The 2nd Annual Quill Gordon Summit

For the second year, I attended (and hosted this year at my cabin) the Quill Gordon Summit in Potter County. This "jam" is a brainchild of my friend Coty and myself, and is quickly becoming a highlight to the PA Fly Fish calendar of events. Coty did an EXCELLENT job of summarizing the event, and said it better than I. So please go read his recap of the weekend. Getting skunked in God's Country is better than catching fish in a lot of other places!

Not quite epic

I've had some good days on the water this year, but I haven't had an epic day. I'm not even sure how to define an "epic day", but I'll know when I have one.

Saturday was the closest I got so far. Over four miles of hiking, 20 native brook trout, and two flies. The first seventeen brookies came from the same royal wulff, which, by the end of the day, was reduced to a few strands of peacock hurl, battered hackle, and a piece of red thread. So why didn't Saturday classify itself as "epic"? I'm not quite sure. The number of fish was strong (though not amazing), they were all caught on the dry fly, and I didn't see a single person the entire time I was out. Still, something was missing.

I think the missing element will be something completely unexpected, something that makes a fly fishing trip completely memorable. Saturday will blend into the foggy memory of good days spent on the water,  but it won't stand out. When I think back on the really special days, Saturday won't be on the short list. I don't take days like Saturday for granted, don't get me wrong. I'm thankful for the thousands of "good days" on streams. They mold together into one giant memory of fly fishing. It's as if they're one more piece of foil to PeeWee Herman's giant foil ball. It's the good days on the water that keep me going out in search of the epic days.

Selling Graphite

In an effort to replace my graphite arsenal with more glass, I'm selling a Crosswater combo. Help a brotha' out!

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=171023163063

Warm Water Lunch Breaks

With the unusual "heat wave" going on in SE PA and an unusual week of hour-long lunches, I'm making my way to the local warm water river, the Conestoga, for some lunch time fun. I went yesterday for the first time, and had no action at all. Gains Popper, brown and white buggers, white wulffs, SJW, nothing. I did, however, see big carp jumping clear out of the water. Wonder what that was about and I wonder how the Featherlight would have handled it...

Today is even warmer than yesterday. The Fenwick is packed and ready to go, I brought sneakers along this time so that I'm not standing on the creek bank in my dress shoes, and I wore brown pants so that if I get dirt on them, it doesn't show like it did yesterday in my black dress slacks. Let's do this!

A free weekend and lots of brook trout

I had a free weekend. I mean, really free. No homework, no lessons to plan for Sunday morning, no work, nothing. Not to mention, temps were very nice.

I kicked it off w/ a Friday evening trip to Hammer Creek. The bait slingers were EVERYWHERE, but none of them came down stream to where I was fishing. I guess they figured there were no stocked trout down there. They were right. All the trout I caught were wild. A few wild browns, but more importantly many native brookies including one very nice 10" brook trout.

After sleeping in and spending some time w/ the fam on Saturday, I set out for some small stream exploration. I met up w/ a newbie on PA Fly Fish who wanted to tag along. The stream I was planning on fishing is a tributary to Hammer that I never fished before. I made it known to the noob what kind of fishing I'd be doing, yet he still decided to show up! So we headed up this tiny little trib. I'm glad I did. Despite the tight quarters, there were a lot of brook trout in that stream. I know this, not from catching a lot, but from spooking a lot! Gin clear water, blue bird skies, and a stream you don't know leads to a lot of darting trout. Still, I managed to land a few. Very pretty and very orange were the brookies in this stream.

After the exploration, I headed up another trib to Hammer that I know very well. On our hike in, I noticed two other fly fishermen. Now, I'm generally not very social, but I had never seen anyone else fishing this stream, so I had to go talk to them. I'm glad I did because it turned out that they were two members of PA Fly Fish! A very pleasant surprise indeed! One of the guys was very excited because the trib was fishing very well. This stream got nailed by the floods 3 years ago, and didn't seem to recover as well as the other small streams in the area. Saturday showed us just how resilient nature can be, though. The brookies were out in force, and taking dry flies! We had an excellent day working our way up this trib, and I'm excited to see this stream recover even further.

Today was going to be my sabbath rest. However, after coming home from church, the wife decided to take a nap and I found myself alone thinking about fishing. Some friends recently fished a very small stream not 15 minutes from me in the next town over, a stream that I've been meaning to fish for several years. They gave me an access point and I headed out. As I said, this is a very small stream, and very tight, but there were indeed a lot of trout. Every little pool had brookies willing and ready to take my elk hair caddis. The best fish of the day was an old brookie with a big head and bright orange belly. Absolutely beautiful trout in this little stream. I can't imagine trying to get around it in the summer with the brush fully grown in, but in the spring its a great stream to hit and I hope to fish it again soon when I have more time to really invest in exploring it.

The air is warm, the water is warming, and the brook trout are rising. Is this never-ending winter finally ending!?

Tired of crap needing repaired!

Aquaseal to the rescue. I came out of the stream the other day with two very wet legs. The one leg seems to be leaking at a seam just above the bootie. The other leg has some worn spots from brush, I assume those are the leaks. I'm just tired of fixing these dumb waders. They're getting aquasealed again, but man, I need to find a pair of waders that can hold up to small stream fishing. These are the Cabelas dry-fit or whatever they're called. A lady I work with, her husband spin fishes and has the same waders. She said they've held up for him. Well, he ain't exactly out every week climbing in and out of briers and brush, on his knees in the middle of a stream trying to stay out of sight of natives. I'm sure these things would hold up if I was a once or twice a month big-water fisherman.

I'm going to save up for a nice pair of LL Beans or something. I got a pair of wading boots from them at Christmas. I love them. They're light as all get out, they have a lifetime no questions asked warranty, and that's what I want. I don't want to deal with Aquaseal no more.

Ready for bass

After a reattachment of the tip, and a reversal of the reel retrieval, the Wonder Rod/Eagle Claw GR 780 is ready for some serious warm water action!

A Test Drive for the Medalist

I was able to get out last night to hit the local ATW (which happens to be littered with native brook trout). I was expecting there to be crowds of bait slingers, instead I spoke to one spin fisherman who was walking back to his car as I was suiting up. I asked how he did, he said he caught a few small natives. I told him, "well that's good! Those are the fish I like to catch!" He felt the need to inform me that they were small. That's okay. I'd rather catch a 5" native than a 15" stocker any day.

I felt this would be a good test drive for the newly repaired Medalist. I grabbed my Fenwick before leaving for work yesterday, slapped the Medalist on it, and had her rigged up w/ a dry dropper ready to go so that I could hop out of the car, throw on my waders, and take advantage of the remaining hour of daylight. The plan worked.

It was windy and colder yesterday. I didn't take a stream temp, but the fish were definitely put down. I managed to catch two chubs (the Sasquatch nightmare! One was big w/ thorns...nasty!), but no trout were brought to hand. Still, I saw a few rises, missed a couple on the dry fly, and I had a NICE trout hooked at one point. It jumped and threw my fly, but it was was not a stocked rainbow. I got a quick look at it, it seemed to be of good size, but I couldn't make out the species. It definitely wasn't a bow, though. If it was a brookie, then it was one of the biggest natives I've ever seen. If it was a brown, it would be wild as they haven't stocked browns in this stream for two years now. I'm going back on Saturday when the temps are supposed to be in the mid to upper 50s, pray to God that the stream isn't littered with truck chasers, and I'm going to catch this fish!