Winter fly fishing in Pennsylvania is all about simplicity. There’s no need to carry a wide range of flies to match a hatch – although we do have a couple of winter hatches, which I’ll discuss below. But this time of year, catching trout is more about using a handful of flies effectively than having […]
Top 10 Flies for Winter Fly Fishing in Pennsylvania Read More »
A handful of palomino trout circled the pool in front of me. They went round and round, all five of them, searching their watery confines for a cool place to rest before eventually stationing themselves in fighter plane formation where the riffles dumped into the pool. A few minutes later, they repeated the process.
Getting Skunked with Dignity: Early Summer Midges Read More »
The evening began on the lower end of First Fork’s Delayed Harvest section. The afternoon rain had cleared into a beautiful evening – a little too beautiful, in fact, as the sun beat down on the water, and at times it felt downright hot. I picked up two fat rainbows on a Sexy Walt
A Tale of Two Streams: Chasing Drakes Read More »
I caught two trout on my first two casts before I realized there was a full scale Blue Quill hatch going on and trout were rising all around me. The rises were subtle, which is why I hadn’t noticed them when I first waded out into the stream. And then I was distracted by
April Showers Bring…Blue Quills on First Fork! Read More »
True story. A few days ago, I was fishing with my buddy Dylon Hoelzli on Elk Creek near Erie, PA, and overhead a group of guys talking about how could there be so many fish in the streams, yet so few of them willing to bite. These five guys were bantering back and forth and
Favorite Steelhead Flies Read More »
Memorial Day Weekend started with a hard rain that brought the streams up to normal levels. In fact, over the years, I can recall more Memorial Day Weekends with rain than I can without. One thing I know for sure, though: rain or no rain, Memorial Day Weekend has always been one of my
Sulphurs in the Rain Read More »
The world of a fly fisher revolves around mayflies. Visit some streams during certain times of year, such as late May when the Green Drake hatch typically appears, and conversations among anglers likely revolve around when these flies will appear, if they’ll appear, have they appeared, or is the best yet to come. There’s just
Mayfly Life Cycle: From Nymph to Dun to Spinner Read More »
Clouds of Grannoms filled the morning air. They came out of the water in waves, one huge flurry after another. There were so many Grannoms that they bounced off of my face, got caught in my net, and a few even flew into my short sleeves and crawled around inside my shirt. Yes, there
The April Caddis: Fishing and Tying Grannoms Read More »
I wish I had discovered the effectiveness of tiny flies when I was younger and had younger eyes instead of only within the past five years. A few months ago, my optometrist prescribed “mildly” progressive lenses, and I asked if that was really necessary because, in my opinion, I could see just fine. He looked
Small but Mighty: Fishing the Zebra Midge Read More »
Masking hatches are “usually” a large fly that’s emerging about the same time as a smaller fly. The smaller fly is usually less obvious, and in fact, you may not even see it hatching at all, yet the trout seem to prefer it over the larger fly for one reason or another. I place
Masking Hatches and Selective Trout Read More »