May 20, 2015 – The Brodhead Creek – A Little Redemption/Revenge Served Cold?

The Brodhead Creek at dawn.

I had the day off today, but in planning where to go fishing, I had to take care in selecting a stream with some water.  After weeks of unseasonably hot weather, it was going to be chilly, with highs only in the low 60s, so I had that going for me.  But we have had close to zero rain in eastern Pennsylvania despite days of clouds and humidity this month, and with this kind of cold front come the inevitable winds.  I had narrowed things down to the Lehigh or the mighty Brodhead.  The only other option was to venture to the shore, but with the sun coming up before 6 AM now, and none of my surf stuff really ready to go, that sounded too much like work.  The Brodhead it would be.

Morning stats.

The Brodhead has been sort of a second home stream to me for the last couple of decades.  From misspent days at ESU to many NEPA opening days (at one time known simply as opening day), I know it well, and fish it in all kinds of conditions in all seasons.  It has adult stockies, fingerlings every couple of years, wild fish, and many, many holdovers that survive the summer and winter in its deep, deep holes.  Those deep holes, even in low water, also factored into my decision to head there this morning.  To give you an idea of how low the streams are, the Brodhead usually flows at about 150 to 140 cubic feet per second this time of year, but it was flowing about 45 today.  The creek is usually treacherous to wade with slippery round rocks, actual tumbling freestones, steep banks, and the aforementioned deep, swift holes.  I have heard many stories of plunges and close calls, and I have had my own.  Sharpies carry a wading staff.  When I was young, I used to scoff naively at old timers with long floating nets that did double duty.  I once had to go out and rescue my dad because he was rightfully afraid to move a foothold for fear of going end over end.  So, basically, 45 cfs flow gives you options to wade safely and gain access to spots (and fish) otherwise very tough to access.  It’s not often you can say that a trout stream fishes better in low water, but that is the case here.

Enough history, and on to fishing: I beat the summer roadwork crews and made awesome time to the Poconos, arriving at about dawn.  After dressing (or under-dressing, as I was quite cold until at least 11 AM, even sitting in the car with the heat on between spots) I was on the water by 6 AM and making my way down to a favorite spot a short but adventurous hike below the stocked section.  This totally unpressured stretch holds plenty of fish, both wild and holdovers who have migrated downstream, and it can be a handful to wade and fish.  The water near the banks often drops to 4 or 5 feet, and the gorge is strewn with large boulders and rugged outcroppings.  In other words, it is a fun, physical challenge on which to ply one’s angling craft.  I once caught a wild brown trout here that was close to 28 inches long on a Rapala CD 3 plug (and have not one picture to prove it, either, as is sometimes the case), so that is always on my mind when approaching this area too. 

I got one pretty rainbow high stick nymphing a fast run, but the morning started out slow and cold.  I think the temp was dropping not rising as it got later.  It was already getting windy by 7 AM, with strong gusts once in while that even made casting a 4 wt line tough at times, so when some caddis started dancing around and trout started responding all around me, I decided to swing wet flies in tandem instead of dry fly fishing.  I would high stick upstream, letting a tungsten beadhead and a couple shot get the flies deep enough, and then fish out the swinging soft hackle hares ear for the remainder of the drift, most hits coming as the dropper "emerged" near the end of the swing.  

Pretty fish.  Note the intact adipose fin: stocked bow gone rogue or a stocked fingerling who made a long, long journey.

Selfie with another wildish rainbow.

A good trip isn’t complete without a heartbreaking missed fish, and I had one of those shortly after changing tactics.  I broke off a monster wild brown!  When you swing a fly, you are fishing a tight line, so it is easier to be a little too manly with the hookset.  It is great to feel the jolt of a fish hitting, but you have to be gentle when you have no slack to take up.  Well, I got a monster jolt at the end of the line, raised the rod, and PING, no fish and no soft hackle.  How do I know it was monster, you ask?  Well, as if to tease me, the fish decided to jump after he got off, and then jump no less than 3 more times, I assume trying to rid himself of my size 14 hares ear.  He was a big brown trout, with the pale, brown and silver colorization of the wild ones in this creek.  I shook it off and retied a new dropper on with heavier tippet and went back at it.  The technique yielded two more pretty bows, all silver with nice fins, even healthy adipose.  These two fish were like rockets, running all over the place, going skyward multiple times.  I was having so much fun I set the timer for a selfie…

After a fishless and cold 30 minutes or so, I hiked it up to the stocked section to a hole we often fish on opening day each year (see skunk link Opening Day) which is on a big, deep bend.  This was a redemption visit to set things right and realign after a whooping on opening day 2015.  I nymphed a handful out of the deep hole and then moved up to the fast, shallow water above to try swinging wets again.  Wow, was that the right call!  I landed a bunch more acrobatic, healthy fish doing this, and missed a few too on the tight line.  Fish are far easier to hook when you are behind or beside them, not when they are downstream from you grabbing a fly on a straightened leader.  But that jolt in the line is worth the effort and the missed fish or three.

Swinging the soft hackle in a shallow, braided run.

Soft hackle pheasant tail did the trick too.

A couple got hold of the caddis beadhead too, mostly upstream as I high sticked it to get down deep.

It was still windy and cloudy and cold, so I took a break to sit in the Subaru with the heat on.  After warming up, I decided to drive to another favorite spot on the creek.  This particular hole is pretty unique.  Because of the literal freestones in this particular area, the path of the creek will take detours and unexpected bends, often after major storms.  I know this is a sign of a stream that needs love and a better way to control regional runoff, but it does make for some interesting features sometimes.  For the last few years, the creek takes a nearly 80 degree bend here and drops quickly toward the opposite bank before turning back downhill.  Fish line up in the eddies the plunging water forms and hide in the deep, oxygen-rich hole all year long.

A fun, unique hole: riffles perpendicular to the bank.

With low water, the fish were tight to the fast riffles and didn’t hesitate a second before taking the nymph or the dropper (or in the case of a couple tail-hooked and foul hooked fish—both).  I completed the trout trifecta here with a couple brook trout, which I know were stocked last fall because my buddy Kenny and I banged them up one day in late 2014.

Some shoulders to complete the trout trifecta.

Oh, yeah.  I actually used a net today.

At one point, the dropper hooked the tale of a decent rainbow, and he forced me to chase him downstream since he had the advantage of not being turn-able (nothing stronger than tail hooked fish!).  As a result, I involuntarily moved down to another nice hole, so I decided to stay and attempt to nymph it with an indicator and a green weenie.  I landed one or two this way, as the weather began to improve.

Green weenie worked too.

It was getting close to 1 PM and my self-imposed quitting time when the cold front passed, the sun came out, and the wind died down a bit.  I was content to quit with an even 20 fish for the day if my count was right (which it often isn’t) until a feisty fish tried to eat my indicator.  I am no dummy.  I tied on big caddis and decided to target the risers that the wind prevented me from targeting earlier in the day.  I landed three more pretty browns this way, one that was getting some nice color on his cheeks despite once being a stockie.  I can’t think of a better way to end a good fishing day than a few violent surface takes on a size 12 or 14 elk hair caddis.

Finished the day with some dry fly success.

I was on the road before 2 PM, finally warm and definitely happy after a successful day.  After a few bad opening days in a row at the mighty Brodhead, today was a good reminder of why it remains one of my favorite places to fish.

Last one of the day.  This brown nearly swallowed the elk hair caddis.

May 11, 2015 – Tobyhanna Creek DHALO section – Another Silly One

Brook trout and more brook trout.

Today I visited a Delayed Harvest Artificial Lures Only section of Tobyhanna Creek in the Poconos with a young lad of 46 named Kenny. I had fished the creek a couple times in the past, probably 20 years ago, but the reason I targeted it today was because it was stocked late last week, and it doesn’t usually get a lot of pressure as a DHALO on State Game Lands (SGL).  The only other person we saw all morning, until a truck pulled in as we were leaving, was a very lazy turkey hunter, who was set up not 50 yards from the parking lot.  If all went well, it would be a catching not a fishing day, and we all deserve one of those once in a while. 

Notice: we dumped a lot of fish here!

The morning started out a little rough.  As we were getting close to our destination, I handed Ken my phone and asked him to put in Route 423 in Coolbaugh, PA, which runs parallel to the SGL and the creek.  Darn knock-off Siri in Google Maps auto-filled an address on Coolbaugh Road outside of Stroudsburg.  None the wiser, I let the voice lead us astray.  Granted, it was a nice house and even sat across the street from Delaware State Forrest or game lands, but it was not where we wanted to be.  Eventually we got there, though, and the plan paid off.  I should have charged my young protégé a guiding fee because I am pretty sure he’s never caught so many trout in his life!  At a couple points in the day, he was giggling to himself, I swear.

Ken all thumbs up in blaze orange.  Can't be too careful with turkey hunters hunting 50 yards from the road..

Not just a pretty face.

We gave the turkey hunter who was afraid to get too far from his car some space and jumped into the creek below the DHALO section.  The water was low and reading nearly 65 degrees, while the air temp was close to 75 and humid, even at 7:30 AM.  Ken and I both started nymphing under an indicator, and it didn’t take long for Ken to get on the board.  I left him to it and headed upstream to a hole spilling out of a beaver dam.  I quickly caught two on a caddis nymph below the dam and then hopped over to fish the deep hole on the other side.  By the time I waved Ken up to share the honey hole, I had 4 or 5 more to hand.  That was about where I lost count, as it was just steady fish catching for at least 3 more hours. 

Ken let me catch at least 25, maybe more.

Any nymph would do: caddis, hares ear, prince  This one hit the hares ear above the dropper.

We just picked fish at a steady pace, all decent-sized,  most freshly stocked brook trout, in a long deep hole like it was the kiddie trout pool at the sportsman show.  Around 9 AM or so, fish started rising, so I put on a caddis and got a few skating a big caddis across the surface.  I had half a dozen misses too, so it was a lot of fun.  I might have giggled at that point too.  Pretty much the only fish I caught that weren’t brookies were on the dry, which probably means the brooks were new to the scene.  I got two browns and a rainbow on the elk hair caddis and one brown in a deep hole under the bridge with a prince nymph.

A rainbow and a couple browns on the big caddis.  

It was hot, close to 90, and after exploring upstream and finding shallow water with little life, we needed a water break, so we hoofed it back to the parking lot.  After the Cliff Bar and beef jerky lunch of champions, I was hoping the dry fly action would make my afternoon even nuttier.  Ken decided to use his new spinning rod he made and some soft plastics, as if the morning wasn’t silly enough!  Needless to say, he slaughtered them.

Ken's very effective jig and soft plastics combo (and his new handmade rod).

The wind picked up with the high temps, like an August convection wind, so the dry fly bite never happened.  I got 2 more after lunch on the nymph and one while stripping a wooly bugger.  To give you an idea of how many fish we caught, Ken started to keep count while fishing the spinning rod, and as we quit, he had 19 from the same hole I called him up to in the morning.  He was sad that he didn’t get 20, but he did catch a little bass on a spinner, so I think he’s good.  It was well-worth the long trip, made longer with Google map detours, and I was in bed by 9 PM sleeping like a sunburned baby.

Pretty fish

Parting shot of one honey hole.

May 5, 2015 – A Leisurely Trip on the Wissy with my Dad

Postcard worthy?

I had the morning to play because I was working a late night and not going into the office until 1 or 2 PM, so I called my dad the day before to see if he wanted to get out.  I thought the PFBC had put fish in the creek on May 1st, so they would be set up or at least driven around by a weekend of pressure.  Not so.  As we would find out from the ridiculous number of trout dumped indiscriminately in unfishy spots (like over 2 feet of sand bottom, so they could become eagle feed), they were just put in the water the afternoon of May 4.  We had a fun, relaxing morning, but for me it was also a reminder of how ridiculous the put-and-take fishery is when you have to rely on volunteers (or, worse, no one at all) to do the stocking.

My dad started out throwing a Rapala CD 3 and ended up catching 4 rainbows at the first hole we fished, probably holdovers from the last stocking in mid-April.  I got 3 on nymphs in a couple holes that often hold fish into the summer (at least when it rains—another story altogether this spring; we need some badly).  

The reliable CD 3.

A couple on the caddis beadhead.

Fishing was tough with clear water and high sun, not to mention nearly 80 degrees.  We didn’t get started until after 9 AM.  Fish were hitting very short when they were hitting at all.  We fished a couple of my favorite holes and had early success but then couldn’t get any more to cooperate.  As we were moving down to the next favorite spot, I spied buckets of fish dumped in a shallow, flat stretch that would be 70 degrees in no time with the heat this week.  The fish were just scattering at shadows and chasing each other around like they were in an aquarium.  We each hooked one or two who were hidden in the shadow of an overhanging tree branch, but mostly we just watched and marveled at the ridiculousness.  We quickly moved onto the hole where we were originally headed and met another nice father/son team who pointed out the buckets of spooked trout in front of them in this hole too.  There were another fifty fish in this spot just chasing each other around.  My dad hooked one and landed a few sunnies.  I hooked half a dozen rock bass on a streamer before quitting (at least the rb's knew not to pass up a meal). 

A jigged hares ear worked on at least one.

The highlight was spending time with the old man on a weekday and seeing the Wissy eagle, possible eagles, again.  My pop even saw him or her eating a trout on the bank downstream from him (once again too far for my phone camera to capture).  The eagles will do well this week eating stockies out of 6 inches of water where they were indiscriminately dumped.  I will be checking water flow gauges in NEPA and planning my next move for Monday, probably giving the Wissy a rest until we get a couple days of steady rain or I decide to get my young son on a few fish.

May 3, 2015 – Huge Bucks County Wild Brown Trout

A gorgeous wild brown trout.

For a change of pace this morning, I got up at 4:30 AM and took a drive to a little tributary of the Delaware River that holds a reproducing population of wild brown trout.  Heading up Route 611 along the “Big D” always makes me happy.  My dad and I used to run the river for smallmouth and walleye in a Grumman square back canoe back when I was barely a teenager.  Today I decided to try a spot I have fished a few times before with limited success.  The fish I did catch in the past were gorgeous 8 to 10 inch wild brown trout, so I was not at all prepared for the two monster brownies I caught today.  I am not a religious man, but I gave an NFL-worthy two gun salute to the sky after landing both of these fish today, especially on a 3 weight rod and 6X tippet.  I am also not superstitious by nature, but I have shopped for a new landing net a few times this spring and haven’t pulled the trigger yet, mainly because the ones I like are close to 100 bucks for a friggin’ net, and yet I have landed a bunch of big trout this spring without having a net with me.  I know I need one, fish as big as the ones today, especially wild fish, need me to net them, but now I am afraid it will jinx me or something.

Today's choice: a Delaware River, limestone tributary.

I arrived around 6 am to the sun just coming up.  The first stretch I fished for a full hour with one hit, a swing and a miss on a little brown trout I saw flash before I even noticed that the indicator had paused in the current.  No early risers and I didn't even spook any in the shallow water.  That was it for all my driving and walking.  However, I had done a lot of research on access to this creek using Google Maps and the like since the last time I fished it, probably winter of 2013, so I thought I had found another place to park that wasn't posted and gave me access, after a little bushwhacking, to a good half mile or more of the creek as it ran through farmland with only a couple houses in sight.  I hoofed it back to the Subaru along a country road without meeting any guard dogs or goats, and drove a couple miles upstream to find this new spot.  The pull-off was not posted, which is nice, and it was not a bad walk, more like a steep slide, down to the water.  Some nice water greeted me, deep holes under an old footbridge or aqueduct, and a couple undercut banks guarded by tree roots. 

Deep water and signs of life at last.

I tied on a caddis dry with a pheasant tail dropper after I saw a splashing rise on the tail-out of a pool above me.  I stood and waited and he never showed again, so I moved down to the deeper hole and tied on a caddis nymph.  As I crept close to make a cast, I saw a good size trout suspended in the water column and feeding.  I made about 4 or 5 casts in this hole, keeping a low profile, thinking I was targeting this actively feeding 12 incher, which would have been a prize for this creek any other day.  At one point, my indicator slowed just slightly, maybe a rock, but I set the hook as any red-blooded angler would do.  Holy cow, I was off to the races with a huge brown trout.  All he wanted to do was get back into the deep water and under the riffles, and I could barely turn him with my light rod.  I just prayed I could get a good look at him.  I finally played him into the shallow water of the tail-out and got my hands under him.  He was probably 20 inches of beautiful wild brown.  I botched the one picture I took because all I could think was that I have to get this thing back in the water healthy, which I did, but a 30 dollar net would have helped—again.

Close to 20 blurry inches of wild brown trout.

I revived him and did a subdued touchdown dance as he moseyed back home, my middle-aged heart racing with the sheer surprise of seeing a fish like that, especially where I was, and then actually landing him.  I almost quit and went home on that high note, for a 10 inch trout would have been anticlimactic, but I had to investigate the next hole in sight downstream.

Couldn't quit when this one was the next hole in sight.

As I high-sticked my first cast through this great looking hole, my indicator stopped again.  I set the hook and had another big feisty brown on the line, this one trying to get under the tree roots across the creek from me.  The colors on this one were unreal.  After another touch and go battle, I glided this one into the shallows and brought him to hand.  Crazy, I tell you.  He was a good 16 inches or more based on the marks I use on my rod to estimate length.  This trout was so colorful that I gently put him down in the water and placed the rod down next to him.  This shot turned out, thank god, because it will likely be my wallpaper for some time.  After some deep breathing, I did quit fishing—how could it get better, seriously—and I started climbing out, doubly grateful for the hot streak I am having this spring.  I hope the net I buy this week doesn’t ruin it.

Another big, beautiful brown.