Hello everyone, 

I was hoping to get some tips on an area that I'm not very familiar with. I posted on here several years ago right before I moved to South Carolina for college to get some tips about collecting in the state. Since then, I have gotten familiar with a lot of good collecting spots in the state but had some questions about an area that I'm not yet familiar with. I currently live in upstate SC and will be traveling to Asheville in mid-March to do some trout fishing. Since I'll have to buy a North Carolina fishing license to do so, I wanted to see if anyone knew of any good locations for collecting darters or shiners that time of year. In particular, I'd really like to find some warpaint shiners and redline darters. I'll be staying right in the city, so locations that aren't far from downtown would be ideal but am open to other suggestions. I would have liked to explore the area for myself but I'll likely only have one day to spend time collecting so having some locations to focus my search would be great. I have a dip net and a seine at my disposal to collect with. I  appreciate any help I can get. 

South Toe River in Micaville, NC (if you consider hour and a half close)

If I have time to get out there I will definitely check it out. Does anyone know any locations that are closer to the city or on the way from SC just in case I run out of time to get to that location?

I did a couple of research projects in the Pigeon River and streams in its watershed all over Haywood County (the county just west of Asheville) and a little bit of Buncombe County (but mostly limited to Pisgah National Forest lands).  I know it's not near downtown, but it's not not a bad drive.  Sadly I don't remember most of the tributary streams sites - it was about 13 years ago.  But a few snorkel sites on the Pigeon mainstem were memorable (mostly on public access like roadside parks or bridge crossings in Canton and Clyde).

Redlines are pretty common up there and you can find them in the riffles or swift runs with cobble substrates in small streams to large rivers. However, in my experience, warpaints are more easily found in "bigger" waters.  I'm not going to say you won't find them in a 6-ft wide stream, but I tend to see them in greater numbers in streams with larger contributing watersheds.  If you have some helpful hands, I think that you, 2 others, and a seine could have some luck.

I caught redline and gilt darters in the French Broad R at Carrier Park many years ago, about 2 mi SW of downtown.  It's a big river so you'll need low water flow to wade in it, which may not happen in March.  If water is too high, try small tributaries at the lowermost bridge closest to where they join a bigger stream.  Seining is NOT allowed in designated trout waters, so check the NCWRC trout maps.

I appreciate everyone's help. Hopefully I'll have time to try as many of these locations as possible. I'll be heading up there in about two weeks and will try to take pictures of anything I am able to catch to share on here.