May 6, 2022 – Beat the Heavy Rain Close to Home and Landed a Sand Bag with Fins – Wissahickon Creek

The mighty Wissy.  Preview of bow flex.

With rain coming late in the morning, and a little work to do in the afternoon, I decided to stay close to home today.  Valley was on the table, but there was a chance Eric, who was also working from home today, could join me close to home for a couple hours, so I decided to make my second visit to the Wissy of the year.  With the rain starting, the park started thinning out in a hurry.  I arrived around 8:30 and fished until 2, with a couple longer walks in there, and the place was empty by 10:30 AM.  I would like to say that fishing was great, but it was not.  I caught a mess of bass and sunfish, but their activity level and light hits gave me a clue as to how the trouts were likely feeling too.  Perhaps with the front coming, they were shut down.  Sadly, there were midges and caddis present all day until it really started to pour, but all the fish, including a golden and Porky Bow pictured above and in a blurry collage below, took a size 18 walts on the dropper tag.  I guess midges have been on the menu, but it was hard getting a tiny bug in front of the less than eager faces today.

They made we work and only ate small bugs.

I would not accept that one of favorite holes was empty, so I spent way too much time there trying to get one to eat.  All my stubbornness was rewarded with rock bass, small smallmouth, and sunfish, no trout.  When I finally moved and targeted some pocket water, I put together a run of 4 or 5 rainbows and then my only brown of the day.  There were probably lockjawed fish in that favorite hole because I had a similar experience with the hole where I eventually landed the pig and another bow after stopping on the walk back.  I fished way down beyond where the Commish has been stocking, and it was not awesome, but I did land a few fish down there, so they do still stock it when they have help.  I also landed a decent sized golden down there, but the pics turned out blurrier than those of the pig rainbow.

Brownie.  I guess I missed the place because I took a lot of creek pics in the rain.

The rain stayed light for my entire stay, but I did not want to stay too long either.  The water was not really coming up with all the older growth trees around, but dirty water from the streets was finding itself to the creek from some ditches and little tribs, so I knew it was only a matter of time.  To take advantage of the stain below one of these tribs, I even tossed a black bugger for a while, but I only landed sunfish and little bass.  There were trout in there, however, because once I started nymphing again, I hooked a few more trout and that golden before turning back for the parking lot.

Like wrangling a small toddler.

Climbing out of the wet, muddy gorge was a chore, so I only stopped at the hole where I landed the pig in order to clean my waders and hands, honestly.  The golden in there was looking active, so I made a few casts, and low and behold the pig next to him that I had not seen ate the little walts.  These are primo fish left over from the local tournament, so it did not fight like a bag of cement even if it looked like one.  I had 5X and the 3 weight rod, and I could not chase after this fish because it was sheer rock on my side of the crick, that good old Wissahickon schist.  I had to tire this one out, allowing multiple runs downstream, before reeling it back in at least two or three times.  I could only see the back when she tried to jump or roll, and because it was low light, I had no clue how wide she was until I got her in close.  After a meh day, this was some content for the blog!  Well, sort of, as the rain and humidity did not make for great photos.  I did the right thing and revived this fish, and stood in the rain while some mutant stockie regained her strength.  I guess I just figured some kid would love to take this thing home.  She eventually moseyed off, and I did the same.

I guess only the selfie lens was fogged.  Not a hideous fish by any means!