Chasing the Cicadas

[jifigz]

Jifigz, long casts and finding pods was the key the other day. Was pretty wild watching them eat my flies. Told my brother it looked like they were making out with it before they would take it. Often, one would come look at my fly. Then the group would come over and one would snag it. They are definitely cruising around looking for them.

Well, they wouldn't have had to look very hard yesterday. The dang things were EVERYWHERE!

 

[tomgamber]

Tom, I'm pretty familiar with watching carp breed. They used to do it in my Juniata at the island in front of my parents' place before the population seems to have disappeared. Either way, I don't think they were spawning. I spoke to another boat, and they were catching carp on cicadas the day before. I think they were actually hooking cicadas on bait holder hooks.

excellent!

 

[mt_flyfisher]

I wonder if he missed the hatch.

 

[SBecker]

Got out on sayer’s yesterday chasing carp while on a boat. We did pretty well! Was my first time ever targeting them and after a few missed inhales, we figured it out and landed a few. They are super spooky and we definitely were moving around trying to find them, but they are definitely floating around looking for cicadas. Sight casting to them is a blast.

Chasing trout and watched this ol donut mouths lips slowly chasing my cicada down stream. Even though I knew it wasn’t a good idea on my 5wt, I couldn’t pull the fly away.

25’’ 8-10lbs

 

[sarce]

It's been a while since I've been on here. Life got busy, but this cicada talk has roped me back in! I was fortunate enough to get out on some local MD streams back in 2021 for brood X and did well the few times I did go. I wish I had gone more.

So as I sit here in MD eyeing up the PA cicada madness, I was just wondering if anyone could be so kind as to try and paint a picture of how far east and south these bugs are emerging (in numbers that fish actually notice). If you don't want to name streams, towns or geographic features work! Edited to add, I am talking about areas that haven't already been mentioned in this thread...I read the whole thing.

I have looked at some of those online report maps but find they are hit or miss, as there are entire counties that are supposed to have heavy emergence of brood XIV and yet these maps don't have any reports from these areas. I take it this is due to lack of participants in the surveys rather than lack of bugs, but I'd rather not drive 2+ hrs for a complete bust.

 

[Nocktavius]

It's been a while since I've been on here. Life got busy, but this cicada talk has roped me back in! I was fortunate enough to get out on some local MD streams back in 2021 for brood X and did well the few times I did go. I wish I had gone more.

So as I sit here in MD eyeing up the PA cicada madness, I was just wondering if anyone could be so kind as to try and paint a picture of how far east and south these bugs are emerging (in numbers that fish actually notice). If you don't want to name streams, towns or geographic features work! Edited to add, I am talking about areas that haven't already been mentioned in this thread...I read the whole thing.

I have looked at some of those online report maps but find they are hit or miss, as there are entire counties that are supposed to have heavy emergence of brood XIV and yet these maps don't have any reports from these areas. I take it this is due to lack of participants in the surveys rather than lack of bugs, but I'd rather not drive 2+ hrs for a complete bust.

Try the cicadasafari app. Should give you a good amount of intel on closer spots south and east.

 

[sarce]

Try the cicadasafari app. Should give you a good amount of intel on closer spots south and east.

I had not looked at that source yet, thanks!

So I pull it up and this is basically the area that baffles me. No reports anywhere here, really?

 

[Swattie87]

From what I’ve seen, the activity is north of that area.

That area had Cicadas in 2021. I fished a couple Brookie streams and they would try to eat them, but mostly couldn’t. I got lots of hits, but only successfully landed one. A standard Wulff worked just as well, and I switched to that and was catching them as normal.

 

[sarce]

From what I’ve seen, the activity is north of that area.

That area had Cicadas in 2021. I fished a couple Brookie streams and they would try to eat them, but mostly couldn’t. I got lots of hits, but only successfully landed one. A standard Wulff worked just as well, and I switched to that and was catching them as normal.

Thanks Swattie and that's very interesting because many of the counties in that area are shown as expecting "heavy emergence". And the same is true down here where some western MD counties are supposed to get heavy emergence, but they just had the 2021 brood.

My experience in 2021:
I went to my closest marginal wild trout stream during peak cicada. I only had 1.5 hrs to fish. I caught 6 wild browns on cicadas including a 14.5" which remains my largest brown in that specific stream. I also had an hour one day to fish the C&O canal and the cicadas were almost done by then, but I did manage to get a small 3-4 lb carp to chase down my imitation. I've been planning to hit this year's brood ever since!

 

[jifigz]

Alright, fellas. Yesterday, I got my first cicada eaters. The one stream that I have been monitoring had fish eating cicadas. I was throwing a streamer and catching fish and then I witnessed a nice brown of about 15" come up and crush a cicada as it drifted by. This led me to immediately tie on my new cicada pattern invention. After a few drifts over the fish, he tried to eat it, but the fish missed it. This led me to just keep casting it and seeing what would happen. I had many fish try to eat it, and I landed several, but I also lost several. The fly I schemed up is tied on a 3xl #8 streamer hook. I also witnessed a few refusals from fish. Overall, I like the pattern, but I think it has too much orange on it. I am going to tie the same basic pattern today with less orange and more black. The fish that I landed were so fat. They had guts that looked like they just didn't know they should stop eating. They were FAT!

After tying up some more flies today, I am headed back out and fishing as much as I can before this spectacle ends. The fish definitely want to eat your cicadas, folks. Get out there!