November 1, 2022 – Another Surprisingly Good Late Morning Under an Hour from Home – Northampton County Limestoner

Shy of hero/selfish photo category, so just "hand with fish" today.

Unlike Monday, there was a bit of a stain this morning from about a quarter inch of rain on Halloween night.  The trick or treaters beat the rain mostly, and I only stole one bag of candy from the neighbors while being made on the Ring camera….  They were out and left candy out for the kiddies, so I was being a nice neighbor and saving the bowl from the heavier showers on the way, and I only took one bag, I promise!  The rain did not move the gages much, but it did send down the leaves and add a bit more color.  The creek today even had a tannic look to it, perhaps because of the decomposing leaves already littering the bottom of every back eddy.  I was not hopeful when I worked through a couple prime runs and only stuck a few YOY and one 8 incher on small bugs, but I kept the faith because I had a feeling a run of pocket water upstream might be better with the presence of small caddis and the air temps nearing 65 degrees around 11:30 AM.  Yeah, it was another later start on purpose.

Small bugs was a smart move, but the move to 6X had almost predictable consequences.

I do love the early morning even if the bite takes patience to develop, but it was just cloudy and drizzly enough this morning to convince me that this popular little creek would potentially offer some solitude and some action.  I was right, thankfully.  As I alluded to above, it took about an hour and change to get really productive, but I had a nice 2 hour window of good fishing, including landing a decent one and breaking off another even a couple inches bigger.  I know I have written about this creek and how plain, nondescript, and small bugs tend to produce.  No different today.  I landed around 10 real fish, and almost all took a small brown nothing hare’s ear or a caddis larva.  One or two took the dropper, a little mayfly imitation in size 18.  That was the bug that fooled one about 17 inches that I broke off.  It’s been a while since I have broken one off while fighting it, but I had to try and stop this little piggy from diving into a mess of limbs and rocks. Of course, I had been fishing 5X all morning and made the unwise decision to rope down.  When I had to retie after treeing a couple bugs with an ill-advised hookset, I wondered if this little bug might dance better and get down in the riffles quicker with lighter tippet.  I just wrote yesterday about not tinkering if something is working too.  Had I not landed a nice mature small stream fish not three casts before, I may have been more pissed.

A couple more shots of the nicer one.

These two nicer fish, and at least five others of various sizes, including a few more YOY I did not count in my nine or ten total fish count, were up off the bottom and actively taking nymphs or emergers in braided and pocket water, some right on the current seam like it was late May or something—what I had been hoping for since perhaps my last experience of that ilk on the Brodhead last month.  I considered making another move because I had time to fish a while longer, but I kept to the plan in my head about just working this productive pocket water and then calling it a day.  I did not expect it to be as good as it was, but that happened on Monday too, so I remain grateful for the nice weather, some close to normal flows, and these hungry fish close to home, even if I miffed my chance at this month’s first hero shot.  No redds visible yet in the usual spots, so I may be back in the next week or so before the window of opportunity closes.  Judging by the colors of them today and how some were grouping up together yesterday, I would say it won't be long and/or is probably happening in some places in the region already.  Almost time to oil up the surf gear and dig out the junk flies for the stockers!