Trouble in Coburn

Last week I looked at all the USGS sites and found that Penns was in the best shape, Spring and Bald Eagle were both too high to support a decent Trico spinner fall- hell the trout could not take them that fast as they would float by them! As one again cleaning the parking area at the walk over bridge below Coburn I met a fellow from Manitoba, Canada that has a summer cabin on Big Fishing Creek who had his dog over on Penns for a long walk an swim, talk about a long drive for a summer vacation- wow. Once again I had to clean the parking lot, just full of crap and one pile had nothing but sun tan lotion bottles on it (4 to be exact) as I was getting ready to fish one of the local fellows drove down and showed me more of his pictures and tell me about the 70 year old from Milheim that has long white hair and his habit of coming down at 5-6 AM and fishing minnows and taking every trout he catches home, some time eating them or selling them to the Amish, the fellow also told me that he and another guy called the PA Fish Comm. and got no where, heck it took them 4 days to call them back and the Waterways office told him that he was to busy to come over and take a look- what the hell ever happened to the old days when a poacher would be a target of an field trip, I guess a few trout are not that important any more,maybe the locals should teach the fellow a lesson on driving a truck that has holes in the tires or something else that will make him think twice before he does this crap again but these types of guys never change till they die or become to old to do their thing. If you are there in the early morning and see this guy fishing minnows and in the act of keeping fish do confront him, this crap has to stop.
  Tried to fish this Wed but it again rained like hell for most of the morning, my advice buy an ark.

Time for Trico's and Caddis

If it ever stops raining maybe we can fish without fearing for our lives because of the lighting or the fast rising waters. This week it looks as if we can get a chance to fish one of the best time in the entire year the first two or three weeks of the Trico hatch and spinner fall, I focus on spinners and very seldom even fish a dun but before the fish get spooky after getting pounded by guys who can't cast a shit or don't know how to get a good drift make the fish ultra picky- go now. As on the Missouri River make sure your first cast is the best one, across and slightly downstream is the best presentation. I use #24 or a #26 (if the fish are picky) poly wing black or dark olive spinner with the barbs pinched down. After a good hour of spinner time, it will be about the time the #16 tan caddis start to make their appearance, do not over look these, at this time of year the trout feed on them very well, if your on Penns in the morning look for spent caddis in the slicks or back eddies then as the morning fades look for the adults to emerge just fluttering over the waters surface, trout love them.
  If I'm fishing Spring or Bald Eagle and it gets to be noon, I have lunch then look for a shady section to fish a #12 black foam beetle or it it's Penns a #16 Black ant or a nice fat hopper pattern! Nice easy slow fishing and your home early- just do it. I was surprised as to how good Penns is holding up and how it did not get blown out at Coburn and below Weikert, not like Spring and Bald Eagle and not to mention Big Fishing Creek they all are suffering from excessive water but hey normally we don't have any this time of year!

Water water everywhere!

As I write this on the 4th of July we are blessed or cursed with a ton of water, no fishing for a few weeks will do the trout well. The other week I was to help the Big Brother & Sisters of Center County with a fish out at the Federal Hatchery in Lamar but due to a violent thunderstorm it was cancelled unit July 7th (no worry about high water all the fish are in a raceway), I drove back to State College to fish the afternoon. I have know Steve S. at Fly Fisher's Paradise for more than 40 years and always value our conversations, this time he was in a bad mood because of guys fishing Penns with the higher water temp's, ok we might do that but most of us stop fishing Penns in July & August because of low water and high temp's, ok that was solved. Steve also was adamant about anglers not using big tandem streamers for trout, might a new book by Geo. Daniel have something to do with this? Steve also once again told me to use wet black ants and this has not been the first time he has told me this, he even said it works well on Penns, ok I gave it a try on Spring that afternoon and it did work very well, I used a #16 black epoxy ant under a NZ wool indicator with "2" very small shot to get it down, not bad to cast and the trout ate it, next time your out give it a try! I have not used any streamers with tandem hooks and really do not know if it really hurts the fish as Steve thinks it does, all my streamers are single hooks and I am now just starting to do some tube and intruder style streamers for later in the year when I hunt for bigger browns in Bald Eagle!
  Until the water goes down read or tie flies and give the trout a good rest because on Penns they really need it, if you see the amount of guys that fish below Cherry Run in the last 2 months you will understand why they need a rest period- where the hell do they all come from "Hoffman's cabin"?