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3. Trip to Bellefonte

Fished Spring Creek yesterday with Tony, aka Gutcutter, water just too high, and almost no visibilty. Flow was just under 300 cfs at the Axeman gage at 6:00 a.m. and still 270 at 7:00 p.m.

I nymphed hard for two hours and only caught the bottom. Left at 11:45 and drove down to Clarks Creek. Water was up significantly but I liked the flow rate and the clarity was excellent. Water was very cold and many of the fish were sluggish. Landed eight and missed/lost another six.

Matt, next time Spring is up and muddy, you might try streamers, especially sculpin patterns. Anyway, it'll just be a little longer till the Hendricksons start popping near Hancock.

as matt stated, we met on spring creek thursday morning. the water came down steadily and the flow decreased towards normal over the next few days. there were plenty of olives - they just weren't in the areas that are traditional for this time of year. i had a tough time catching fish on nymphs as matt described. only got a few fish each day before the olive hatch started. i tend to fish the same way matt does - tight line with splitshot. maybe the bobber guys did better.
i also witnessed the best stonefly hatch i have ever seen in 30+ years of fishing this stream. and i'm not talking little black stones.
they were a grey stone size 14 and i never saw a fish rise to the hundreds that were dropping eggs and sitting on the water for 2-5 seconds before they flew upward to do it again.
there was also an 18 little black stone and a 16 tan caddis plus a lot of very small cream midges.
again, few fish on #12-16 stonefly nymphs swung into the shallows with no weight (sight nymphing) or deep in the pools with splitshot.
when the olives came off it was really cool to see the mayflies heading up away from the water and the stoneflies heading down towards the water.
the fish didn't start rising in earnest until after 3pm and they seemed to be taking emergers in riffles instead of duns in pools. they were tough to see. i did pretty well thursday friday and saturday
i also caught 4 fish up at the paradise on 26 and 28 midges with my new cane rod. first fish i have caught with it.
all in all an o.k. trip - about 25 or so fish in 2 and a half days, but disapointed that it was not as good as recent years.
i suspect the massive run-off and wild flows had something to do with it.
i am usually only up that way in march and august so i don't know if those stones are common. when i started this obsession as a teenager with a drivers license, i fished there at least once a month -every month- and don't ever recall seeing large stoneflies like that.
are they there but normally at another time?

I've seined Spring quite extensively, and I can't recall ever even dredging up a stonefly nymph. I also can't recall ever having seen an adult on that stream. But my experience on it only goes back 6 years or so. Good stuff.

-Shawn