Richard Formato

Richard Formato is an avid catch-and-release fly-fisherman from Wytheville, Va. When not on the water, he operates a small business there. Formato loves to fly-fish in his native Southwest Virginia because of the great water and wonderful people. He also loves to fish the flats and shallows of the Gulf of Mexico and Atlantic whenever work and weather permit. He is on the Department of Conservation and Recreation's board of directors and is a trustee of the Shenandoah National Forest and Skyline Drive.

Recent columns

• What about Bob?
• Notes from the Charlotte Fly Show
• A chance meeting
• A wish for Jack

• Column archive
• Talk fly-fishing

The color brown does not conjure up visions of beauty. Brown, as a color, is well … brown.

It is nondescript. Brown is the color of a shoe loafer. It is the cousin of beige. You don’t buy a brown sports car.

When I first started fishing and was told a stream had brown trout, I thought, “How about rainbows?”

Who doesn’t like a rainbow? Rainbows have all the colors, and the rainbow trout is a pretty fish, if you have never seen a wild brown.

Plainly stated, wild brown trout are a stunning, “jaw-dropping-ingly” beautiful fish. I caught one of these wild bruisers Tuesday. It was incredible to behold and a gas to catch.

Wild brown trout are flecked with red and purple halos, a banana-colored underbelly and an olive back. Sharp choppers fill its long mouth.

Brown trout are bad boys, too. They are the predators, nocturnal, and they get big…. real big.

Just ask Mike Perkins, who in 1990, caught the state record brown trout on the south fork of The Holston River at 14 lbs., 2 ounces.

Browns eat the normal trout diet, if you consider small birds normal. It is fact that, in addition to bugs and bait fish, brown trout can and will eat hatchlings if they have the chance.

Browns are not native to the United States. They were transplanted from Europe and Asia, but they are now found throughout the country, from the western states to the tailwaters of Georgia, where they reign in the Chattahoochee River near downtown Atlanta.

I have found populations in almost every wild trout stream in Southwest Virginia, and reeling in a brown is considered a premier catch wherever you are.

Catching and releasing a brown has a cache the rainbow doesn’t possess.

Catching brook trout are wonderful, but wild even wild brooks don’t hold the same allure of the brown. It seems unreal that you can catch a 20-inch brown in three inches of water from a narrow mountain stream. That is what fly-fishing is all about.

A few weeks ago, I was alone on Barbour’s Creek, and was having one of those days that started off badly and was getting worse.

My first few casts got hung up in the trees. I tied on new flies, and promptly launched my next back cast into a bush. Frustrated, I yanked my fly and broke off my leader, and lost my fly again.

Fighting glare and the cruelty of gin clear water, I told myself, “10 more minutes, and if I don’t catch anything, I am bailing for the house.”

I sloshed up a waterfall, and was looking for a path out to the road, eventually to the interstate, when I saw a small rise.

To heck with it, I looked in my box and pulled out the biggest stimulator I could find, and stood quietly, seeing if my little ripple would reappear.

Still disgusted with my previous incompetence, I wasn’t really that excited.

I was still heading for the barn, but one more cast wouldn’t hurt.

Now, the sun was low, the glare was gone, the temperature was falling, and I could see some rises, wakes and shadows.

It reminded me of fishing tailing reds in Sarasota Bay at dusk.

Whatever fish were in this nice flat run, they were frisky, but based on the kind of day I was having, I would not have been surprised to yank out a nice horny head.

I looked back and took a few false casts, then shot that stimulator upstream. Right on delivery, I had a take, but I was too slow on the rod tip to land the fish.

Not on the second shot, though.

The fish sipped the stimulator and started toward me, then ran up stream, and bent my rod in half, before I put him on the reel to get in him in and off as quickly as possible.

No matter what size you catch, you have to be impressed with the excellence of the brown trout.

Casting again, I caught a big brown that I measured from my cork handle to the first eye on my rod.

In that one run, I snared five big browns and one very big rainbow that seemed out of place.

That was enough for me. I broke it down, and headed back home.

The best streams for browns are the Smith River, The Jackson, Mossy Creek and the Tailwaters of the Holston, which have the fastest hitting fish I have ever seen.

For the record, they are not brown. They are amber golden. They are majestic, colorful, and perfectly camouflaged to a clear river bottom.

Anglers will travel the entire world to catch brown trout: Chile, Russia, New Zealand …Virginia.

We are so fortunate to have these brilliant trout in our fisheries.

When you catch a trout, it is always great… but there is nothing, nothing like being in a stream, landing a fish, and yelling out to your buddy, “Hey, It’s a brown!”