It took a little over two hours of four-wheel driving, over and through mountains, into National Forest and, eventually, wilderness area, to make it 12 linear miles and find the tank trap that marked the beginning of our on-foot leg. It was a long walk in, loaded down...

The river valley is clogged with fog in the dawn and early-morning hours, casting a gray light over warm, clear water that carries foamy bubbles and the occasional rings of a rise downriver. It’s remarkably quiet, save for the quiet rush of water as it tumbles over led...

We're officially in the Dog Days in southwest Virginia--the peak of summer--and good days on the river have been rolling steady. Heavy rains that were forecasted as a result of Hurricane Isaias missed our region, largely, but regular, isolated rainfall has kept our str...

It's been an interesting year in every sense of the word, and it's difficult to believe that we're already living in July--well into the smallmouth season, and it seems like we've really just been getting started. Since June 10, we've been fully back in the saddle with...

We've fallen out of the habit of publishing regular fishing reports because our guiding operations were halted for a spell during the peak of the Covid-19 outbreak, but we're hopping back on the train, right now. As you know if you subscribe to this website, we have sl...

The story I’d like to try to tell begins in the late 80s, though it doesn’t really. It really starts before that, with a wild boy in Clifton Forge, the major settings being the Jackson and Cowpasture Rivers. Or, maybe it should start even earlier, on a mid-spring day i...

The Blue Ridge Discovery Center (BRDC), a non-profit based in Konnarock, Virginia at the foot of Mount Rogers, has a vital, driving mission—to foster ecological awareness and promote experiential, outdoor learning that encourages healthy outdoor activity and the growth...

Musky are curious critters. If you follow this column, you know that I spend what probably amounts to an unhealthy amount of time considering what makes them tick. They’re a mysterious fish with a swagger that doesn’t always match their predatory physiology. They’ll br...

Fish enough, and keep track of the weather and conditions, and certain patterns begin to emerge. Like, for example, when it’s worth going fishing, and when it’s not.

When the South Fork gets a bit of rain in the winter and the clouds hang on for a few days after, and wh...

For the better part of February, we've been battling high water in southwest Virginia, keeping us off the big river and prepping for spring and the great smallmouth and wild trout fishing that comes with it. Despite snow and frigid temps coming this weekend, in just th...