Centre/Huntingdon County Area Streams

[McSneek]

Was planning a day trip to Penns today. By 5:00am or so the USGS data had her up to 600cfs. $h!t! Any local guys up there that can confirm stream conditions? Little J spiked too. They usually drop fast at this time of year. Any chance for Sunday on thiose streams?

 

[Foxgap239]

In my opinion Penn's fishes best between 350 and 250. It's currently down to around 330 or there abouts. I think fishing will be perfect up there. Enjoy.

 

[nymphingmaniac]

it's not about the flow, it's about the clarity. little J is muddy and won't be fishable until sunday. Penns takes one more day (typically) to clear.
lots of other options should be prime with the injection of water, six mile run for example.

 

[PENZZZ]

Nymph, are you saying Penns is muddy?

 

[nymphingmaniac]

The J was muddy friday and murky saturday. Since Penns takes one day more to clear, I'd expect it to be somewhere between mud and murky right now. the gauge reading at Penns also suggests it has not cleared. Sunday might be good though.

 

[PENZZZ]

Ok, 223 feet means muddy. Thanks for the help.

 

[JackM]

PENZZZ, clarity and flow are not always directly related. Oftentimes they are, but not always. The advice you were given suggests that the river will be fishable. However, if low water clarity bothers you, it sounds like you may waste a trip. A murky river is not anything to fear. High and fast water is to be feared, at least to me, no matter how clear, just because of the added risk of taking a dunk or getting a reasonable drift.

In other words, an angler looking at guage reactions over a short period following rain might be able to guess at the clarity, but this is dependent upon their familiarity with the stream. Guage height or cfs alone will not predict conditions of water clarity.

 

[PENZZZ]

Water conditions were low and clear. BTW, I've fished Penns a couple hundred days since 1983. The whole point of my questions centered around how unreliable forum listings can be. An individual posted that since LJ was muddy Penns would likely be also. All of this was sight unseen, thus my question as to whether he'd actually seen the conditions.

 

[JackM]

I thought he tried to give you helpful information to the best of his ability. As I read your posts, I did not get the impression you were either familiar with how the stream reacts to rain events, nor that you were requesting only eyewitness accounts.

 

[PENZZZ]

No problem Jack. If anyone else read the early post to infer that Penns wasn't in good, fishable conditions they lost out on a good opporunity. Saturday conditions were likely even better. I didn't see another fisherman all day Sunday in middle of the No Kill. For a lot of years I struggled to get reliable water condition reports for Penns. Then the USGS site came up and while that helps, clarity can't be determined by interpretation of flow rise or drop. Penns is unique and forecasts of its fishing conditions can't necessarily be connected to conditions elsewhere. You'll be wrong much of the time. That's why a visual is most valuable, but even then we all have our own feelings about which conditions fish best.

Jeff