October 29, 2018 – Went Out Looking for a Good One – Saucon Creek

A good one, but not on the streamer...

As the title says, I did go out this morning looking for a good fish or two with the streamer rod, but the good one I did finally land was not on the streamer, so I can hardly say things went exactly as planned.  I arrived at the creek around 9:45 AM, and the ground was still damp from recent rain showers.  The creek was up a little but mostly clear, except for in the deeper holes, so I would call it slightly stained at best.  Surprisingly, I did not spy any redds or fish acting funny in any of the spots where I usually see them about this time of year.  I know it will happen soon here, but the good fish I did catch was not an aggressive buck gearing up for the spawn but, instead, a fish deep in a feeding lane likely picking off emergers from the brief and light blue winged olive hatch that I was lucky enough to step into on this unsettled, cloudy, and windy day.

What are you doing down here?

Early into the trip, I had one decent wild brown jump off the streamer after a short battle, and I moved one that was nearly the size of the one I nymphed up later.  This fish was under a new down tree, smack dab in the middle of a favorite run, but I did coax him out to eat.  He bumped it once but did not feel the hook, I guess, because he kept charging until he cleared the rake of tree limbs and saw me.  He then did a quick about face, of course.  Shortly thereafter, I stuck the hook into a good bump and was disappointed to land a 12 inch rainbow that had been washed down from the stocked sections upstream, no doubt.  He fought well, and was in good shape, but he was not what I was hoping for after catching sight of such a big brown just moments earlier.

Arty, yeah?  Took a lot of pictures of this fish, but none were true keepers...

After seeing the aforementioned olives getting active, I could not stop myself from clipping off the streamer and digging in my bag for a nymphing leader.  Even though I was holding my 9 foot 5 wt, one that is more like a 6 wt—thus employed mostly as a streamer rod—I went for it nevertheless and tied a size 18 pheasant tail on the dropper and a heavier jigged pt on the point just to get down quickly in some pocket water and deeper, braided holes.  The big wild brown that I landed a few minutes later took the size 14 jigged pt, not the smaller imitation, and then proceeded to jump at least three times in rapid succession, at times nearly three feet out of the water.  This fish was a hot one, for sure.  Thanks to the deeper, larger net I scavenged from the Brodhead earlier in the month, I had no problem keeping this beautiful fish in the net once he was done putting on a show.  A quick hand measure had him just shy of 18 inches, and he was a healthy one.

Moving some water still but rather clear.

I was ready to go home content after that, but I had to turn back and try a couple holes I only swung a streamer through earlier in the morning, especially now that fish seemed to be eating.  There were no further sightings of the first big fish I saw this morning, but I did land one more acrobatic wild brown of about 10 inches in another nearby hole.  I am not sure he was worth all the backtracking and additional wading, but he did give me a good note on which to end the afternoon.   I went out looking for a good one, saw two, and landed one of them, though not the way I thought I would.  I am thankful I tie up some extra leaders once in a while and wrap them on old tippet spools, however.  Having one handy and ready to go quickly this afternoon was just good planning, even if it didn’t exactly fit in with the original plan for the day...