A Sad Story

This past weekend I fished Friday (on Penns) Saturday with my grand daughter in State College and attended the Spring Creek Chapter of Trout Unlimited Banquet and Fund Raiser then fished Penns again Sunday, the Grannonm's were on in Coburn and it was not hard to find rising fish but you had to float it over them multiple times before they would take it but I did manage to take quite a few really nice browns on both dark and light #16 bubble back caddis. My granddaughter caught 9 fish before lunch at Mickey D's, then we fed the monster fish below the falls in Bellefonte before we finished the day at Sweet Frog for a treat, a day I think she will remember.
  While I was at the banquet I saw Greg Hoover who I have know and consider a good friend for over 38 years, we talked at length about Penns and Big Fishing Creek, I asked him what were his thoughts on the condition of BFC and he told me that in the past few years he has seen a steady decline in the water quality there. Greg told me that he has put in new substrate panels to access the insect populations and in past years they would be soon covered with caddis and mayfly nymphs but sad to say about all he gets on them now is midge larva and that in a red flag indicator of poor water quality along with a lot more sediment, he said it is a direct result of "the plain folks" farming practices! Ouch that really hurts especially because there is zero we can do to stop it, the use of chemicals is also playing a role in the water quality and insect populations, we need an orgization to step up and form a plan to help stop this from getting worse.
  Back to the fishing on Penns, did not see but a very few Hendrickson's all caddis and typicaly over by 1:30 - 2:00 PM. Did see a map of the deeded parcels below Coburn and low and behold none of the cabin owners above the bridge own any land from the edge of the road to the stream- amazing! All the no trespassing signs on the stream bank are a bluff, sad to see them but I guess it is a sign of the times. I need to fish below Cherry Run to see the full force of the Hendrickson's and a good spinner fall before the Grey Fox and March Brown start their march upstream but we need rain badly.

Go now young man or woman!

If you ever wanted to be in the thick of a Blue Quill, Quill Gordon (this is a once in 5 year affair) or a Hendrickson emergence, go this week and Monday would be the best day possible, cold damp weather helps to slow down the post emergence flight of the adults- easy picking for the trout. I have been told there are some little black stones around but have not seen many of them myself. I have not seen any spinners but that may be a case of not being in the right place at the right time. If you can make it, Penns and Big Fishing Creek would be your best bet, Spring has BWO's and does not see the big hatches. Be aware that some sections of the streams and other entire streams are off limits till this Saturday, Bald Eagle Creek is one of the them as is Penns below the C&R section, also be aware that on Saturday you are not allowed to start anywhere before the 8:00 AM time!

Early Day on Fishing Creek

I wanted to go to Big Fishing Creek the other day to introduce my lab puppy "Drake" to fishing just as I did my "Trico" 11 years ago, there is a spot where you can see an entire hole and riffle at the same time and can easly handle a new wild dog on a 30' lead- well almost! The day began very cold and that was not a problem, the flies were a bit late, little black caddis, Grannom's and a few (very) few Hendrickson's. Typical caddis emergence in the AM where you have to hit every fish as soon as you see it, no blind dead drift casting at this time. The swarm moves up the stream and as there becomes more and more of them the actual emergence peters out, time to sit down and have lunch and give the puppy a big chew bone to keep the bugger quite! A few Hendrickson's did do a float by and there were no takers at all. Just a typical very early season day on Big Fishing Creek, it is a stream that takes a while to warm up and get things moving, my guess is that if you are there today (Friday) you would see an entirely different emergence BUT remember caddis tend to emerge in the morning then gather on structure and do their mating swarm later in the day, at that time a down winged spent caddis will result in a lot of fish. For the caddis hatch I use black bodies bubble back caddis with CDC and deer hair for the adult and a bead head pupa pattern.
  Oh my "Drake" needs a lot of work before I can take him off his lead, he tends to be prey oriented and needs constant attention, our fault for treating like a baby.
 
Enjoy