Kettle Creek, Potter County 4/27/10

[DaveKile]

Storm came through previous days and really drove all the water up in the area. Kettle seemed almost unaffected by the situation. Went over to the CRFFO project off Ole Bull.

Sunny, clear and very crisp out as a cold front really drove the temps down. Water and air got no better than 47 degrees. Very very windy.

Last time I was on Kettle Creek a couple of years ago the whole stream was packed with anglers from Leidy Bridge to the project.

Nymphing seemed to worked best in the morning. Afternoon the hatches arrived. I felt like was on Penns Creek on a late May evening. Not a lot of bugs, but the list was quite diverse: Red Quills, Quill Gordons, Caddis, Little Yellow Stone Fly, Henderickson and then to top it we had a little early arrival from some March Browns.

That was the good news. To bad the trout didn't know they were supposed to come up for the afternoon buffet! Did catch a few on the project and then later down at Leidy Bridge on a Red Quills.

4/28 the wind was even stronger and no bugs through 3:00.

 

[govtmule]

sweet pics....

jeff

 

[troutslammer]

i have fished with the guy on the right at north fork fly project in brookville , i think he has a camp somewhere near there if i remember right

 

[DaveKile]

Troutslammer that is him.

 

[JKnPA]

Excellent Report......... good example that others can follow.
I always like to know what's hatching, and what patterns worked ; as opposed to how many fish one caught.
Could you name the insects shown? I think I know them, but not sure. I've never seen a 'Quill gordon', so that would be nice.
First Post.......... looks like a nice informative site.

Thanks,
JK

 

[DaveKile]

Sorry for the delay about the insect identification. Top to bottom.
Caddis underwater
March Brown
Hendrickson
March Brown
Quill Gordon
Caddis (sorry didn't take time to identify)

The March Browns were the biggest surprise. Seemed like that was a week or two early.

 

[JKnPA]

dkile wrote:
Sorry for the delay about the insect identification. Top to bottom.
Caddis underwater
March Brown
Hendrickson
March Brown
Quill Gordon
Caddis (sorry didn't take time to identify)

The March Browns were the biggest surprise. Seemed like that was a week or two early.

Dave,
Thank you. Nice photos!
I assume insect #5 and #7 are the same insect....... the Quill gordon.
I've never seen one astream........ yet!

 

[gutcutter]

i fished kettle in the same general area 4/29-5/1.
saw the march browns, too and i'll swear i saw some sulfurs.
these were the oddballs. throw in a few species of stoneflies and a couple of caddis and the smaller midges.
the usual suspects were there in full force - mainly bluequill and redquill.
spinner fall was awesome but you had to fish until it was dark and bats were hitting your fly and even after that then it was time to quit.
the emergence was pretty good, too. it just wasn't the usual 10-12 and 1-3 bq then hendrickson routine.
the bq came off as soon as it started to get light and the redquills started before the bq stopped.
it was all but over by 11am. i had rising fish everywhere and not a worm-slinger in sight to share it with!!!
the bait guys (and almost all of the flyfishermen) seemed to be chasing hatchery trucks as there were very few people fishing the state park or the project 4.5 miles below
that was just fine with me...

 

[DaveKile]

Wow I need to do better when I am commenting on my pictures. I went back and looked at my original 8 meg pictures to get the details. The mayflies that were pictured were:
Hendricksons - is the Ephemerella subvaria and has three tails
Quill Gordons - I am sure is the Epeorus plurals and has two Tails

The flies are as follows:
#1 Caddis underwater
#2 March Brown - Two tails
#3 Hendrickson - Tails uncertain, but wing veins don't diverge at base and others photos show the three tails in a few pictures about 20 seconds a part
#4 March Brown - Two tails
#5 Quill Gordon (not) - Hendrickson - you need to look closely it has three tails and my mistake
#6 Caddis (not sure)
#7 Hendrickson - This is a Hendrickson because it has three tails

The picture I am adding has two tails and am uncertain if it is Quill Gordon or not. Lighting not good.

 

[JKnPA]

Dave,
Thanks for the update. Entomology is a big part of FlyFishing for me.
Anyway, I can't tell by the picture. The Quill gordon should have a grayish-yellow body, dark grayish-blue wings, and the legs should have brown mottling with heart-shaped markings.
It was originally classified as 'Iron fraudator', and called the 'iron blue dun'; I suspect because of the iron-blue color of its wings.

 

[DaveKile]

JK,

A little familiar with the name iron blue dun for Epeorus. We had a lot of different insects that afternoon. The three of us that were there felt for certain we saw them, but it did seem a little odd as it was after 3:00, the water was 47 degrees and it seemed almost late in the month for them.

Thanks