We are now halfway through summer and the main subject of conversation the last few weeks has been the heat. Everybody starts the conversation with the same thing “Can you believe how hot it has been!” The TV weather people are basically on auto-pilot with their daily reports, record heat and chance of thunderstorms today. Just returning from a week of fly fishing in Colorado with 80 degree days and 45-50 degree nights I had almost forgotten the word humidity. However take heart, in another 45 days as we start to enter September this will change to a fly fishing dream as we have our first cool nights and change is in the air.

Thanks to everyone who came out to our last chapter meeting at River John’s on July 28, this joint gathering of the Little River and the Great Smoky Mountain chapter has turned in to a summer highlight. River John’s for the first time visitor, never fails to elicit surprise at what a hidden jewel it is just minutes from downtown and family owned; they are great friends to TU and our local community. Burgers, hot dogs, homemade peach cobbler cooked in a Dutch oven made everyone a little heavier and a lot happier as we spent time with our TU chapter members and friends.

Tennessee TU officers and members from across the state attended the July 9th TU State Council

on the Caney River at the Army Corp of Engineers facility. The agenda was filled with updates, reports on current projects, elections and committee appointments. Mike Bryant, president of the Little River Chapter was elected TU State Chairman for the year 2016-2017. Melissa Harrell, vice president of the Clinch River chapter was appointed as state committee chair for the Women’s Initiative program. This TU program promotes and encourages women of all ages to get involved with TU and helps facilitate this group thru seminars where they learn fly tying, casting, and use of equipment to get them out on the water and enjoying our sport.

I was appointed as the state committee chair for the TU 5Rivers program, and as many of you know with our chapter involvement with UT-Knoxville’s “Vols on the Fly” it is a great opportunity to introduce college age students to Trout Unlimited. Now with over 65 chapters across the country we are excited to help any we can with colleges across our state that want to start their own chapter. The 5Rivers programs are student led and organized chapters with an emphasis on conservation, and volunteering in their community. If you have a student in your family attending college in our state that enjoys the outdoors and fly fishing, ask them if they have a chapter on their campus. If not, let us know so we can assist in connecting them with all the information they need to start a TU 5Rivers chapter.

The next year is going to be an exciting time for the chapters in our area, in September it will again be time for the annual fall camp out at Smokemont in the Great Smoky Mountain National Park. This will be I think our fourth year in the group campground camping with the Little River chapter and each year gets a little bigger. The sign up will soon start; don’t miss this one if you enjoy tent camping, casting for trout and campfires under the stars with your TU friends and family. Save the date of September 23rd & 24th for our two night camp out!

If camping is not your thing, then help Melissa Harrell and volunteer to help on the “Women on the Water” event that same weekend. The day starts at Millers Island on the Clinch river where women of all ages learn to tie flies, casting seminars, fishing in the Clinch, followed by a lunch and all equipment provided at no charge. This is an event that fills up quickly and I promise you will have maybe more fun than they do helping out. More details will follow as we get closer.

The biggest event of the year will be next April when the Tennessee State council and all its chapters will host the TU Southeast Regional meeting in Gatlinburg. The planning has begun and I am excited to be sharing the host committee chair with Mike Bryant. After being a member of the planning group for the last two regional meetings in Asheville, NC and Roanoke VA; I am looking forward to showcasing our mountains, streams and tail waters to TU members from all across the South. We are planning to make this a can’t miss event and we are pulling out all the stops for this annual gathering of our TU family!

John Reinhardt

President
Email: john711111@yahoo.com