best trout stream

bowmandjk

bowmandjk

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Jan 14, 2007
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i was wondering what anyone else thinks is the best trout stream in northwest pa , i really love oil creek it has a nice hatch and the solitude to get away from everyone
 
My favorite, although I wouldn't call it the "best" is Mill creek in Clarion county near Strattenville. Has a couple of class A feeders as well.
 
My favorite, although I wouldn't call it the "best" is Mill creek in Clarion county.

The same name is used for several creeks in PA.
I was born in Doylestown, PA and went to high school at Central Bucks and the best fishing of my life was at Mill Creek!! Three miles north of Doylestown on Edison-Furlong Rd!
Mill Creek, in Bucks County, is now a almost dried up ditch with nothing but snakes!
Not too far from JayL was trout fishing paradise only 40 years ago.
Thanks Gamber for the wonderful flashback of my fishing youth.
Oh, how I wish I had a time machine.
 
DSCN1971.jpg


This is the Mill Creek that runs thru St. Clair, PA.

Many Brown trout.. wink wink
 
The "V" as I like to call it or otherwise known as Valley Creek. Not the best but tough. Can send the best of them home ready to break their rod's in half. Don't wade unless your crossing or absolutely have too.
 
He did say NW PA.
 
lol I have never fished in North West PA
 
Chaz wrote:
He did say NW PA.

Sorry Chaz. I didn't do to well on my speed reading course. I missed that NW. It won't happen again sir!! :-D
 
My top 5 in NW PA:

1. Elk Creek (when steelhead are in)
2. Hemlock Creek and tribs
3. Oil Creek
4. W. Branch of Caldwell (and Caldwell itself)
5. Brookie streams. There are lots and they won't be mentioned.
 
I live about 45 min north of Pittsburgh so this is my home waters. I second Elk for steelies, Slippery rock for smallies, I like the Neshannock for the scenery, and the closest good trout fishery with SR.
Not that it even comes close to a good fishery, but I like Brady's run park in the first month of the season (that's the only time there's any fish in it before all the put and takers get to it) for the midge hatches. I have a few honey holes that I always, and I mean ALWAYS outfish all the bait fisherman early on when they hit my sz 20-22 griffiths gnats. I love the looks on their faces when I get a hit on my tiny fly, while they're wondering why the fish won't hit their maggots and rooster tails!

Question.... does anyone fish the Sandy creek, or little Sandy creek? I meant to go up this year and fish them, but never got the chance.
 
Well, with the standard disclaimer that "best" can mean a lot of things, I'll second a few of PCray's selections.
The WB Caldwell is (or can be..) a difficult stream, but despite decades of assorted insults, it remains a very good one. The Hemlock watershed while not overloaded with fish numbers is a unique and very beautiful place.

Depending upon how you define NW PA, there are a lot of good trout streams in the area.

From an ability/capacity to produce good numbers of wild fish/carry good numbers of stockies into Fall despite pressure and other insults and disregarding stream size, in the western portion of the NW region, it's difficult to beat either Sugar Creek watershed or a couple of the smaller drainage basins in the Oil Creek watershed from Titusville upstream. A little to the east, another watershed with very good physical characteristics and a considerable ability to produce wild fish is the Spring Creek watershed east of Corry. Good luck fishing most of it with a fly rod though, with a few exceptions.

If we expand NW PA to take in Warren, McKean, Elk and Forest Counties, the number of "good" trout streams increases considerably. Here in the ANF, if you're looking for decent wild trout fishing or again, streams with the ability to carry good numbers of stocked fish into Autumn, a general good rule of thumb is to concentrate on direct tribs to the Allegheny or Allegheny reservoir and spend less time in the Clarion basin or on streams that flow into Tionesta Creek from the south. This is general and there are exceptions, but its a fair rule of thumb.

Finally, there are some good, smaller trout streams that flow to the PA portion of the Allegheny in McKean County and the Susquehanna side of the drainage break in Elk and McKean counties also has quite a few good smaller streams.

Oil Creek, Neshannock, Brokenstraw, main stem of Tionesta Creek and even the South Br. of French Creek and in Erie County are all pleasant streams to fish with a fly rod when the water is cool and there are still a lot of stocked fish around. Oil Creek is probably the best of these in terms of holding fish, but the Brokenstraw can also be surprisingly good for this sort of larger water fishing..
 
RLeeP,

Spring Creek (near Corry) is North of Oil and Titusville, not East.

And there are plenty of good streams flowing into the Tionesta from the South. I get the feeling your comments are pointed at, in particular, Salmon Creek and The Branch. Those streams have nice structure and stay cold, but they aren't that good due to water chemistry I guess. So if thats what you were referring to, you are spot on, but I wouldn't expand that to include other streams coming from the south.

Tionesta Creek itself is a nice stream, but is severely limited by how warm it gets and how early it does it. Most of the watershed is very good indeed.
 
As mentioned above, "best" is way too subjective. There are tons of criteria, including hatches, trout biomass, habitat quality, etc. Just keep in mind that when people say "best", they are just talking about their favorites based on certain qualities.
 
>>RLeeP,

Spring Creek (near Corry) is North of Oil and Titusville, not East. >>

Well, yes. That's what I said. East of Corry. I referenced the watershed's directional relationship to Corry, not Titusville.

I'm sorry if I was less than fully clear about that.

Additionally.. You'll need to clarify this a little bit before I can decide if I agree:

>And there are plenty of good streams flowing into the Tionesta from the South. I get the feeling your comments are pointed at, in particular, Salmon Creek and The Branch. Those streams have nice structure and stay cold, but they aren't that good due to water chemistry I guess. So if thats what you were referring to, you are spot on, but I wouldn't expand that to include other streams coming from the south.>

The section of Tionesta Creek I'm referring to is pretty much from Lynch to Nebraska Bridge. Like the majority (there are a few exceptions) of the Clarion drainage, this area has some of the poorest buffering capacity in Pennsylvania, as I understand it and the streams here are (on average) notably less fertile than those of the upper Tionesta watershed and the direct tribs of the river. So, yes this would include the Salmon Creek drainage as well as Blue Eye. The Coon Creek watershed is supposed to be a little better, especially since some residual AMD there was cleaned up. But still, my understanding is that even it is relatively infertile even by ANF standards.

For the most part though, this increased infertility is not so pronounced that it precludes the area from having a number of pretty good wild ST fisheries. I should have said that in my original post.

The Clarion drainage (again as a general rule of thumb) is pretty much the same as these lower Tionesta tribs. In his book "Rivers of Pennsylvania", Tim Palmer notes that there are many first order streams in the Clarion basin with low flow PH's in the mid 5's. This leaves virtually no room for additional acidification before even brook trout cannot make it. Again, there are exceptions. The upper WB Clarion watershed was improving a good deal the last I looked into it and both BT and ST reproduction were up. So too with portions of the Spring Creek drainage. But by and large, streams like Maple, Millstone, Mill, Bear, even Spring and most of their tribs of significance are not and historically have not been good producers of wild trout, although as I recall from time to time brook trout pops build up relatively well in Upper Bear for example before crashing again.

I probably also should have originally noted that there are a number of good wild trout streams in the upper Tionesta basin, especially among the tribs of the West Branch. Maybe some of them enter from the south, I dunno...:)
 
Fished Little Sandy many times. Years ago (20) I lived in the Franklin, Oil City, Grove City, Barkeyville area. The area of Polk (little Sandy) year round was previously well stocked with rainbows and browns. The fishing in the fly only area was mostly easy access. Some areas were brushy and a chalange to cast.

Very typical stocked spec. regs stream. This was of course 15-20 years ago........ okay stream to fix your fishing Jones. Would more likely look at the streams that flow directly into the Allegheny River in the Franklin, Oil City area.. HINT HINT... some hold some incredible browns. Look for small streams.

If you want to learn a second language I would also consider taking up FRENCH ..... get it....

Have a great time.... DryFlyJC
 
RLeeP,

Regarding Corry and Spring Creek, I was referring to this snippet.

....Oil Creek watershed from Titusville upstream. A little to the east, another watershed with very good physical characteristics and a considerable ability to produce wild fish is the Spring Creek watershed.....

We all make mistakes, didn't mean to call you out, was just clarifying.

I've fished Spring Creek only a few times. My impression was that there weren't many fish, probably due to temperature, but the stream was fertile and the fish that were there grew big. I don't have much experience in the Clarion drainage.

Regarding the Tionesta drainage, I haven't fished much of Coon or BlueEye, mostly downstream of there. Between Minister and the dam, I can think of 3 streams which have fair to good wild brookie populations that flow into Tionesta from the south, which is, umm, basically all of them with the exception of the 2 previously mentioned. Two aren't even on the fish commission list, to my knowledge. The third is on it, both lists in fact. I'm sure you know it but I don't want to mention its name. You may or may not know that it also holds wild browns. As for the Branch, it has a few wild fish, but I remember when it was much better than it is today, and it still has tributaries that are very good. Salmon, likewise, has tributaries that are very good, though I don't ever recall the main stream being good. I always had the impression that those two streams had some sort of spill or something, as their drainages seem just fine but the main streams don't. Heck, Salmon won't even hold stocked fish for more than a few days, I guess it could be acidity but where's the acid coming from if the tribs are good?

I also fish the northside streams. They are good as well, and from a how good of fishing they are, I can't say I ever noticed a difference between the south side and the north side. You probably know more about fertility than I, but its only one of many factors.
 
dryflyjc wrote:
Fished Little Sandy many times. Years ago (20) I lived in the Franklin, Oil City, Grove City, Barkeyville area. The area of Polk (little Sandy) year round was previously well stocked with rainbows and browns. The fishing in the fly only area was mostly easy access. Some areas were brushy and a chalange to cast.

Very typical stocked spec. regs stream. This was of course 15-20 years ago........ okay stream to fix your fishing Jones.

I actually think Sandy could be a decent wild trout stream if given a chance, there are good numbers of small brookies and browns in the upper stretches and also a good number of wild fish in the special regs area. A little more habitat improvment would go a long way there.

Kev
 
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