What Uncle Jesse said! lol This is a great thread, shame Betty can’t put in her 2 cents worth. 
While I do relish being called a lad once more, that just supports the following. It seems we are getting down to the roots of what really brought the South down those many years ago. Not only are southerners delusional that the Great Smoky Mountains are mountains, let alone, great, now the delusional episodes are extending to fish that they brag up because they are not fortunate enough to have an abundance of trout. You just can’t sustain sanity after being that delusional for that long.
I’m prayin’ for you, Uncle Jesse, I’m prayin’ for you!
I hear of lots of southerners coming west to fish for trout but don’t remember hearing of anyone going south to fish for 'gills.
What about Dave Whitlock? Didn’t he move from Colorado to Arkansas to be nearer good warm water fishing? (I believe he now lives in Oklahoma.) Ok, you’re right that’s more east than south. 
Hey Uncle Jesse, You are an older and no doubt wiser man than I am. How long will it take our northern friends brains to thaw out? I figured they’d be thawed by mid July, but they still don’t think we have Great Mountains or fish?!? Will they be thawed by August? lol
Seriously though, I’m glad Betty is ok, can’t wait to hear her fish tales.
We protect our best 'gill waters by hiring rough-looking guys to sit in decrepit shacks and play banjos. It is a ploy which has worked very well, thus far, although Jack Hise did move down here from Evarts, MI (banks of the Muskegon River, a trout stream) a couple of years ago. One fishing trip and he was down here like a shot.
But that’s ok, Kevin. You probably think burgers on the grill = BBQ. We understand and hurt for you.
Ed
Ed, There go those delusions again. There isn’t much I can’t cook over an open fire and as long as it doesn’t fall through the grill, I can cook it there, too. I can boil water without a pot, cook an egg without a pan, light a fire without a match, and make a mattress with a knife from a pine tree.
When Hank Jr. wrote that song about Country Boys, he was writing about me.
We cannot be held responsible for your shortcomings and your lack of appreciation of the finer things in life. While there are a few states in the Deep South that do not have trout, we manage to get by with record setting bluegills, shellcrackers, crappie, largemouth and smallmouth bass. OH, I forgot the world record Brown Trout was caught in a southern state, Arkansas. Only if you live in Florida do you have to travel more than one state to trout fish and if you are unfortunate enough to live in Florida you just have to get by one warm water species plus snook, tarpon, etc.
Yes your big bare brown rocky mountains are higher than our green, lust, eastern mountains. You can’t learn to play a banjo or make shine if you have to hold on to a rock to keep from falling off the edge of the world. What brought us down in the earlier unpleasantness was Sherman broke our skillets and we had to resort back to grilling again. We do love to come out west in the summer when it’s only in the 90’s and the humidity is below 50%. Ya’ll come on down, stop in Memphis and have some real BBQ, drop down in NW Mississippi and catch some pound bluegill, or whatever else gets in the oxbow down there, the Mississippi River restocks it almost every spring. Big smallmouth in NW Alabama on the Tennessee River; spotted bass in North Central Alabama in Smith Lake. Darn, I just don’t know how I existed until I moved to Georgia where they have trout.
Thank you for the prayers, with my age and bank account, I need all the help I can get.
[QUOTE=kbproctor;377177]Ed, There go those delusions again. There isn’t much I can’t cook over an open fire and as long as it doesn’t fall through the grill, I can cook it there, too. I can boil water without a pot, cook an egg without a pan, light a fire without a match, and make a mattress with a knife from a pine tree.
Unfortunately, none of that sounds like BBQ either, so I’m afraid Ed’s point still stands. Though that is a mighty fine skill set and one to be proud of.
Burgers on the grill are burgers on the grill. Tasty, but not really BBQ.
If your definition of BBQ is to drown it in sauce and burn it in a smoker, then I don’t know how to do that.
Too much of what folks are trying to push off as BBQ is smoked. I guess they get away with it because it is slow cooked over fire of some sort. To me, a pit roasted pig is BBQ. A half a steer turned slowly over a bed of coals all day is BBQ. A rack or two of ribs slow cooked on the grill is BBQ.
Now give me a couple of trout, caught a few minutes ago, a little lemon juice if it’s available, some wild onion, (picked minutes before cooking, of course), a nice bed of coals, and I will eat like a king. That ain’t BBQ, either, but mighty tasty.
My friend we have a point of agreement, BBQ has nothing to do with sauce, good meat, select hardwood, a low fire with lot of smoke and time. Now I prefer pork for mine, I have had some beef in Texas that wasn’t bad, chicken is great. I have yet to be convinced about Kentucky goat BBQ. The best places in Memphis use a dry rub of spices which I prefer for additional flavor. BBQ as described by a former colleague from NC is properly prepared by building an altar from select hickory, killing a flawless young pigs and placing it on the atlar and lightning comes from heaven and lights the fire. I think they collect the resultant charcoal and ship it to Lynchburg for further use.
Grilled trout is good, just my personal preference is a crappie filet rolled in cornmeal and fried golden brown, my sister in law in north Mississippi does it better than anyone I know and makes a hushpuppie with fresh tomatoes in them that are the best I have ever had. She’s an Illinois yankee by birth but has been naturalized. Now there is a restaurant in north Georgia that prepares a pecan crusted trout that makes it worth going up there.
Have a great weekend, I think a saw a message where you were leaving on short notice to try and get in a little fishing. I hope you have so much success you get a sore arm. I have never met Betty personally, but I think she would approve of a lively discussion with her name in the title box.
She will probably be disappointed that we didn’t pick on her more.
I’ve been thinking of this spot I’m headed to tomorrow for a while now. Not too many trees to feed flies to, every kind of trout you can ask for except golden, and most certainly cooler than the 101* that is predicted for down here tomorrow. Plus the fact that my wife is doing alterations on a wedding dress and a couple of bridesmaids dresses tomorrow so the house will be filled with a gaggle of wimminz. I’m going out of self preservation even if I can’t scare anyone up to go with me. :lol:
It just dawned on me that unless they flew, Betty had to go through town to get where she is at and didn’t even say hi!
That is some beautiful country out there. I do confess to liking to try to fool those western fish, I actually caught my largest trout south of you up on the Mogollon Rim, where Gemrod lives. Ft. Apachee Reservation has some good fishing as well as the National Forest lakes, nice in cool in the summer.
MN & WI are places I would like to stop for smallmouth and toothy fish. There’s a baby tarpon in a golf water hazard in Florida that played with me and my spinning rod several years ago, I want to play with him on my 5/6 wt. There I go dreaming again. Have fun this weekend, I will likely go float my little 3/4 miles section of the Hooch and enjoy the 50 deg. water and play with a few small trout.
I slipped out to the local stream this morning and caught bluegills on soft hackles! best of both worlds!
Kevin, in that case it is with great joy that I acknoledge my error w/ regards BBQ. We still need to work on your “appreciation of bream” skills.
Ed
Legally and Culturally to be BBQ it must be cooked or a long time over low heat and lose at least 1/4 of its weight as a result. Sauce does not BBQ make. Good sauce makes it taste better. Bad sauce is a result of a poor cook &/or an attempt to cover up a poor piece of meat. Having said that, Dancing Pigs BBQ sauce is as complex and subtle as a good wine.
Ed
P.S. since we haven’t talked about Betty enough, who wants to speculate on whether her current coif is Mamie Eisenhower or Cousin Itt? (or both!)
Can’t argue with you on what real BBQ is. I prefer pork myself, but have been to a couple of shindigs in Wyoming where they did a half a beef that was quite yummy. The sauce didn’t give much flavor at all. Mostly glazed and sealed the juices in. I’ve been to one where they did a Mule Deer, too. That was good!
Wasn’t it Quivira Kid that was saying that Betty was very familiar with both of those hairstyles? :shock:
I’ve never caught one big enough to eat, let alone eaten one. Never caught a bass, large or small. I have been fishing for, catching, and eating trout in Colorado and Wyoming since I could hold a pole. When I was a boy, my Dad (also my Scoutmaster) would take the troop on survival campouts. You took nothing with you other than what you might have for a day hike. My hiking stave is a survival kit in itself. Under the parachute cord grip, is 3 or 4 hooks with 15-20 feet of mono on them. More than once I have caught trout on one of those, then proceeded to cook it up with whatever was handy for condiments. I packed one with wild onion and wild asparagus, lashed it to a stick and cooked it over the fire like a weenie. That was about the best tasting meal I think I ever had. :lol: