East Br. Brandywine Creek, Chester County, 12/31/15

[sarce]

Fished the upper east Brandywine near a tributary mouth this afternoon from 1:45-4:45. Met up with Brownie101 and we fished until almost 3 without a hit. I think we were both using woolly buggers. He had to leave and around that time I switched to a #10 golden stonefly nymph. This fly seems to work very well in cold weather. I tie it very heavy and that allowed me to have slower drifts which I think turned out to be key today.

I ended up catching 2 wild browns, 10" and 11", in the Brandywine as well as a 14" fallfish that I initially thought was a nice holdover rainbow. I also managed a 9" wild brown in the tributary. The brown in the trib was rising to midges but took the nymph on the first cast. Water was slightly higher than normal for this time of year but didnt feel that cold. Easily mid 40's water temp with air temp about the same. 2 fish were holding in pretty deep water with some current, the third was in front of a rock next to a very fast run.

All in all a surprisingly good day on the water- I'm used to the wild browns in that part of the creek being smaller than the two I caught today. I'm also used to finding more stocked trout than wild there - not the case today.

 

[sarce]

Fish pics:

 

[geebee]

nice. i didn't know the EBB could hold wild fish.

 

[Mike]

Fishing the East Branch in certain areas puts you in close proximity to wild trout stream tribs. Given that we are now in the post-spawning period, it is a relatively high probability event that an angler can find wild trout in a receiving water near a wild trout trib. Check the wild trout streams list if you wish to find areas to target on receiving streams that are not generally considered to be wild trout streams and would normally be classified as transitional or warmwater streams based on their fish communities. I would not expect high numbers of wild fish, but perhaps a one to three fish trip would be a reasonable expectation for three hrs of fishing if the angler covers some ground....perhaps 300 to 400 yds of stream.

 

[sarce]

Geebee: Mike's comment is spot on regarding wild fish in the EBB. I think it is too silty to support reproduction on its own, but you can consistently find a few wild fish around tribs in the colder part of the year.

One exception was in 2009 which was unusually cool summer, I ran into small wild browns in many stretches that year where I haven't seen them since. One of them was right in the middle of the DHALO section.

 

[HopBack]

The East Branch does get very hot in the summer but there are a lot of springs and cold water seeps that flow into the creek above blue marsh creek which allow for a small resident population. I catch small wild Browns from time to time off the beaten path. It still amazes me that anything can survive the tremendous amount of pressure that steam receives.

 

[pcray1231]

I know where you were sarce!

Yeah, EBB itself has some wild fish in the upstream reaches, and farther down, has some wild trout tribs, with a few wild ones that find their way into the main stem in the colder months.

 

[sarce]

^yep! I know you have been there. One of my favorite spots back home.