Little J, Huntington County, 6/14/20

[greenghost]

TIME: 11:00am - 3:00pm

LOCATION: Above Spruce Creek

WEATHER: Mostly cloudy high around 70 degrees

WATER TEMP: 57 degrees at 3:00

BUGS: Caddis (green?) size 16, cahill size 14, BWO size 18, 20, Slate drake size 12 (yes, I'm sure)

FLOW: 141 cfs, median is 227

After a few cool nights, I thought I'd fish the river before a full-blast-furnace summer kicks in. Water was cool. River was buggy. And there were rising fish. The only problem was, I couldn't figure out what was bringing them to the top.

I first tried an elkhair green bodied caddis since I noticed quite a few of the bugs on the water. No go. I switched to cahill emerger. Nope. Then I thought that no matter what they were interested in, I'd throw a curveball-- a foam ant. Three flies, I'm out.

It was almost an hour since I arrived and I was nill. I stood mid-stream perplexed as at least a dozen fish rose around me. I noticed their rises were gentle almost like midging fish. That's when I saw a tiny BWO olive size 20-ish flittering off the surface. Then--like focusing on one of those paintings where you have to relax your vision to seen the hidden image-- I saw tons of those damned little bugs. Tied on 6x tippet and a size 20 BWO comp dun, flipped it out and without hesitation a fish took. All-in-all probably caught around 15 brownies, all cookie-cutter Little J size; 8 to 10 inches. After 2:00 the hatch slowed as the sun came out more often. I tied on a caddis nymph and started to work the deeper runs. Caught a couple of hefty fish, one close to 18".

A great day on the J. How can you not love that river.

 

[Dave_W]

Good to hear you solved the riddle.

I was up there in that same section a few days ago and saw the tiny BWOs... but the fish were not on them and everything I tried was ignored. My two buddies also struck out - tough day.

The only anglers I saw catch anything were a couple old timers fishing worms.

 

[greenghost]

Yes Dave, the J can be tough to figure sometimes. I got lucky. Plus yesterday's weather was a classic BWO day--cloudy and cool. It was also breezy at times. Between the lower light conditions and the breeze blowing the mayflies, it was difficult to see those tiny things. Of course, my old eyes aren't as sharp as they once were. Ha! The other thing that was strange was that there seemed to be more mayflies floating on the water than in the air. Fortune was on my side. For a change.

 

[Sharknado5]

I also fished above Spruce Creek last week on June 8. Not a BWO day at all but I did see the little buggers on the surface. I found a couple spots with small pods of rising fish and they were quite gentle rises, but I wasn't smart enough to try a BWO. I was enamored with the fairly steady cahill hatch (like the birds were), even tho my cahill was ignored, and I never saw a trout take one. I have to learn to be less stubborn, I guess.

 

[Swattie87]

I get stuck in this rut when Sulphurs are hatching too. Usually there are March Browns hatching too at the same time, and there's often more MB's than Sulphurs around. But more times than not the fish are taking Sulphur emergers. Switch to a Sulphur parachute or other Sulphur pattern that rides fairly low in the water and you'll start to pick them off. Sulphurs must taste better, or be easier to catch...I suspect the latter. 😛

I got burned one evening on Penns this year by this. MB's everywhere and I couldn't buy a strike all night. Only saw a handful of Sulphurs all night...On the walk out it hit me...Duh. I think next season from mid May to mid June I'm going to try starting with a Sulphur whether I see them or not, and then only switch to the bug I'm actually seeing if I'm not getting takes from the risers on the Sulphur.

 

[troutbert]

Sulphurs are also smaller than March Browns and Green Drakes.

With the smaller flies, it's easier to fool the trout.

With big flies, our fraudulent imitations are easier for them to detect.

 

[evw659]

Nice report.
For years, i underestimated the degree to which larger browns surface feed on the small stuff (olives, black caddis, small tan caddis etc.) on that river, even during a steady hatch of larger mayflies.
I primarily nymph the river but many of the larger fish i got out of there this year were on really small bwos/caddis, with the largest on a 20 bwo.
One fly that I have had a lot of success with there over fussy fish is a 18-22 olive quill body with a medium dun or slate cdc puff wing. Some of the caddis there have an emerald green body and this fly seems to pass for that as well as an olive.

 

[drakeking412]

Nice report. I was there on the 13th and saw the tiny BWO's but little to no rising fish to them. It was my first trip to the J and I really like that stream, my only problem is all the extracurricular stuff like drunken boaters and cameras on the banks. I'm going back next year for that sulphur hatch though.

 

[PennKev]

All-in-all probably caught around 15 brownies, all cookie-cutter Little J size; 8 to 10 inches.

That's actually a sad statement. There are still much bigger fish in the river for sure, but I can recall 20+ fish days where very few were much under 12" and it seemed like half were over 14". However, most of those days are 10 or more years ago. It really seems to have shifted from a river with a great size range of fish to lots of small ones and a handful of big fish.

 

[Prospector]

I’ve only fished there once, last summer, and the fish I caught and the others rising were all nice fish. So maybe location also factors into the average size.

 

[greenghost]

PennKev wrote:

All-in-all probably caught around 15 brownies, all cookie-cutter Little J size; 8 to 10 inches.

That's actually a sad statement. There are still much bigger fish in the river for sure, but I can recall 20+ fish days where very few were much under 12" and it seemed like half were over 14". However, most of those days are 10 or more years ago. It really seems to have shifted from a river with a great size range of fish to lots of small ones and a handful of big fish.

I'm primarily a dry fly guy. That definitely has something to do with the smaller size. Like I mentioned in the report, I did nymph a deeper shaded run and picked up a couple of bigger fish. One fat fish around 18"

Short of major hatches that bring even the big fish up, I've been catching the vast majority of fish in that range (7" - 12") on the river for nearly 40 years. I've had a few days where I've caught a lot of bigger fish... one of the biggest browns in my life (25") was caught on a slate drake dry about 5 years ago. And there are DEFINITELY stretches that hold bigger fish, but I never remember a period of time when I consistently caught big fish like you had mentioned.

Again, most likely that's just how, and where, I fish.

 

[PennKev]

My best time period on the LJR was probably 2006 to about 2012. I will agree with the notion that some areas are better for bigger fish than others and still are that way. Probably what has changed the most is that I can no longer have my first choice of spot (or second or third choice in many cases), so I am forced to fish areas that I would not spend as much time on otherwise.

 

[greenghost]

Yeah Kev, seems like the less fishing licenses sold the more crowded the Blue Ribbon waters get. Better spots on those waters get advertised and before you know it, you have a harder time accessing them. I’m changing my strategy for fishing lately. Fishing less known waters for non-typical species: carp and now, Muskie. Since you frequent some of the streams I fish in Western PA, you can probably guess where I’m spending more of my time. Without any crowd problems. ;-)

 

[larkmark]

Smaller fish will continue to be what you will mainly catch with all the constant pounding. Same with Spring Creek and Penns will go that route too. Too much pressure. The fish are caught over and over and die. Enjoy your hot dog sized fish guys.

 

[greenghost]

larkmark wrote:
Smaller fish will continue to be what you will mainly catch with all the constant pounding. Same with Spring Creek and Penns will go that route too. Too much pressure. The fish are caught over and over and die. Enjoy your hot dog sized fish guys.

Actually, studies have shown the opposite to be true. Catch and release increases the chances for larger trout to be caught. And to be honest the "pounding" isn't all that constant, especially after mid-June.

 

[evw659]

Smaller fish will continue to be what you will mainly catch with all the constant pounding. Same with Spring Creek and Penns will go that route too. Too much pressure. The fish are caught over and over and die. Enjoy your hot dog sized fish guys.

When was the last time you fished this river?

 

[DGC]

In 5 trips to LJ this year and about 40 trout total, none were under 11 inches and most were over 12. Very football shaped and muscular. I upped my tippet size at the expense of drift to better manage the odd 15inch to 18 inch.

 

[Dave_W]

LJ continues to produce some good sized fish for me. Last month I got a 14" on a sulphur dry and an 18" on a streamer on the same day.

I'm not an LJ regular but, in my experience, the fish are as strong and large as I remember.

 

[afishinado]

Dave_W wrote:
LJ continues to produce some good sized fish for me. Last month I got a 14" on a sulphur dry and an 18" on a streamer on the same day.

I'm not an LJ regular but, in my experience, the fish are as strong and large as I remember.

Yeah, me three! ^

The LJ gives up some really nice trout. The size of fish actually seems better now than a decade ago for me and many other anglers I've talked to recently.

It's a fairly long trip for me. I wish I had the chance to fish it more.

 

[Swattie87]

The last time I fished it (April 2017), I only fished for an hour or so, but hooked two Trout. I landed one, 16-17" range. The other, shot downstream and immediately and effortlessly pulled 40 feet of fly line, and then was gone. I was nymphing, with 5x to the bottom fly, and I assumed a break off, but when I pulled the line back in the full rig was still there. I never saw the fish, but I'm confident this was the largest Trout I've ever had attached to the end of my line. It was scary powerful.

The time before that (2016 I think?) I also only caught 2 fish, during an evening MB hatch in May, but there were both 12-14" range fish. I didn't catch any hot dogs that night, but I distinctly remember cooking a few up over the fire while listening to a Penguins playoff game on the radio back at camp that night.

Edit: Both of these outings were on probably the most popular stretch of the stream.