Tiny Baetis mayflies are perhaps the most commonly encountered and imitated by anglers on all American trout streams due to their great abundance, widespread distribution, and trout-friendly emergence habits.
This one was surprisingly straightforward to identify. The lack of a sclerite at the base of the lateral hump narrows the field quite a bit, and the other options followed fairly obvious characteristics to Clostoeca, which only has one species, Clostoeca disjuncta.
Mlatimer on Jul 16, 2020July 16th, 2020, 2:07 am EDT
I was in the smokies fishing the headwaters of Lynn camp a couple weeks ago, and while I was standing admiring the landscape I happened to glance down at my rod only to find a blue quill esk fly had decided to rest on my rod handle. I snapped a couple pictures for identification since I’m not the most knowledgeable when it comes to specific insect varieties. I would really like to learn more on the entomology side of fly fishing and would like to know more about this guy. I also saw an adult yellow stonefly but it didn’t pose for pictures sadly. My best guess is blue quill but I could be way off, it seems a little on the small side.
Partsman on Jul 16, 2020July 16th, 2020, 11:03 am EDT
Mlatimer, I would agree with Taxon, bluequill. I would like to thank Jason, this is the best trout fishing, flyfishing website ever created! All of the folks here are so cool, Matt and Jonathon, and Martin are fishermen that I really take in to consideration for most of the conditions I get envoled with. And so many fine folks have great input from all over the country, this is just such a great learning website. Jason, thanks for all you have done here! And to all those that contribute photos, and the experts such as Taxon, thankyou!
Mike.