January 18 and 28, 2023 – A Couple More January Trips to Small Creeks for Wild and Even Native Trouts – SEPA

Some pretty wild fish and native fish in January.

It’s been a while, and I have been busy, but I did sneak out a couple more times this month, and I hope to get out Monday too.  Today, Tom and I went to his little brookie spot, a spot that is slowly becoming a wild brown spot.  That seems to be the story with several creeks within a couple hours of home.  I like browns, but I do like to mess with a native (or ten) a few times a year if I am lucky.  That is becoming harder as creeks warm and browns keep migrating upstream and procreating at better rates.  It was not a terrible day by any means: warmish, sun and clouds, good flows.  It was winter fishing, so my expectations are always guarded at best, but the water temperature was 40 degrees, and we saw some midges and even early black stones on the water, so there was a chance it could have been an even better day.  In fact, Tom had an eager brown pop his indicator at least twice in a deep, slow hole, where I eventually landed the best brown of the day on a small jigged bugger.  It was a healthy 9- or 10-inch fish.  Most of the brookies we landed were very small, like last year’s babes, but I did land a couple toddlers too.  For a while, we saw some bugs on the water, and we witnessed at least one more rise, but the action never turned on like we had hoped.  Tom had plans for the early evening, so we had to quit around 1:30 PM.  That said, I don’t think we missed much in leaving when we did, maybe a couple more browns at the first spot that produced earlier in the morning.  It was good to get out with a mitch and catch a few fish, and some days that is enough.

Nearly skunked earlier in the month

Earlier in the month, I narrowly avoided a skunk on one of my favorite Northampton County limestoners.  I got surprised by another angler at my winter honey hole here, after most of my other spots came up empty.  I was retying next to a loud plunge, so I didn’t even hear dude walk up and ask me if I caught anything, and he startled the hell out of me.  He then proceeded to fish the same frigging hole!  He appeared to be a noob, perhaps accustomed to the close quarters tolerated on stocked creeks, so I held my tongue and just put a lot of distance between us.  After a long walk downstream, I was rewarded by a nice fish eating a jigged bugger in another favorite hole where I came up empty earlier.  Well, sort of rewarded, as he got off the bugger before a net job and a photo.  It was a shame because he was a good 14-inch fish too.  Of course the only fish that hit in two hours, when I was lulled to sleep by no hits, was a solid fish.  It was a fun fight with a pretty, colored up male fish, but had I not landed a YOY before I quit, this day in January technically would have been my first skunk of the young year.  Better days to come, I am sure.  I like February fishing, especially when some bugs start waking up with the longer days.  January can be tough, even a warm January like this one, but another short warm up already has me thinking about Sunday or Monday of this final week of January.

The Silver Fox in action and some more small winter brookies.