Pennsylvania Fly Fishing

2013 Fly Fishing Jamboree and Meetup

Mon, 13 May 2013 11:00:00 -0000

Over the past 18 years one of the best things to come out of the site are meetups and the annual Paflyfish Spring Jamboree. The Spring Jamboree is our annual get together to fish, camp, tie flies and discuss the one that got away. Over the years we have found an accommodating campground in Central Pennsylvania for us all to meet and camp for the weekend. I wouldn't even call it an exclusive Pennsylvania event with folks coming from Ohio, New York, New Jersey, Maryland and Florida. Some photo's over the years are here.

We have a lot of fun fishing over some of Pennsylvania's finest streams. If the Green Drakes often hatching and many head over to Penns Creek. Other streams the Little J, Spruce, Fishing and Spring Creek all offer some of the best in class fishing in the region. In some years it has rained, well every year, and there are many alternatives to the bigger named streams as well.

This year is no exception and members on the forum are making plans to meet the weekend of May 17-19, 2013 at Seven Mountains Campground in Spring Mills, Pennsylvania. Please contact them if you would like to stay there that weekend. They have a limited number of cabins and campsites.

We are working on more details but often we will have guest speakers, casting lessons, fly tying lessons, gear swaps and cool gear to check out.

Friday, May 17th
Jam attendees often start arriving throughout the day if they haven't arrived earlier in the week. We don't have use of the pavilion until 3:00 PM on Friday. Stop by after 3:00PM to help or meet others trying to get back out on the water.

Saturday, May 18th
Coffee 6-9am available at the pavilion

Fire Ring at the pavilion around dark with Live Entertainment! - The PAFF Band gets going about 10:00 pm out some great tunes for all to enjoy. Hoping that Shaky and the rest of the band can get back together for more tour! If you'd like to join the band or just put in a solo performance, just bring your instrument and/or voice and let 'er rip. Quiet hours may be a factor. If we get all the sites booked for Seven Mountains, perhaps they'll extend them for us.

Sunday, May 19th
Coffee 6-9am available at the pavilion.

Streams like Penns Creek, Spring Creek, Spruce Creek, Little Juanita and Fishing Creek are all within an hour of the campground.

In addition to the expected fly fishing opportunities authors, fly shop owners, and other experts are usually in attendance and provide a lot of great knowledge at the evening gathers. Follow the latest details in the forum here.

Cicada Fly Fishing Coming Soon!

Wed, 08 May 2013 00:50:00 -0000

So you probably have already heard about the onslaught of cicadas coming our way on the nightly news and just about every other media source. Cicada's are just weeks away from inundating much of the east coast and more annoying news coverage to follow. Mainstream media will pull out the playbook and ultimately take it to a stupid level like encouraging some Honey Boo Boo wannabes into eating some of these Cicadoidea [latin]. By the end of the coverage, some clever reporter will talk about cicada soup or grilling them or better yet some dumb sauce to put on them.

Sorry I digress and back to trout eating cicada.

So will this be a big deal for fly fishing? For some of parts of the region it may be. It has been 17 years since the Brood II has emerged. Generally they will be covering North Carolina thru New York. But heavily in Eastern Pennsylvania* and New Jersey.

Generally, we will not see much activity until the ground temperature reaches 64 degrees. Most records seem to indicate that this late May to early June.

"Thermal soil temperature is one of the things that trigger their emergence, along with a gentle to moderate rainfall," Greg Hoover, Senior Extension Associate Ornamental Entomologist at The Pennsylvania State University, said.

These insects emerge, mate and die all within about two to three weeks. They have no mouths and do real no damage during this final stage. Remembering former cicada brood fests, it is really just a big pain in the ass having millions of these bugs all over the place. They get into your house, car and just about anything you leave open.

For fly fishing anglers what does this mean? Well these things are insects high in protein and will likely fall in the water. No fear trout and other fish will be eating them.

Will cicadas be the only thing in their diet, probably not. Being prepared with a few tied up cicadas is probably a pretty good idea. As Tom (Afishnado) posted, "I'd have to say the cicada hatch in Central PA a few years ago was one of the best kept secrets of all time." So no doubt this year cicada fly fishing for trout, carp and bass will be important.

Like any fish food it will always be shape, size and coloring that will be important for imitations. This things are pretty darn big at about 1 1/2 inches long. Dwight Landis (Troutbert) suggests starting with size 6 hook. Generally they are black bodied with orange accents in this Brood II. Deer hair ties similar to what you might use for bass flies are good. But as Ed Maurer (Heritage Angler) offers, "All my cicada patterns are now made with a foam body. Foam is your friend - embrace it." There is a lot of conversation on options, but I would go with Dave Weaver's (Fishidiot) tie he shares here. But it is anyone's bet!

I would be targeting bigger trout later in the day. Kind of normal trout feeding patterns. But this is a bit of crap shoot and older reports share tales of carp going crazy for these things too. If your next question is how do you cast and present this beast? Well firstly don't slam the darn thing into the pool you want to target. These things are pretty big and if done improperly you will likely scare out all the fish, herons and beavers for a 1/4 of mile, so go easy cowboy and have fun.

This is going to be interesting in a few weeks and love to hear if it is a bust or a boom?

* Additional notes on Pennsylvania cicada locations: Berks, Bucks, Carbon, Chester, Dauphin, Delaware, Lancaster, Lebanon, Lehigh, Luzerne, Monroe, Montgomery, Northampton, Philadelphia, Pike, Potter, Schuylkill, and Wyoming Counties

Team Paflyfish Brings it Home!!

Sun, 05 May 2013 01:40:00 -0000

Well I just received an email from Shane on the latest from the Harman Invitational. Phil ended the day on Friday having caught the biggest trout of the day. This put them into a good spot to start the day on Saturday. The day ended with Shane sharing the following line: "We brought it home!"

Here is Shane and Phil during their interview with Curtis Fleming from the Outdoor Channel

Congratulation to Shane "SBecker" Becker and Phil "PhilC" Chadbourn for their efforts this weekend and representing Paflyfish. More details when the guys get back home and to some cell coverage!!

Team Paflyfish at the Harman's Invitational 2013

Tue, 30 Apr 2013 11:00:00 -0000

Todd Harman, Owner of Harman's Luxury Log Cabins, approached me this past winter about making sure Paflyfish was represented at this years Harman's Invitational. The Harman's Invitational is a fly fishing competition with two-man teams hitting the North Fork of the South Branch River in West Virginia the weekend of May 3-5, 2013. Typically there are about seven to nine teams represented from the East Coast.

Plenty of big bows and avid anglers in a great setting!

Harman's Invitational 2012 on Fly Rod Chronicles

I received quite a bit of interest about this opportunity from several folks on the site. Not to miss out of the fun, Paflyfish rallied Shane "SBecker" Becker and Phil "PhilC" Chadbourn to represent us in West Virginia for the weekend. Shane and Phil will be heading down Thursday to get settled in and prepare for the tournament.

"I think it will be an amazing opportunity to represent the members of the site," shared Shane. "Hoping we can do well for Paflyfish while we are at Harman's this weekend."

Maurice helped make sure we sent the guys off with some new Paflyfish hats and shirts. I just asked them that they have fun and do their best.

We look forward to hearing about the weekend. The event will be covered by Fly Rod Chronicles with Curtis Fleming from the Outdoor Channel and aired at a future date.

Harman's Luxury Log Cabins is a sponsor of Paflyfish. The North Fork does not support naturally reproducing trout and is stocked by Harman's along 1 3/4 miles of water providing anglers with the opportunity to fish for rainbows, browns, brookies, tiger and golden trout. Everyone who has stayed has had rave reviews of their trip to Harman's.

Fly Rod Chronicles with Curtis Fleming airs weekly on the Outdoor Channel. Tuesdays at 11:30 a.m., Fridays at 1:00 p.m., & 6:30 p.m. EST every Saturday.

The Pennsylvania Fly Fishing Museum Grand Opening 2013

Thu, 25 Apr 2013 18:10:00 -0000

By Dave Weaver

Earlier this month, the Pennsylvania Fly Fishing Museum celebrated its grand opening and many from our PAFF community were in attendance. This museum, as many of you know, has been an accumulating collection of our stateâs legacy anglersâ equipment, papers, and flies etc for many years. Some of the collection has been on temporary loan to various communities around the state including here in Gettysburg. However, some of the best interpretive displays that many of you no doubt are familiar with have been displayed in a small museum located in a hallway in Fairfield Hall on the grounds of the Allenberry Playhouse. These displays are still there although the topic material has been rotated.

In recent years, as the museumâs collection has grown, there has been an effort to secure a larger space with the capacity for better displays showing the full fly tying desks or rod building shops of men like Vince Marinaro or George Harvey. These displays are similar to the ones that can be seen celebrating the Darbies or Wulffs in the Catskill Museum of Fly Fishing. In addition to Marinaro and Harvey, who have larger ârooms,â there are display booths for Joe Humphys, Jim Bashline, Ed Koch, Ed Shenk and several others. Speaking just for myself, when I gaze at the gear collections of so many great and innovative fly fishermen, Iâm often struck at how basic and well worn their equipment was. These guys donât often look as if they were kitted out with the latest high end stuff from the latest trendy catalog. In any event, if youâd like to check out the Pennsylvania Fly Fishing Museumâs website where you can see more pics of the museum, please hit: http://www.paflyfishing.org/.
You can also join or support the museum association.

Itâs a wonderful museum - kudos to the volunteers from the museum association who have worked so hard for so long to bring this new museum wing to fruition for us to enjoy. If youâre joining me for the 8 June Gettysburg/Cumberland Valley mini jam, weâll be making a brief detour to see this museum. Also, the following weekend is the museumâs annual Heritage Day on June 15th. Hope to see you there.

The main room with exhibitors
(Photo Courtesy Skybay)

âSkybayâ and âFishidiotâ
(Photo courtesy Skybay)

Mark Susinno at work.
I consider Mark to be the best painter of game fish in the world. Check him out at: http://www.natureartists.com/mark_susinno.asp
(Photo by Fishidiot)

George Harveyâs display booth
(Photo by Fishidiot)

Among the top notch tiers present for the event were our own
Paffers âWetfly01â and âFrequent Tierâ (Dave and Mike).

Check out Daveâs flies and methods at:
http://www.wetflywaterguides.com/

Fly Fishing Getting Started - The Mayfly Stages of Life 101

Mon, 22 Apr 2013 11:00:00 -0000

A mayfly hatch is the grand finale in the year long seasonal play that returns annually for trout and anglers.

This show begins the previous season with mature female mayflies, called spinners, laying their eggs on the surface of the water. The eggs shortly hatch into small larvae and quickly change to nymphs.

The nymph phase of the mayfly is the longest and will last just about one year. During this time the nymph will grow and molt regularly. Molting is when the mayfly breaks out of its old skin and a larger one is exposed underneath to protect it during the next growth cycle. A mayfly will molt many times during the several phases of its life.

The emergence stage can be a quick and dangerous time for these transitional nymphs. Trout can find and aggressively feed on these insects that normally may be hiding or burrowing at the bottom of a stream. Once the emerger swims to the surface film these nymphs molt their skins and expose there wings.

The cloudy, grayish wings they emerge with give them there name: dun. The duns sit on top of the water and prepare its wings for flight. Once the dun escapes the water, it will head for the trees for several days.

While maturation occurs during this stage a dun may molt several more times until it becomes a spinner. As spinners, male and female mayflies will seek each other out to mate. The females will quickly lay her eggs back at the water starting the cycle over again.

The cycle ends when the dead and dying mayflies drop to the stream. The spent wing spinner is the one final opportunity for tout to feed on the last stage of this great yearlong production provided by the mayfly.

To learn and discuss more about mayflies on the site head over to the Hatch and Entomology Forum

Spring brings an order of Trichoptera (Caddisflies)

Tue, 09 Apr 2013 00:00:00 -0000

As the longer April days warm the waters in the region this provides incentive for the caddisflies (Order Trichoptera) to begin their annual cycle. Not always the preferred insect of the fly anglers, but without a doubt the caddisfly is found in most all the waters in the region.

It is the one insect that has succeeded and thrived in streams that have been decimated with pollution. Streams like the Tulpehocken, Oil Creek and Casselman are are just a few streams known for their abundant caddis fly populations in our region. For many of these streams the caddisfly is so prolific that mayflies are an often after thought for anglers.

The caddisflies behavior is a little less predictable and is certainly one of the reasons it is not as popular for many anglers. Many mayflies can be timed to within a few days and hours. The Green Drakes on Penn's Creek are revered by anglers the same way the "Swallows" of Capistrano are anticipated at the Mission San Juan Capistrano. Caddis flies not so much.

That is not to say great hatches of caddisflies are not enjoyed by anglers and trout, as there can be wonderful evenings and days with them covering a stream. Just as often there can be sporadic emergers happening with without much fanfare.

There are over 1200 species of caddis flies in the country. They range in size and colors covering the gambit of black, green, tan, cream and white bodies. The more popular Grannom hatch do arrive across much of the region at the end of April and are much anticipated by anglers and trout alike.

To get some understanding of their cycle it is as easy to do as by simply lifting a rock the next time out on the water.

Many types of caddis larvae can be found at the bottom of the stream in self-made protected cases or roaming along the bottoms of streams. Some these species create protective cocoons made of small stones or sticks held together with silk like threads. This thread is also used to secure the larvae to the larger rocks or stream bed where they live.

As the caddisflies mature they reach the pupa stage were they hold-up inside their cases and prepare to emerge out as adults above the water. This transformation from water to wing is the most dangerous for all insects. The caddisfly rise from their cases often with the help of a small gas bubble pulling them towards the surface. Once there they emerge with their uniquely folded tent-style of wings they take flight.

The caddis return to lay their eggs either on the surface or by diving to the bottom depending on the species. Like when they emerge, this is the time when they are most susceptible to hungry trout. The cycle of life then returns as these eggs transform into the larvae again.

Like mayflies, caddis flies begin in ernest in April and are big part of many streams. Continued sporadic hatches can be found through the late Fall.

For more on this popular order of insects check out Gary LaFontaine's book Caddisflies.

Winter Photo Contest Awards 2013

Fri, 05 Apr 2013 00:30:00 -0000

It is always a lot of fun when members share their images from the stream. I love photography and try to capture those moments on the stream when I am fly fishing. So this winter we held a photo contest to add to the fun this winter.

Allen Fly Fishing sponsored our event this season and offered up some of their fine rods for our winners. I want to thank them for their support of the contest. Anglers can find out more about the complete line of rods, reels, hooks and lines that Allen Fly Fishing offers here.

So our judges enjoyed the many entries by members with the contest. Our first place goes to Dshee1 with Steelhead Beauty and wins the ATS 9'0" 5wt.

Second place to Tomitrout with Anticipation and wins the ATS 7'6" 3wt.

Finally and honorable mention by Studiomule for Snowman and is awarded the Compass 9'0" 5wt.

I want to thank all the participants who dared the cold and entered the contest. Thanks to our moderators/judges for their voting and of course Allen Fly Fishing for providing the rods to our three winners.

Winners please PM with your contact info.

No specific plans yet, but hoping to announce another contest this year. So keep those fly fishing images coming this spring and summer!

Launch of the new Pennsylvania Fly Fishing Magazine

Mon, 01 Apr 2013 04:10:00 -0000

Well it has been several years in the making, but today I am proud to announce the launch of Pennsylvania Fly Fishing Magazine. The regions newest and best publication about fly fishing in Pennsylvania. Here is my upcoming interview with Field and Stream due out in May.

Bob: So Dave what made you interested in creating a new fly fishing magazine?
Dave: The world is changing and timing is everything. The market seemed ripe to deliver a monthly highly visually and comprehensive publication about fly fishing in the region. There is so much to offer outside the overly dynamic world of the Internet. For some people web browsers can be pretty daunting Bob.

Bob: So Dave who will be reading this magazine?
Dave: Probably not a lot of people at first. Once I get past the viewership issue and the distribution thing worked out it will be smooth sailing. I am confident some successful mail campaigns will really spike readership and new reader awareness.

Bob: When will that happen?
Dave: I am looking to get those cards dropped in August. Can we talk about something else?

Bob: Sure Dave so who is it targeted for?
Dave: If they get Readers Digest those are my peeps.

Bob: So Dave would you say your market is anglers who fly fish in Pennsylvania that subscribe to Readers Digest?
Dave: You got it Bob and they are really adverse to technology.

Bob: Sounds like the Amish?
Dave: Can we talk about something else?

Read more after the break here

2013 PAFF Instructional Jamboree (aka Newbie Jam)

Mon, 25 Mar 2013 12:20:00 -0000

Heritage Angler, Pcray(in the photo) and Foxgap239 put together the planning for another Newbie Jam on March 16. One of the several meet ups every through out the year that members on the site put together to fish or provide instruction.

The focus of the jam was the coaching and training to those new to fly fishing. The Newbie Jam was held at the Wildlands Conservancy's Pool Wildlife Sanctuary in Emmaus, PA on March 16.

Several members here from Paflyfish helped Heritage Angler, Pcray and Foxgap239 to then deliver hands-on training about many different topics including:
â¢ Gear/Setup - âHead to Toeâ
â¢ Knot Instruction (hands on)
â¢ Leader Setups
â¢ Entomology (What trout eat, and their imitations)
â¢ Fly Tying For Beginners
â¢ Fly Casting Instruction
â¢ Where to Fish â Types of Streams, and How to Find Them.
â¢ Wild Brook Trout Fishing â Gear, Techniques, Navigation

Also in attendance was site sponsor Michael from Gogal Publishing sharing information about fishing guides.

I very popular event and one that speak volumes to the Paflyfish Community. Heritage Angler summed it up pretty well , "Today reminded me what good friends I've met through PAFF. I hope everyone makes the kind of friends that I've met here. Good fishing buddies are the best kind of friends, and I've been blessed with some truly great ones."

A special thanks to Heritage Angler, Pcray, Foxgap239 and all those who helped put this together.