Watauga River

The big freestone that drains the west slope of the Unaka and Bald mountains and punches through the deepest gorge in the Southeast before it spills out at Erwin. Be honest about what the "Chucky" is: first a smallmouth river, second a whitewater river, and only in the cold months and only up top a trout river. From Chestoa and Erwin down it's rock gardens, ledges, and boulder pockets you work with a 6- or 7-weight and Clousers, crawfish patterns, and dawn poppers for river-wide smallmouth, big muskie in the slow lower reaches, and a seasonal put-and-take stocked-rainbow reach near the Erwin hatchery that warms out of trout tolerance by May.

The "SoHo" is the tailwater that put Tennessee trout on the map — cold, limestone-rich water from the base of South Holston Dam holding one of the densest wild brown trout populations in the East and a year-round sulphur hatch that makes for some of the most technical dry-fly fishing in the country. A single-generator dam and a re-oxygenating weir dam mean everything keys off the TVA generation schedule: wade the flats before the afternoon release, float when the water's up.

Nashville's trout river — a cold Army Corps bottom-release tailwater running out of Center Hill Dam and, above all, a midge factory. Center Hill is a hydro-peaking dam, and TVA reports its release on the Lake Info feed, so the whole trip revolves around the generation schedule: wade the gravel flats only on zero generation, float through one or two units. When the turbines spin up the river rises several feet in minutes, so check the release before you go and give it a couple hours to drain after they cut water.

The Clinch below Norris Dam is Tennessee's oldest trout tailwater and, on the right day, the best shot at a genuinely huge brown in the eastern half of the country — this is the river that gave up the 28-pound-12-ounce state record in 1988, and fish in the high-20s still turn up on TWRA electrofishing runs. Day to day it's a technical, gin-clear midge fishery: the anglers who catch the most are drifting a size-18-or-smaller midge larva or pupa on light tippet, with a 14–20-inch protected slot keeping the big browns in the system. Everything keys off the Norris generation schedule — wade the flats around Miller Island and the weir when the turbines are off, and get well clear before a one- or two-unit release turns 13 miles of tailwater into an unwadeable torrent.

A big, scenic TVA tailwater running through a forested gorge in the Cherokee National Forest near Reliance — and a river with a quirk. Apalachia Dam doesn't release into its own riverbed; it shunts the whole flow through an 11-mile mountain tunnel to the Apalachia Powerhouse, and the trout water starts there, at Big Bend. So the number that decides whether you wade, float, or stay home isn't a dam gate but how many generators are spinning, which is exactly what the TVA release reading reports. Cold tailrace temperatures keep stocked rainbows and wild browns fishing year-round, over what locals call the most diverse bug life of any Tennessee tailwater — spring grannom caddis blizzards, a famous May-into-summer sulphur show, and big summer Isonychia.

Three rivers under one name on the Tennessee side of the Smokies — the West Prong and Greenbrier (Middle Prong) tumble down out of the national park as wild-trout freestone pocket water with native brook trout up high, then the same water rolls into Gatlinburg's stocked town reach and out to a warm lowland mainstem. Wild specks and a family stocked stream inside fifteen road minutes of each other.

The Smokies' signature roadside freestone — the East Prong drops off the high country below Clingmans Dome, runs a boulder-choked gorge of plunge pools and pocket water past Elkmont and the Sinks, and hits the Townsend "Y" before leaving the park. One watershed stacks warm smallmouth and rock bass at the Y, wild rainbows through the gorge, the park's largest wild browns between Metcalf Bottoms and Elkmont, and native Southern Appalachian brook trout in the headwaters and upper prongs. Short-line, tight-quarters fishing on a 3- or 4-weight; April is the peak with overlapping Quill Gordon, Blue Quill, Hendrickson and caddis hatches.

Tennessee's biggest freestone trout stream, tumbling roughly twenty miles out of the North Carolina line down through the Cherokee National Forest to Tellico Plains. It has a split personality: the roadside lower river along Tellico River Road (FS 210) is put-and-take stocker water on a $3.50 Tellico-Citico daily permit, while the wild-trout heart is up in the delayed-harvest reach and the flies-and-lures-only tributaries — Bald River, North River, Citico Creek — that hold wild rainbows, surprisingly large wild browns, and native Southern Appalachian brook trout.