Falling Springs Branch 22Jul2007

[albatross]

This was my first time on the FSB. On arrival I observed a nice brown holding above the bridge where I parked. I rigged-up a cricket pattern, and on the first cast I hooked up with my target fish. The fish promptly ran into a bed of watercress and burried himself. I had to wade out to try to free the fish from the weeds. As soon as I got him out of the cress, he made a run and easily snapped my 6X tippet. What a hoot! I was pretty charged up after that.

The next couple hours gave me some perspective and I didn't get so much as a rise to my fly. As I was comming back to the car to move I ran into a local gentleman who lurks (reads without posting) on our board here. He had seen my post about comming to FSB that day and wanted to show me around. He took me to another section of stream and walked me along pointing out the sections where the big fish lie. Then he went off to have dinner with his wife. I fished the section he showed me and spooked several nice fish. Just as the frustration was getting to me, a real nice brown came up and grabbed my hopper just in front of a log in the stream. My hookset pulled the brown partially onto the log and I could see he was a heavy fish. He got his wits about him and pulled my line over the log. Broke me off pretty quickly.

For not actually catching any, I sure had a nice day on the water hooking up with two large browns. I also had the pleasure of meeting meeting another flyfishing fanatic. He came back after dinner and we had a chance to talk and stalk a few more fish.

 

[shipnfish2006]

Glad to hear you had a fun outing. Those fish are very smart and the crazy thing is most locals use 7X on their terrestrials. Those fish get really dry fly scared in there by mid august, but you definitely did better then most do their first time on the stream.

 

[albatross]

My anonymous local benefactor recovered my hopper from the mouth of a fat 18 inch brown last evening. Seems my assessment of that fish after my brief hook-up was pretty accurate.

 

[mrchunk]

@albatross - your report and other post on Falling Springs has gotten me intrigued enough to have a go at it. My father-in-law who lives in the area has been working on me to hit the stream for many years. I grew up in Harrisburg and am familiar with most of the area streams but have never hit Falling Springs.

Where would you, or anyone familiar with FS for that matter, suggest I put in? I was going to start with the FFO section but I am very open for suggestions 🙂. Nothing better than hopper fishing IMO!

 

[albatross]

Mr. Chunk,

My only experience with FSB is the one day on the FFO section. I can't speak to the DHALO section wher there would be stockers mixed in with the wilds. The hopper fishing was fine, but I'll probably wait for cooler weather before I make another visit.

There are 4 or 5 places where roads cross the FFO section. Have a look at the water at each stream crossing and fish where you have the most confidence. There are fish thoughout the special regs section.