Fly-Fishing Through Disasters
Hurricane Helene caused widespread damage across the mountains of the Carolinas. All photos: Jim Mize
The cicada hatch of 2024 should have been a sign. Both the thirteen-year and seventeen-year cicadas hatched in the same year for the first time since 1803. Thomas Jefferson was president at the time, and there’s no record indicating that he went fly fishing. He probably missed an opportunity.
When I was a child, we called cicadas “locusts,” after the plagues we had learned about in Sunday School. Since then, the name has stuck.
The year I turned twelve, we had a massive locust hatch. I spent a week camping at the nearest lake with my cousin, and we caught so many carp on our fly rods that we tired of it. The process was comical. We’d paddle our canoe to the bank, shake locusts off overhanging limbs into the boat, and then put them on hooks to cast to cruising carp. The carp cruised the surface, leaving wakes like freshwater sharks. They never seemed to tire of feeding, and they always managed to beat the other fish to our offering.
It sounds simple, but casting live locusts was no easy feat. Just about the time you released your line to a fish, the locust would decide to fly. It couldn’t carry the weight of the line but it could sure make it go a different direction. Luckily, you can miss a carp by several feet and still catch it. The live locust sent out vibrations the carp locked in on, and they just tracked it down until the bug disappeared in one methodical slurp.
With that memory in mind, when a dual locust hatch fell upon our region like a plague, I went fishing. I tossed ugly imitations of locusts hoping a brown trout might be fooled, but had no luck. I guess it only works on carp
When the cicadas are out, warmwater fly fishing can be lights-out.
Wind and Water
Looking back, the locust hatch of 2024 was just the first plague to arrive.
Hurricane Helene came second. That storm blew down trees, flooded creeks and rivers, blocked roads, and knocked out power. At my cabin in the South Carolina mountains, I endured seventeen inches of rain, seventy-mile-per-hour winds, and was without electricity for eight days. I couldn’t get to a store or gas station for three days, and then they could only take cash. Apparently cash registers have to connect to some central system and these couldn’t.
The only beneficiary of the hurricane was Moose, my black Lab. He got a lot of my time during those eight days without electricity or communications. We went through two cans of tennis balls.
It is hard to find an upside to that storm. People’s lives changed, taking their possessions and sometimes family members. Houses were swept away, and whole towns demolished. Rebuilding would take years.
Even those who fish felt it. A North Carolina hatchery was knocked out, the remaining trout concentrated on a few delayed-harvest streams, and the fishing pressure increased on limited waters. You could only find wild trout by hiking, and often those areas were closed even to foot traffic.
Trout’s ability to survive floods is remarkable.
But anglers tend to be optimists. As soon as I could, I fished a section of a nearby wild-trout stream, and I hardly recognized it. Where it was normally knee-deep, flood waters had driven it higher by twelve feet. The streambed was scoured, and each hole had been rearranged. Where there had been a gentle riffle, there was now a long pool. Rocks the size of basketballs accumulated at the end of one run, creating a new dam.
The trout seemed to have mostly survived, though a local biologist said the aquatic insects were likely affected. In any event, I caught a few fish and released them as gently as I could. I figured that they had about the same sort of week that I did.
Fire on the Mountain
Then, we had a dry winter. All that downed timber from the hurricane lay on the forest floor creating kindling for the first spark. Fires started in remote areas, and spring winds fanned them. Fire crews couldn’t risk getting in front of these fires in rough terrain, so they built firebreaks well ahead and waited for the right weather to burn out the space between the break and the fire.
One fire burned steadily toward my cabin, bringing with it the notice to leave. A fire truck rolled by with a siren that couldn’t be ignored and a voice on the loudspeaker declaring, “Evacuate. Evacuate.”
I was gone for five days.
Finally, the rain came, the firebreaks worked, and the fire was held in check. I got back into my cabin, but the crews were still out on the roads accessing hotspots they found with drones.
I’m trying to find an upside to the latest plague, but it’s difficult. Soon, the rains will wash all manner of silt and runoff into the trout streams. While I’m waiting to find the silver lining, I’ll create my own. I’m headed over to a small pond this afternoon to fly fish rather than drive elsewhere and get in the firefighters’ way.
Besides, with three plagues already behind me, I think I can guess just what the next one will be. Locusts, floods, and fire have already come with a vengeance. For the next one, my money is on a plague of frogs. Lots and lots of frogs, hopping everywhere, climbing trees, squishing underfoot, and falling into the lake.
And if that happens, the bass will be biting like crazy.
Jim Mize looks for the opportunity in every plague. Check out Jim’s new book, The Jon Boat Years, or buy autographed copies here.
