August 6, 2018 – Endless Mountains, Endless Rain, Limited Fish – North Branch Susquehanna River

A tough one.  Large for today.

I fished with Kenny and his brother in law, Stan (the mitches behind Fitt Premium Lures) on Chris Gorsuch’s 20-foot river jet today.  Kenny fishes with Chris, who runs Reel River Adventures, about monthly, and I have been penciled in to go a few times over the last year, but like my fluke trips with Ward, weather or water conditions have led to cancellations many times now.  As a matter of fact, Chris gave Kenny and Stan an out today, which in turn gave me an out, as the main body of the Susquehanna has been blown with high, muddy water for weeks, and the North Branch was falling but still very high and turbid.  Pair that with a heat advisory for 90+ degrees, humidity, and no wind, well, let’s just say that if not for the fact that I have fished so infrequently this summer and have not fished with Kenny in too long, I would have been the first to say, Let’s postpone, yo…

So hot, he took a seat, young Kenny.  Hat came with a free bowl of soup....

With four men on a 20-foot boat, it is arguably difficult to bring the amount of water needed to stay hydrated on a day like today; that is, without sinking the boat.  We did our best on the hydration and fishing fronts, but to say it was a tough day is an understatement.  We made it, though.  Stan even ate two tuna fish sandwiches that his wife packed out of love (or cruel revenge for some unknown slight, I am willing to bet) and was not on a river bank hunched over in abdominal distress.  Even for August, the size of the fish was truly disappointing, as the only ones consistently feeding were last year’s young of year, it seemed.  By 1 PM, we were testing our falsettos to the Best of the Bee Gees, just to lift our spirts enough to make it to the end of the eight hour tour and put up numbers Chris could even begin to sugarcoat on multiple social media platforms (the man has to eat).  Kenny and I have put up 80+ good fish in the dead of winter with Chris, so I still believe in his skills…

My first one in years...

If legal this time of year, we would have been more successful deer hunting or turkey hunting!  We spooked two sets of twin fawns as we pulled into the camp ground that serves as Gorsuch’s North Branch home base, and later on the river, we all watched a massive buck, roughly a 10-pointer, I swear, crash back up the bank after his warm, muddy drink midday.  A family of turkey trotted around the campground in the morning, and a couple eagles were also making a ruckus later in the morning, likely pissed that they have had no fresh fish filets in weeks and grown tired of picking on the quickly decomposing carcass of a deer who underestimated her swim earlier in the month.  Hard to tell in all the muddy water and buried structure, but the river itself looks beautiful and plenty productive on the right day. Surrounded by the Endless Mountains, with numerous small tributaries, likely holding trout, the river has a different character than the main stem, even the West Branch, with which I am just a little bit more familiar.  

Endless Mountains still in haze late in the afternoon.  We had two hours of fog in the morning.

Stan got on the board early with the best fish of the day, probably all of two or two and a half pounds, tossing a chatterbait, and in over-confidence we released it without a pic.  He also landed a good channel cat with the same lure shortly thereafter.  In the stained water, our anticipation for a large bass nearly held until Chris slipped the net under the whiskered interloper.  After that, we caught plenty of fish, but nothing of note besides my first walleye in many years, and even that was small, albeit respectable for this particular river, I suppose.  The pitch counter surpassed 50 fish for the three fisherman aboard, but on a good day, I doubt the captain would have clicked for an 8 inch smallmouth, dig?  Chris is a good captain and good company, however, and he worked hard, covering a lot of spots that should have produced.  Ambush spots, especially, came up empty, so falling water had fish on the move or hunkered in unpredictable spots, perhaps beginning to abandon the refuges they sought in the many spikes of water the summer.  We tossed plugs, spinnerbaits, and every soft plastic in the Fitt Premium Lures line, but established no patterns on color or presentation besides slow and deep, which in muddy conditions means a lot of lost lead and plastic.  Ken sent me two pics the next day with the curt message, Yesterday sucked.  My tired, dehydrated body concurs, but we did go fishing, so it wasn’t all bad.

Ned rig and the undisputed king of poor man's yacht rock navigating the early morning soup.