09 Foothills Meeting: Clarkesville Library - 178 E. Green Street

18 Rabun Rendezvous - Dillard House, Dillard, GA

TBD Hoot on the Hooch (Yes, really)

This is not a drill. Oh yes, it's happening in March. Tell the Governor and get your donation money ready. Bring Kirby Smart if you like. Details coming very soon, but very reminiscent of the Hoots of the past.

After a two year absence due to COVID, the Rabun Chapter is back to hosting the (in)famous Rabun Rendezvous! The 2023 Rendezvous will have all the familiar Dillard House food, fellowship, bluegrass music, raffle and auction items that have made past events so much fun. This year the Rabun Rendezvous will be held Saturday, Feb 18. You and your Chapter members are invited to the Rendezvous!

Our goal is to sell at least 2,000 tickets = $20,000.  Each Chapter will receive $3.00 per ticket sold.

The Project Healing Waters group usually meets the 1st & 3rd Wednesdays, 2nd & 4th Tuesdays and virtual meetings 1st & 3rd Saturday of each month at the American Legion Post #7 in Gainesville, Georgia.(2343 Riverside Drive, Gainesville, GA 30501).

As the weather warms and the rains hopefully fall, they will start offering some fishing opportunities. They have a great group and good time at their meetings. All Veterans are invited.

This program could not be offered to our Veterans without the support of the Foothills TU Chapter, the Gold Rush TU Chapter and Unicoi Outfitters. They have really began to grow in numbers and programs because of all of the hard work by the volunteers who are TU members.

For more info: contact Deborah Scott

https://www.facebook.com/deborah.scott.391

Dear Bruce, Foothills Trout Unlimited Board of Directors and Chapter Members:

As you can imagine, the past few years have been challenging years for Casting for Recovery Georgia. Due to Covid-19, CfR Nationwide made the difficult decision to cancel all retreats in 2020. In 2021, with lots of safety precautions put into place, the Georgia program was successfully able to hold one retreat last November. In May of this year, we were able to hold another retreat for any woman with any diagnosis of breast cancer. All of the women who attended those retreats told us how important and meaningful their retreat experience was, especially after so much isolation due to the pandemic. They were grateful to be able to share their experiences and seek advice from other women with breast cancer diagnoses, as well as our wellness team, including oncologists, social workers and a registered dietician, all experienced in working with breast cancer survivors. We are so grateful for all of our dedicated volunteers & supporters who helped make these retreats happen.

Now we are actively preparing to hold our last retreat of the year and our 1st retreat for women with a diagnosis of metastatic stage IV breast cancer since 2019. CfR Georgia started hosting 2 retreats per year in 2016 but due to Covid vulnerability, the decision was made to postpone metastatic specific retreats. Casting for Recovery now has a National medical advisory board, responsible for keeping us with all things Covid and making recommendations for retreat safety.

There is no cure for breast cancer. Women with a metastatic stage IV breast cancer diagnosis know that their time is limited but they don't know what that time frame is or what their health will be during that time. They want the opportunity to experience a week-end, free of the day-to-day challenges of balancing family & work and still finding time for themselves.

Costs for our retreats are increasing each year, especially for lodging and food services. We have been limited in our fundraising efforts over the past few years since we have not been able to hold any person-to-person events. We are relying on our generous donors and supporters to help us fund our retreats.

The Foothills Chapter of Trout Unlimited has been a generous donor in years past and we ask again this year, that you give consideration to making a donation to Casting for Recovery Georgia's program to provide FREE week-end retreats for more women. Donations can be made at www.castingforrecovery.org or by sending a check to our National office at the Bozeman, MT address below. Please be sure to specify "Georgia" in your donation.

If you would like additional information about Casting for Recovery, you can go to the website: www.castingforrecovery.org or feel free to contact me. Also, please feel free to share this information with the other members of the Foothills Chapter of Trout Unlimited.

We sincerely appreciate your consideration in supporting Casting for Recovery Georgia.

Beverly

Beverly Booth

Co-Program Coordinator, Casting for Recovery - Georgia

M 678.480.8052

PO Box 535, McCaysville, GA 30555-0535

National Office:

109 E. Oak St., Ste 1G

Bozeman, Montana 59715

888.553.3500

The Upper Chattahoochee Chapter of Trout Unlimited's project on Crayfish Creek may reach it's goal by the end of the year, but they are not there yet. Numerous hours of volunteers have been logged to remove two old culverts and cleanup of both invasive plants and debris have occurred.

A contractor has been selected to cleani up the degraded banks, but additional funds are needed to get to that remaining estimated cost budget. As of right now $180,000 of the estimated $200,000 has been raised. The finish line is right there and they are so close, so we hope you'll consider donating.

But wait, there's more. There are going to be some volunteer opportunities this fall to assist with the project, so please also consider donating some of those incredible muscles you built up during the COVID shutdown.

One more thing, spread the word about this wonderful grassroots project. This project is but a small example of what this country's foundation has been built on. It's the small ideas put on by the people that get traction from the smallest places and builds into some of the greatest things you've ever been part of. Please spread the message about the wonderful effort to save and protect one of the few spawning areas for brown trout along the Chattahoochee River.

Did you know that you can make on-line purchases and designating our TU as a charity to receive a donation from Amazon as part of the purchase?

To access amazon for the charitable donation you need to go to this link. Your purchase will generate a donation to Foothills TU. Go to the attached link and then save it to your favorites bar and each time you access it and purchase the donation goes automatically goes to us.

We got this message from our good friend Dredger (aka Jeff) who now takes all the good spots on the streams during the week, but its for good reasons so you get get the most up to date fishing reports.

Are you new to town? New to fishing? A terrible fisher?

Fear not, help is available thanks to the Georgia DNR.

Below are a few links to get you started on your way to becoming a professional fisherman or fisherwoman.

Fishing Report: https://georgiawildlife.wordpress.com/category/fishing/

Reservoirs:

Trout:

Follow GA DNR:

You can also check out NGTO for Dredgers Weekly Fishing Report"

The DH stocking schedule in North Carolina. Remember to check the regulations before you go.

I'm calling it now and I don't care what the groundhog has to say about it. Winter is over. No more cold and no snow, not that we really have to deal with too much of either anyways. Hopefully you were able to attend this year's fly fishing show last week. It was jam packed and I'm sure it got some of you fired up to get on the water. It was good to see a shift back to normality again as we continue to crawl out of the mess of the last few years.

Fishing has been pretty decent across the board if you can dodge some of these high runoff periods. We were in need of some decent water table recharges, so you can't complain too much. I rather like the runoff this time of year for getting into the bigger fish waiting for something to get washed downstream, but I will say the amounts have been just a tad much on the bigger waters. Most fish can still be found in and around the wintering holes as they won't abandon those just yet since the nighttime lows are keeping water temperatures down still. Look to the backs of those pools or soft edges as the warm days hit as fish look for BWOs and other insect activity. I always keep some small micro egg presentations handy for those fishing eating the results of rainbow spawning activity, which will start tailing off. Look though for sucker spawning activity and have some sucker spawn handy over the next month or so. DH streams can be junk or technical depending on stocking. Places like Smith get a bunch of attention when the other rivers get blown out, so those fish wise up and require a bit more on the lighter side of tippet and flies.

One of the many good things about living in the south is that we don't get hit with the harsh winters like up north and we still get the opportunity to catch fish on the dry in winter. Blue-winged olives can be found throughout the south and is one of my favorite flies to have in my box. I'll admit, I lean a little more toward the nymph cycle of this insect than the adult cycle, but I'll still keep a stable of these in my box. My favorite part is the parachute because I can no longer pick up those subtle sips particularly in the ripple water. Be sure to add this to your arsenal.

If you haven't looked at the website lately, check it out. It is up to date and packed full of new information. Check us out. It's where we post all of our information and updates about chapter meetings, projects, fishing outings and any other items pertaining to Foothills.

Also, for even more up to date information, check out our Facebook page. Our Facebook page editor, Ted Jones, does an excellent job at adding new information almost every day. Be sure to "Like" it and share with your friends.

Thank you for your interest in the Georgia Foothill Chapter of Trout Unlimited. We are always looking for new members from the area to join us, so please tell a friend and have them join us at our next meeting.