Brook Trout Monroe County - May 9 2013

I fished for some brookies on Thursday, May 9 2013 from around 1230-330 at Devils Hole Creek. The stream was absolutely loaded with brookies. Plunge pool after plunge pool produced brookies. I used wooly buggers and dries. Fly choice really didn't matter. I landed 40 or so and missed at least that many as well. If I ever want to catch 100 trout in a day, this would be the stream. Beautiful colors on these brookies. Nothing big but they all were feisty and aggressive when hitting the fly.

Lehigh River and unnamed brookie stream, Carbon County, May 3 2013

My day started off with turkey hunting. After an unsuccessful morning hunt, I strung up my fly pole and tied on a royal wulf. My first catch resulted in the below brookie.  Not even 2 minutes after the brookie, I heard a gobbler close range. I only  had half my camo on, no decoys set up, and my shotgun was 20 feet away! I crawled to my gun and backed up to the tree it was resting against. After I called once, the gobbler showed himself at 50 yards. I turned the safety off and waited. He got within 40 yards but wouldn't give me a clean shot with all the mountain laurel. Eventually he took a 90 degree turn and went out of range. I'm not sure why he didn't continue my way. Possibly, he saw the sun reflection off my fly pole as it was still leaning  against the tree by the stream.

Next I headed to the Lehigh River after a quick stop at the Evening Hatch fly shop. The Lehigh flows were perfect for wading at right around 350 cfs. I fished below Rockport in the Gorge. There were tons of caddis performing touch and go's on the water but no rises. I didn't see 1 mayfly while fishing from 11-4. Skies were clear and water temperature showed high 50's on the surface with an infrared thermometer.

I fished streamers 90% of the day. I had 3-4 fish roll up on my streamer but only 1 committed. I hooked in to a beautiful brown in some slower water with a #4 olive slumpbuster. The brown measured just under 18" and flopped out of my hand when measuring it so a picture wasn't an option. One of the few days I wish I carried a net with me. I saw numerous bikers on the Gorge trail but not one other fisherman! I ran out of drinking water at about 3 pm and knew I had a good hike back to the car so I stopped early. All in all, a good day minus my sunburn and the snake sunning himself on the rocks that scared the crap out of me!

 

 

Paradise Creek and Brodhead Creek (Analomink) - May 2nd 2013

Fished Paradise and BHC today from 1230-4 pm. I saw trout rising to naturals on Paradise as soon as my boots got wet. I believe they were little sally stoneflies around a size 14-16. I fished 1/2 the public section and then let an out-of-towner fish the rest since he doesn't have the opportunity to fish it as much as I do. I caught 2 browns and missed a couple of others. I used a yellow stimulator and an orangish sulphur parachute.

On my way home I scouted Cranberry Creek but I couldn't find very much public access. There were areas that weren't posted but that doesn't necessary mean "welcome". I then drove down to the Brodhead Creek near Analomink. This stretch of the BHC is so much nicer than in town. It has tons of boulders. It probably looks the way that the lower BHC use to look like before it was channelized. Gorgeous section! I mostly scouted but I did fish a little bit before I noticed my fly line was severely cracked. The crack was about 5 inches below the welded loop. It’s a mid range orvis fly line and on my 4 weight BBSII reel. It is less than a year old. I contacted the Evening Hatch, where I purchased it, and they're going to make me a new loop before I fish the Lehigh tomorrow and they recommended that I contact orvis directly to try to get new fly line. The guys at the Evening Hatch are great but I doubt I'll buy orvis fly line again. I guess that is why fly fishers always have a back up rod and reel when they're out.

Weather: low 70’s outside air temperature. Water temp was high 50’s. Sunny. No clouds.
Bugs: little yellow sallies, caddis, and a couple of sporadic mayflies.

 Paradise Brown

 

BHC near Analomink

Yellow Sally?

Cracked Orvis line

Pohopoco Creek, March 30 & 31 2013

March 30 - This was the nicest day we've had so far this spring. It was sunny and mid 50's. I fished the PO from 2-5 pm. There were hatches of BWO's, light colored caddis, and black stones. I noticed trout taking naturals as soon as I got to the stream. Majority of all trout were caught on a 16-18 Adams parachute. I landed roughly 8 and missed just as many.

March 31 - Easter Sunday was not as nice at the day earlier. It was overcast with temps in the low 50's. My 7' 3# had trouble casting dry flies since it was quite windy. I fished from noon-2pm. I missed a couple of hits on the dry and had a fair amount of nosed refusals. I scouted further down the stream and ended up tying on a green BH wooly bugger. I caught 1 small brown on the WB in a crazy deep hole. The current water levels are low and that hole was at least 6 foot deep. On my way back to the car, I stopped by an area close to the farmyard where I saw fish earlier. I tossed the WB and the 14-15" brown below practically came out of the water to hammer it. Beautiful brown!

 It's always good to have some small ones as well!

 

Pohopoco Creek

 

14-15" Easter surprise



Pohopoco Creek, Monroe County, PA - March 16 2013

I was lucky enough to fish a beautiful stretch of Pohopoco Creek today. Unfortunately, the outside air temperature was in the 30's and it started snowing halfway through my fishing but I was able to scout out a mile or so of private water. I was amazed on how deep some the sections were. This stream has it all, deep holes, riffles, slow water, bugs, and fairly easy casting.

I started fishing an Adams dry without luck and then moved to a black wooly bugger. I had a couple of small browns roll up on the WB but they wouldn't commit. The last 1/2 hour, I decided to nymph. I used a 16 BH pheasant tail only about 12 inches under my indicator. I had 1 brown hammer it after a couple of minutes in a deeper slow moving seam. The landed brown was on the small side but based on the characteristics of the stream, I'm guessing there are some 16 + inch browns in there. The headwaters of the Po (above Beltzville Lake) contain all wild trout. There is no stocking by the state. The fish that are in there now are very hardy considering the hot and dry summer we had last year. I didn't get a stream temperature today because my digital thermometer needs a new battery but I'd guess it was high 30's. It was overcast outside. No bug activity.

 



Paradise Creek - March 11, 2013

I fished Paradise Creek today in Paradise Township, Monroe County. This was the first time I fished this stream since I was previously unaware of any public access along this creek. The 1/2 - 1 mile stretch that I fished is right in between private fishing clubs.

I started fishing a black wooly bugger but I changed to a hi viz griffiths gnat after a couple of minutes. The water level was low and the WB was tough to fish, especially on my 3 weight. I landed a beautiful brown on my 6th cast. I landed 1 additional brown and missed another couple. The size of browns in Paradise seems larger than in Devils Hole, which is only a couple of miles away and feeds into Paradise.

The previous 2 days were in the 50's so I figured today would be a good day with possible hatches. Water temp was 46 degrees. Outside temp was high 40's and overcast. I saw little black stones and midges. I saw 2 trout rise to naturals as well which is pretty early considering this past weekend was our first warm stretch in months.

 1st brown caught

 

Nice stretch of Paradise Creek

Tom's Creek, Pike County, PA - Feb 2, 2013

I attended Tom Gilmore's seminar titled "Pocono Primer" at the Somerset Fly Fishing show last month. He mentioned Tom's Creek during his presentation. The nice sized wild browns, high bank scenery, and close proximately to my home made me want to immediately check this stream out. TC is a catch and release, artificial lures only creek. It's located in the Delaware National Forest near Bushkill. There is ample parking and well groomed trails that follow the creek.

I didn't expect to catch any fish (and I didn't) but I thought I'd throw a wooly bugger in some of the deeper slow pools. I took my dog so I didn't consider this a serious fishing trip as she constantly likes to chase my casts into the water I'm fishing.

Some of the things that really impressed me about this creek are:

1) There are several large deep pools. Huge boulders are throughout the stream that help form these pools.

2) Hardwoods and conifers make up the trees surrounding the creek which makes for easy casting. I fished with my 7' rod but I could easily use my 9' rod if I wanted to nymph next time I visit.

I tried spotting trout from the high banks but was unsuccessful mostly due to low light and high water conditions. I'll have to wait until the water warms a little bit to see if the trout biomass compares to the similar stream style of Devils Hole Creek. Both are somewhat remote mountain trout streams that hold wild browns or native brookies.

It was cold

Panoram where Tom's Creek enters the Delaware

 

 



Creek improvements?

Huge boulders/pools

 

Watching me fish

 

 

Did I mention it was cold?