July 15, 2020 – One Long Last Waltz, I’ll Admit It – Little Lehigh Creek

Early but not as early as usual this summer

I just watched a documentary about The Band this week, not the one alluded to in my title, but this one did share footage from the star-studded, Scorsese-helmed concert film too.  That title was on my mind this morning, the last waltz, as I drove to the Lehigh Valley before sunrise, mostly because Ron noted that my “final” trout trip of the summer is going on three, maybe four?  To be on the safe side, then, I will make sure that I do not call this the last one.  It almost didn’t happen, to be honest, as I woke up with a start at 4:22 AM and realized that my 3 AM alarm was really set for 3 PM. 

Fish were caught.

The week has not been going great.  I nearly got to the Frank Farley Rest stop on the AC Expressway on Tuesday morning before I got a call from Ward at 5:15 AM saying the captain cancelled our fluke fishing charter due to high winds and rough seas.  Had I actually brought a rod and tackle with me, I may have kept going to the beach and caught some fluke off the sand or sods.  Instead, I turned around and was back in bed sleeping by 6:45 AM.  This morning, I planned to go somewhere an hour, an hour and change from home, a little adventure, and early, but my plans changed when I got up over an hour late.  The Little Lehigh is under an hour and an easy ride.  It was not until I was almost to Allentown that I remembered the tricos…

Remember the Tricos

Even with my late start, I was fishing right before official sunrise, and I only saw one other angler at that time and another around 8 AM.  After I finished working through a favorite run of pocket water, however, I saw them: the tricos and along with a dozen guys waiting for the spinners to fall.  Oh yeah, I thought, that’s why I didn’t want to go here today!  I left for home around 9:30 AM, and I still had not seen a riser or a spinner.  The water has been dipping down to 64 each night, even on the hot days, but I stuck with my plan to get in and get out early.  It was rather productive too.  While they waited, I landed 10 fish and dropped another before netting it.  Small bugs were the order of the day.  I caught a few on a size 16 frenchie after I lost a smaller walts that I was using as my point fly.  Most came on this small walts, one of Eric’s, but I also landed a few on his newer tiny caddis/midge pattern on the dropper.  He had just tied these up and given me a few, and we did not fish them on Saturday in the high stained water, so I wanted to give one a test run.  Small bugs are almost a necessity to fool the wild (and sometimes stocked) fish in the Heritage FFO section, but I think these bugs will also work when it comes time to midge this fall and winter.

Small larvae did the trick.

I don’t know what’s up with this stretch of the Little Lehigh anymore or what’s put in there and not put in there.  I know it is not as good as I remember from way back, and I know it was starting to decline when I first returned to it after a long absence.  Looking at the blog posts, I did fish it a couple years ago with some success.  Like the Bushkill, I fear, when someone deems the wild population is not up to snuff or will not support the historical pressure, other fish of known and unknown origins start showing up to supplement.  Today, I caught some wild browns, one brown that certainly looked like a stocker even though the fins were perfect, at least a couple rainbows with clipped tail fins (?), one small enough that I thought wild until I saw the clip (fingerling stocks in here now?).  I also caught a couple hot bows that did not have any markings of a fingerling or adult stocker, but I have no clue how many wild bows are in the creek these days (if any).  Then there is the fact that the creek is stocked with rainbows above and below, and rainbows love to wander. So, basically, fish were caught, close to a dozen.  Is that vague enough for you? 

Stocked, clipped and unclipped?

After landing about 8 fish in the pocket water where I began the morning, I ran out of water and wanted to find some shade.  That is what prompted my walk upstream towards some wooded stretches, and that is when I began to see just how many others had arrived since I last looked up.  I did sneak into a shaded riffle above the crowd and landed another rainbow in deep pocket water.  When not in the shade it felt hot, however, so I quickly worked upstream to where I had parked.  It was approaching 9 AM, but I figured it would be wiser to wait until rush hour, even a Covid rush hour, had petered out, so I fished some deep but pressured water for another half hour.  I actually found another decent wild brown right next to the lot, so I was not just killing time cooling off, it seems.

Born to be wild.

As promised, I will not commit to this being the last waltz.  The damn tricos have me thinking because I know a couple far less crowded spots where they’re probably starting to show.  As a confirmed hermit, I have a complicated relationship with the hatches and the blitzes, but I do like to catch fish.  I thought catching a few fluke on Tuesday might flip a switch and motivate me to start making some drives to the beaches and bays, but now I can’t say what the rest of July holds.  It will take rain or another cooler night like last night to send me back after the trout, I know, so maybe I need to rig up the 7 weight and target some smallies?  Take the boy for some fluke?  Call Sam in State College?  Young Pete was doing well out that way all last week.  See when Kenny is next getting out on the Susky?  Decisions, decisions….

Some clipped tails some not.  I have no clue on the Little Lehigh anymore!

July 11, 2020 – Fay Saves the Day or You Went and Saved the Best for Last – SEPA Blueline

Fish two or three of the morning, and better things were to follow.

Eric has been jonesing to hit our secret spot one last time for a few weeks now, but it has been hot, and my experiences with other trout streams in SEPA have been mixed.  Having no summer or high water knowledge of this creek, I could offer no informed opinion on what conditions would be like following weeks of hot weather in addition to a tropical storm or two.  Thankfully, we had some boots on the ground.  I was happy to see a text chain of stream pictures on my phone on Friday evening, and I knew the creek immediately.  The fact that I could recognize it after nearly 3 inches of rain in the region was a good sign!  No gage on this creek, and no real comparable creeks on the USGS site, but Eric’s dad took a ride over and gave us real-time data!  We wanted to see how it handled a big rain, and it looked really good.  I knew this was a healthier overall watershed than some of the others in SEPA that I frequent, and I have yet to see any gut-wrenching farm practices either, so I guess I was more excited at the prospect of fishing than surprised.

Hazy sun by 10 AM, but some solid stolen hours before.

I joked that we need to give Eric’s dad a stream thermometer next time we see him, but the reality was that water temperature was still an unknown variable, and again neither of us had any summer experience on the creek.  I wanted to say Yes, let’s go for it, but I was also saying, This place it too special to mess with if marginal.  It is a relatively long ride to take just to drop a thermometer in a few times, but what else pressing was there to do for two married dudes with kids at 5 AM on a Saturday during quarantine?  I was already suited up to wet wade, so before fully committing we walked down to a convenient spot and dropped the thermometer.  Flows looked higher than we had ever experienced, but the creek was in its banks, and there was enough visibility to pick out bigger rocks and logs.  In the predawn hours, I could barely read the numbers, but with the assistance of Eric’s younger eyes, we could confirm that the water was hanging below 20 Celsius or 68 Fahrenheit in a sun-exposed, flat pool right near a road and warmer runoff. 

Often the spot but not today

We had Eric carry the thermometer the rest of the morning, and with that easy to read 20 C mark as a guide, we decided to give it one last go, possibly until the fall.  We took water temps several times this morning, and they never broke 68 before we quit.  Eric walked up a bigger tributary, as well, and that had the same temp.  At a couple of our honey holes where I was worried about lack of riparian buffer, some nearby spring influence and depth actually brought temps down a click or two.  Not that I think we will be back until late September, barring any major change in weather pattern, but we were impressed once again by the health and resilience of this little gem—yet another reason to leave it alone until the fall, I suppose.

The first of Eric's two good fish.

Once we starting picking up fish, we were even more encouraged that today could be a good one.  None of the fish needed reviving, but we played them and released them quickly, keeping them submerged in the net if we needed a photo—we needed a photo of a lot more than we actually took, honestly.  Eric landed two personal bests for this creek this morning, two fish up to 13 inches and a bunch more, and I landed about 20 trout, with a half dozen of them on both sides of 11 inches.  No hatches, but caddis remained in the vegetation on the banks, so hatches are still happening.  This creek has many, many craneflies too!  Without knowing that hatches would still be a factor, my gut was to throw attractors like weenies and terrestrials like drowned ants.  That said, I still rigged a buggy CDC tag jig on the anchor, which accounted for 90 percent of my fish and, after hanging a mop and a weenie in a wire that has eaten half a dozen of our flies and is cleverly hidden in plain sight, Eric also went with buggy CDC flies.  Fishing was over before 10 AM, so on the way back we actually retrieved two of the six hung-up flies with a long stick as part of our midmorning activities, really another win in itself. 

In there with my run of 9 fish from the same hole.

I landed a beauty, the one that opens this post, for my second or third fish of the morning, but most of the others that we landed on the walk upstream were small.  I lost another good one below the additional flow of a tributary, but Eric was up to bat when we reached the first of our two favorite bend pools.  Water temps were actually 67 degrees here at 9 AM, so something upstream besides farms is helping the cause, likely some springs.  The first pool did not disappoint (it rarely has) and Eric landed a gorgeous one about 13 inches long in the measure net.  We pulled a couple smaller ones out of there, I believe, before we moved to my favorite hole on this stretch of the creek.  We landed a handful of average fish out of here, too, taking turns until we each landed a large chub and thought it might be done. 

Some average and many small stream beauties in the mix.

As Eric moved upstream to address his small stream version of a white whale, a good fish he missed in a tricky log jam a few trips ago, I decided the fish every potential line in my honey hole here.  After landing nine fish, a couple more 11 inchers too, in this one hole, I started to feel like a heel and went to find Eric, who was actually bushwhacking back my way.  I confessed to my solo luck, and urged him to give a particular line or two a shot with his different bugs.  Premonition or guilt or both on my part, I am not sure, certainly not Guiding 101, but he stuck his second 13-inch fish of the morning on his second cast!  We were giggling like little kids!

Another, and bigger than the first one.

At this point, against all odd, this visit became the best of the best.  We had both numbers and size to eclipse most if not all of the previous visits.  Two small stream beauties nearly back to back didn’t hurt the voting either.  The hazy, verdant beauty of the summer woods was not a bad sideshow. We saw a snapping turtle make a move at some minnows, spooked a few deer, and I had to take a photo of the sun moving through a trio of spider webs, all full of craneflies, I bet.  The day of cooler temps on Friday and the lingering clouds this morning held off the heat until 10 AM before the sun started winning the day.  We decided to target only two spots on the way back, in addition to an attempt to fish some flies off a manmade nuisance ten feet over the creek.  I was lured into a third spot when I remembered that I had lost a good fish here earlier in the morning, so I stepped in and took another good 11 or 12 inch fish while Eric took a nearby trib’s temperature.

Bonus round fish.

A second stop did not pay off, but the final stop before retrieving flies also produced a nice fish in a plunge pool that only gave up dinks and snags the first time through, although it often holds a good one.  Double-bonus round now.  Even wet wading, I started to feel the heat as we got closer to the road, so we agreed not to visit a couple honey holes downstream.  The creek had provided enough unexpected success and fun this morning, and the rain and clouds had given us a good extra productive hour of fishing, at least.  Let’s not get greedy or irresponsible with such an awesome place.  We were really encouraged by the temps and how well it handled nearly 3 inches of rain. 

Another from that 9 fish run, I believe.

We have fished the creek during three of four seasons, so we are excited to get back this fall and see what a fourth holds.  Besides this, the only thing left on the list is to try and move some grandparents with a streamer.  We have not spooked any true beasts yet, but there are a couple likely spots to target with meat this fall.  I would just like to know.  We may have to take a walk without rods in late November and count redds, but first we have to get Eric’s dad an infrared thermometer so he can do drive-bys—a PA Dutch surf cam of sorts.

And we didn't even take a lot of pictures!

July 7, 2020 – One Last Shot at the Local Trout for a While – Valley Creek

The Silver Fox wet-wading the warm mud....

Rain!  Well, more like floods.  Tom had off this week for his annual staycation, which usually involves some fishing, but this has not been the average early July.  There would be no further brook trout adventures for us this summer.  We texted back and forth on Monday during the floods and settled on the idea that if I was up and he was up and the gage and temps on Valley looked okay, then we would meet over there at 5 AM and give it one last go.  We caught some fish, but the water is spiking to 70 every day, and the warm rain did not help.  The fact that the entire woods flooded did not help with turbidity either, but before the sun lit up the particles, we had a short productive window.  I was encouraged that we even caught a few fish sneaking up a trib, but with the exception of a couple springs/seeps that seemed even warmer than the main branch.  I think I am done with the trout for the foreseeable future.  Plenty of other fisherman out, but I hope they carry stream thermometers!  Tom got a handful on the weenie, and I got a few on the walts.  I rigged up and debated the streamer rod at the ‘Ru as we suited up, but I decided to nymph the riffles based on the color and temps.  I did not picture many moving far to take a bugger today, but hindsight...  We got the fish back quickly with few photos.  In fact, all but one of the fish pictured here were Tom's in my hand, just for some content!  Fish were caught and the wet wading felt good even at 5 AM, so let’s just call it a bonus staycation day.  

Until the fall unless this pattern breaks

July 3, 2020 – A Whole Lot of Pink (and Some Brown) – Northampton County Limestoner

Oink....

Hot, you know?  I was happy to see one of my go-to spots had slightly higher than average flows when I checked the gages last night.  I have been itching to fish, but not really feeling a long drive to the beach if a pop-up storm was going to chase me off.  I even thought about the Big D, but even that was 78 degrees the other day!  My last trout fishing trip was decent at best, and the stream conditions were pretty mucky, low, and getting warm for a limestoner, but it would have to be limestoner and it would have to be an early and quick one if I was going to get out this week.  When I checked the water temp of this creek at 8 AM today, it was 65 in the shallows, so not bad.  Still, this is one of my favorites, so I have no interest in abusing the residents (or the holdovers who really seem to take it hard).  I began my walk-in just after 5 AM, and I fished until 9 AM and called it a day.  I only caught six or seven fish, I believe, but three of them were beauties!  All came on either Eric’s pinky bomb, the caddis version this time, or a pink tag fly—a lot of pink today, especially if you add in the colors on the heavy rainbows with fired-up gill plates and flanks.  But three browns, including a nice one over 16 inches, came out to play this morning, too.  Besides the pre-dawn waking and driving for less than four hours of fishing, followed by another hour drive home, it was a pretty fun July fishing day.

A couple of these too, which is nice.

When I arrived, I climbed down to the creek to relieve the bladder, and it looked like normal flows and limestone green.   I suited up quickly and took the sketchy land route to a deep riffle and hole instead of fishing my way up there.  There is a trico hatch on this creek, but I did not see them today, though there were some pre-sunrise splashy rises to dark caddis.  I was fishing with a mono rig on my 10 foot 4 weight, so not much casting was going to happen.  Instead, I went right to the deepest part of the riffle and dug a rainbow and then a decent wild brown out of there.  In this deep hole, it was the big pink 4mm bead caddis that got the attention of both fish.  They hit well and fought well, so I was happy that water temps seemed good.  I took a step at a time and thoroughly fished this prime spot, hoping for a pig brown not accustomed to visitors so early.  I thought I got my wish when I set the hook on my third fish of the morning.

Oink, oink....

It was not a brown, but it might have been a steelhead!  Or a redband football!  Holy crap, this was a fat, pristine rainbow.  It was definitely a multiyear holdover, a big male all kyped up with great fins and deep hues.  It would not be the first big rainbow I have landed in this hole over the years, maybe not even the longest, but it was definitely the biggest and widest.  I had no clue how to hold him up for a photo, and I had to revive him for a while, so I took a lot of pics while resting him.  I know the water is borderline warm now because the rainbows, even after a quick fight, tired quickly.  The browns raised in this creek are a tougher sort and went back very spry—two of the three jumped a foot out of the water during the fight and fought hard the entire way to the net, but still darted off strong, as they should in mid-60s.  Both times I took a water temp, it read 64-65 after a good long soak, but a bow this fat did not get that way from working out.  I stuck with him, head into the current, and he went back to the deep to fight (and eat again) but this long revive did prompt my first temperature check of the day. 

Normal flow, cool enough early

A favorite deep riffle and hole came up empty, so I tried smaller bugs for a while, and I did land another smaller wild brown on a pink tag fly about size 14 in some heavy riffles.  I ran into another dude fishing downstream with a spinning rod AND a fly rod, and we talked a bit as I let him pass down below me.  When he said he had some worms with him, I was worried that the last hole in this stretch would be a wash, but I actually caught two more rainbows before I climbed out and walked back along the road to my parking spot.  Before I landed a 12-inch rainbow that looked familiar from an early spring or winter trip (he was even in the same pocket) I was in a standoff with what felt like a pig of fish, almost like a carp or catfish but probably a big trout.  I hooked this big fish right in the heavy water under a plunge, and he would not move.  The standoff ended when I eventually tried to drag his butt out of there to no avail. 

Pink tag fly, Eric's pinky bomb in green caddis.

I got bounced and did not connect at another similar spot, but before I left I tried the same standoff spot and pulled a good 15+ rainbow out of there.  I don’t think it was the same one I had on before, but who knows.  This one bulldogged in place too but eventually reacted to side pressure and took a run out behind me.  I was standing in waist deep water at this point, and he almost went for my legs, but it ended well with a couple nice pictures.  This one went back in better spirits too, no prolonged nursing.  I took a water temp again, and it was still 65 degrees.  It was cloudy too, so I decided to try one more spot closer to where I parked in the morning before 80 degrees became 90 degrees, and I had to go home. The sun starting burning off the early haze as I walked.

Another pig holdover rainbow in pristine shape.

The parking lot was full of masked up cyclists and joggers also trying to beat the impending heat.  I quickly fished a couple rainbow holdover spots, and bridge spot that has often held at least one small brown.  I actually saw a brown chasing a rainbow several times.  I have heard that they will do that until they are exhausted if the bow or brookie doesn’t leave the brown’s lair—not good on a hot July day, but the two of them seemed to work out their differences.  I left this one alone but targeted a deeper yet quieter pocket on the other side.  I stood back and lobbed the bugs in and, using the sighter as an indicator, just let them swing for a second or two.  I lifted to set the hook when something felt fishy and, sure enough, I was attached to a good wild brown.  He ranged all over the confines of this hole, even took a big old leap in the air before I was able to bring him to the net.  All that fight, and he still went back in great shape, putting that porky rainbow to shame. It was 9 AM now, however, and the sun had burned off any remaining haze, so I did not push it any longer and headed across the creek towards the ‘Ru. 

Bonus brown to end!

 It was hot on the asphalt of the parking lot, that’s for sure.  I am afraid this heat is here to stay again too (if it ever left), so I was grateful to sneak one in this week.  Barring rain, a day of full clouds, or a cool night or two in a row, I don’t think I will harass the trout within an hour of home again for a while.  I would like to get one more good day in somewhere responsible, but the idea of leaving at 2 AM to go to State College and only fishing until 10 AM at best seems silly right now.  Talk to me in a few days, I guess.  I did rig up some ¾ oz bucktails and fluorocarbon leaders on a couple fluke rods, so maybe I will do that with the boy once the holiday weekend is over?  Maybe?  Hot out there....