Dwayne Hickey

Dwayne Hickey is an In The Spread instructor and one of the most knowledgeable southern muskie anglers in the country. Based in McMinnville, Tennessee, he knows the Collins River intimately, from its weed beds and deep holes to how post-spawn muskies position and feed. He is also a lifelong catfisherman who runs jugs, trot lines, and limb lines for channel cats, blues, and flatheads. In his In The Spread videos, Hickey teaches Collins River post-spawn muskie tactics, reading water movement, and turning a follow into a hookup.

Instructor's videos

Most people picture muskie fishing as a cold-weather northern pursuit, ice-out lakes in Wisconsin and Minnesota. Dwayne Hickey has spent his life proving the fish can be hunted just as seriously in the warm rivers of the south. Based in McMinnville, Tennessee, Hickey is one of the most knowledgeable southern muskie anglers there is, and the Collins River in middle Tennessee is his home water.

Calling him a river rat is a compliment where he comes from. Hickey knows the Collins the way most anglers wish they knew any single piece of water: every weed bed, deep hole, downed tree, and hard-bottomed stretch, and how muskies use each of them to feed and rest through the season. He reads the water movement off the dam releases that shape the river, tracks how post-spawn fish transition from spawning areas to feeding zones along banks and creek mouths, and understands the follow, that heart-stopping moment when a big fish trails a lure to the boat, better than almost anyone. His range extends to the Rocky River, the Caney Fork, and the Calfkiller on Great Falls Lake, and across a long list of species that includes walleye, bass, crappie, striper, and trout.

He is also a serious catfisherman. Hickey has run jugs, trot lines, and limb lines across southern lakes and rivers for decades, targeting channel cats, blues, and flatheads, and the methods hold up wherever those fish swim.

What comes through in everything Hickey teaches is respect for the resource. He is vocal about giving southern muskies a break when summer water gets too warm, and he fishes and teaches with the fish's survival in mind.

In his In The Spread videos, Hickey breaks down post-spawn muskie fishing on the Collins River: where recovering fish position, how water movement changes their behavior, and how to turn a follow into a fish. Learn southern muskie from him and you are learning it from the water itself.