it's a cold front. Yeah, there's serious clouds and wind blew.
• 3:09
  Mac: But literally to have that many bugs and realize nothing's coming up and even
• 3:13
  Mac: looking at them, I wonder if you were somewhere where those had been there.
• 3:18
  Mac: You know, they probably would have responded, wouldn't they, if they were there.
• 3:23
  Mac: Born and raised there, I'm saying they'd know what that meant.
• 3:25
  Mac: But here's a dinner bell going off and they totally got ignored.
• 3:27
  Mac: So I guess because the Hendrickson doesn't look like a pellet, you see.
• 3:32
  Mac: So it takes them a while. Sometimes it takes them longer, you know.
• 3:35
  Mac: This year, it seems like it's taken them longer to figure out, hey, that's dinner.
• 3:40
  Mac: And the swallows were there. Like you said, I mean, we had a lot of swallows.
• 3:44
  Mac: I was like, yeah, there's a hatch. And we started looking at the water,
• 3:47
  Mac: and you could see all the insects in the phone line.
• 3:50
  Mac: But, yeah, the fish really didn't know what that was.
• 3:54
  Mac: Yeah, people get away with a lot of things. It wasn't their first put in,
• 3:57
  Mac: but you've still got to be working a system. system, you know,
• 4:03
  Mac: work in a system, like try something, doesn't work, change, doesn't work,
• 4:06
  Mac: change. I mean, change until you figure out what it is.
• 4:08
  Mac: And I think that's, what's real common, like this time of year,
• 4:12
  Mac: when you see boats, that was the theme of the whole week with the school is
• 4:15
  Mac: just telling them, look, here's your process and going through the process where
• 4:19
  Mac: they've got a process, you know, to figure out what it is.
• 4:23
  Mac: And then they get a big smile once they figure it out on their own.
• 4:25
  Mac: And that's the way it's supposed to be.
• 4:28
  Marvin: Yeah. It's interesting. You know, I always think this time of the year,
• 4:31
  Marvin: unless you see something that tells you to do something different,
• 4:34
  Marvin: you start at the bottom and work your way up the water column and try to figure
• 4:38
  Marvin: out where they are and what they're eating.
• 4:39
  Marvin: I imagine that's probably why the wet flies were so successful for you because
• 4:43
  Marvin: the fish were active and eating mid-column and you were able to pick them up there.
• 4:50
  Mac: Yeah, yeah, that was a good, that was actually the most productive thing that
• 4:55
  Mac: we did during the whole week.
• 4:58
  Mac: I mean, the wet fly game ended to work pretty good the whole week.
• 5:01
  Mac: So, and even today, that's what I did.
• 5:03
  Mac: I have a, I have a guy here from Connecticut for five days and we did a little bit different.
• 5:09
  Mac: We fished real similar to Davey's technique,
• 5:14
  Mac: like a muddler daddy up top with an unweighted wet in the middle and just have
• 5:19
  Mac: a little bit of just a brass bead on the bottom fly, a little small brass bead on a 14-size hook,
• 5:25
  Mac: and just by enticing them.
• 5:28
  Mac: It was pretty funny when the guy got the hang of it. I showed him one cast of
• 5:32
  Mac: how to move the rod tip back and forth as he's bringing the top fly to make
• 5:36
  Mac: it undulate on the surface.
• 5:39
  Mac: Had a rainbow come up and he missed the drive, that 21-inch rainbow today.
• 5:43
  Mac: So it was pretty, then he got really excited.
• 5:45
  Mac: You know, then he did it again in the same spot, same rainbow came up.
• 5:49
  Mac: And he tried to get the dry fly again, but he got excited and yanked them all
• 5:55
  Mac: away. And I said, no, remember what happens.
• 5:58
  Mac: When that happens, you bring the dropper up to the surface next, you know.
• 6:01
  Mac: But he got excited and set the hook, even though the fish never ate it.
• 6:04
  Mac: So a little bit tricky. Tricky.
• 6:07
  Mac: A little bit tricky because people get excited, you know, when they see something
• 6:10
  Mac: close to it, they get excited thinking he might get it.
• 6:15
  Mac: But, yeah, that was fun.
• 6:18
  Marvin: Yeah, I mean, the good news is, right, you know, the longer the fish are in
• 6:20
  Marvin: the system as it warms up, things are going to start to stabilize out.
• 6:24
  Marvin: So it'll start to be a little bit easier, you know, for people to dial things
• 6:28
  Marvin: in because the fish will more likely be doing what you would expect them to
• 6:32
  Marvin: do. But you still need to have a process, right?
• 6:34
  Mac: Eight oh yeah yeah because it's going to move around it's going to move around
• 6:39
  Mac: from from the bottom to the top and on you know more overcast days maybe from
• 6:44
  Mac: the top to the middle um it's you know it's just it's it's fun figuring that
• 6:49
  Mac: part out that's really the whole fun part about it,
• 6:53
  Mac: Yeah, doing the process, and when it's working good and it stops working,
• 6:58
  Mac: that's the part I like the most is get to go back through and work it again.
• 7:04
  Mac: That's the fun part is the process to go back and figure it out.
• 7:07
  Marvin: Yeah, and then, of course, the really fun part of the process is you're officially
• 7:11
  Marvin: done with show season for 2024 because you just got back from being in Michigan last weekend.
• 7:16
  Mac: Oh, yeah, that was a lot of fun. That was a really fun show,
• 7:20
  Mac: and I love how they kick that off every year. I've got the Pied Piper's name
• 7:26
  Mac: and email and all that, but I really like that.
• 7:28
  Mac: They have him do that every year and play the pipes, kick off the show each day.
• 7:34
  Mac: And so I had a fun time talking with him about where he learned to get into
• 7:38
  Mac: playing bagpipes and all that.
• 7:40
  Mac: And we used to go to the Highland Games always in Boone as a kid for Grandfather Mountain, you know.
• 7:46
  Mac: And that was always fun going up there, seeing all the clans come from all over
• 7:50
  Mac: the world, watching them throw the caber toss and all that so yeah there was
• 7:54
  Mac: a really good attentive crowd,
• 7:55
  Mac: up there in michigan the demos and seminars went really well and it was fun
• 8:02
  Mac: it was fun to see everybody up there but i'm kind of glad we're done till next
• 8:06
  Mac: year i don't have to do any,
• 8:09
  Mac: any more of them till sometime in 25 yeah.
• 8:13
  Marvin: You know it's interesting too because i think they They have a really,
• 8:16
  Marvin: really unique fly fishing culture up in Michigan.
• 8:19
  Marvin: I mean, and it's not just trout and steelhead. I mean, there's big smallmouth,
• 8:23
  Marvin: you know, culture up there on the fly as well.
• 8:28
  Mac: Oh, yeah. There's a lot of good. They've got a fantastic Atlantic program going
• 8:34
  Mac: on in Michigan as well. There's just a lot of fun things you can do up there.
• 8:38
  Mac: It's a heck of a fishery. I mean, that's where, when I was a kid,
• 8:42
  Mac: we'd always go up there from the Ozarks. because my dad had a couple ants that
• 8:46
  Mac: lived right on Lake Michigan.
• 8:48
  Mac: So we'd go up there and we'd fish. My granddad would go up there with us and
• 8:52
  Mac: we'd go up to the UP. I remember going up there a lot as a kid.
• 8:56
  Mac: And I hadn't been in. I missed about 15, 20 years of being up there.
• 9:02
  Mac: I'm going to definitely keep it on the radar every year to make a point to get
• 9:06
  Mac: back up there because I think it's a wonderful state for everything about fishing. fishing.
• 9:13
  Mac: So yeah, it's got a lot more opportunity to get on a river and kind of get away
• 9:19
  Mac: from people up there, I think, too.
• 9:22
  Mac: Up in the UP, you can get on things and disappear and not see anybody, which is kind of fun.
• 9:28
  Marvin: Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, as we sort of, you're back at your home base,
• 9:32
  Marvin: that means kind of two things for you, right? It means schools and it means guiding.
• 9:36
  Marvin: So you want to kind of give folks an update on your schools and also where they
• 9:41
  Marvin: can find you. So if they want to book you and float down the river with you, they can do that too?
• 9:45
  Mac: Yeah, that'd be good. The fly fishing schools are on the flyfishingguideschool.com page.
• 9:51
  Mac: We're still going to have April, May, June, October, November.
• 9:55
  Mac: And those are going well.
• 9:58
  Mac: And I guess the way to get a hold of me for the other, I mean,
• 10:02
  Mac: you can message too on like social media stuff.
• 10:04
  Mac: But macgroundflyfish.com is where all the info is for like outfitter stuff.
• 10:09
  Mac: Stuff and um that's that's
• 10:12
  Mac: the easiest place to get information on on doing
• 10:15
  Mac: it online you know like just to go online and do it
• 10:18
  Mac: and this time of year it's also you get the time of year where lots of people
• 10:22
  Mac: are planning their spring trips and it's like today it's funny because you get
• 10:27
  Mac: calls from people are like we're coming we're gonna be there in june you get
• 10:30
  Mac: off the river calling back we decided we're going to a whole other state it's
• 10:35
  Mac: just like i'm glad i didn't answer those calls.
• 10:37
  Mac: But it's just funny. People don't even know, I think, a lot of times when they
• 10:40
  Mac: call, they're like, we might go to the Smokies.
• 10:43
  Mac: And it's like, it's probably a good thing to screen on a voicemail like that.
• 10:47
  Mac: Because it's kind of funny. I'm like, oh my gosh, two hours later,
• 10:50
  Mac: now you're not even going to a whole different state.
• 10:53
  Mac: But it's just funny. I'm glad I get those things taken care of before you.
• 10:57
  Mac: Because I text them back, yeah, you want to talk about this?
• 11:00
  Mac: No, we're going to Wyoming now. Oh, great.
• 11:04
  Mac: But yeah, Yeah, that's kind of funny.
• 11:07
  Marvin: Yeah. Well, you know, folks, when we get on the other side of this little cold
• 11:11
  Marvin: front that's passing through here in the southeast, it'll be a great time to get out on the water.
• 11:16
  Marvin: We got plenty of water in our part of the world, which, you know,
• 11:19
  Marvin: has not been the case the last few years. And you owe it to yourself to get
• 11:23
  Marvin: out there and catch a few.
• 11:25
  Marvin: Tight lines, everybody. Tight lines, Matt.
• 11:28
  Mac: Tight lines, Marvin.