Little Sandy Creek, Venango County, 3/15 & 3/16/14

[streamerguy]

I usually don't post stream reports about LS or similar streams, but since I fished the popular section(FFO) and people may be interested about how the fingerling program is doing I figured why not. So here it goes...

Started the day off Saturday at [d]the zoo[/d] Neshannock Creek and it was packed with people. Didn't stick around all that long for obvious reasons. The stream had a nice green color but was still on the high side.

After lunch my brother and I decided to take a ride up to the family cottage with a stop at Little Sandy along the way. We fished from the upper FFO down to a little ways past the trestle. Caught two fish that looked like the fingerlings from the 2012 stocking, two holdover browns that I'm guessing were from last spring's stocking and swam in from the open regs water(adipose not clipped), a couple fingerlings from this past falls stocking, and some fresh stocked bows and browns at the extreme upper part of the FFO section that swam down from the open regs water, which was just stocked recently. Also ran into a fellow board member. I can't remember the screen name to save my life but if you're reading this it was nice chatting with you Jim!!

On the way back home yesterday we hit it again. For me, yesterday was just one of those days.....nothing was going right. Caught some trees, had two fish break off on the hook set(which very very rarely happens to me) due to bad knots only to see the fish try to shake the fly out with me standing there helpless, almost stepped on a dead opossum on the stream bottom, and I lost what looked to be a nice sized beautiful wild brown at my feet. And to top it off the ice on the rod/line was an extra PITA yesterday. This time we fished the entire special regs section, though the fishing wasn't as good as yesterday. Other than the wild fish I lost, the only fish we caught were some fresh stockies and a few fingerlings from last fall at the very upper end. Here's a couple fish pics...

Fall 2012 fingerling...

Spring 2013 holdover?

I know it's hard to make conclusions after fishing a freestoner in lake winter/early spring with cold water temps, but in regards to the fingerling program I still don't think it's going as well as some thought it would. Compared to the huge numbers of fish seen the past two falls after they were stocked, most of them definitely aren't sticking around very long. Hopefully they aren't wreacking havoc on the wild fish in other parts of the stream, or maybe they're getting eaten by bass, muskies, and pike in Sandy or the Allegheny by now.

 

[boychick]

Nice report, thanks for sharing. Looks like you guys had a good weekend despite your rough day. Look at the bright side, the day could have been worse; you could have actually stepped on the dead possum. 😉

 

[streamerguy]

Thanks, and you're right, things could have ended much worse!!! Overall a good weekend, just frustrating spending 10 min untangling my line from a branch only to lose my fly on the very next cast haha. And I know where that brown lives ;-) I'll get him next time. Also on the hunt for another individual fish, but I need to wait until the rest of the stream opens for him....

 

[boychick]

just frustrating spending 10 min untangling my line from a branch only to lose my fly on the very next cast

Yeah that's frustrating. It's even worse when its on the same darn branch (I speak from experience)!

 

[PennKev]

I know it's hard to make conclusions after fishing a freestoner in lake winter/early spring with cold water temps, but in regards to the fingerling program I still don't think it's going as well as some thought it would.

I think the fingerlings in Little Sandy may be doing a little better than average. At least some long term survivors are showing up. I still think trout reproduction is enough in that creek to support a solely wild population. The habitat (holding water) in the FFO needs to improve before that will happen though. Right now the fingerling program is just jamming more fish into the same limited amount of good habitat.

I guess we'll see some actual survey numbers eventually though. The PAFBC is supposed to be surveying for fingerling survival.

 

[Sylvaneous]

I have fished further up Little Sandy to the next bridge up and I can tell you it holds wild fish and it must then reproduce wild fish. There is no reason to stock fingerlings into this section for a few reasons. First, it's too small to not expect them to move around to the open water and get killed out. The other reason is that, as I found, it has wild fish reproducing and last, in the fly section, little sandy really lacks much habitat. The only really good water is the construction up at the upper section, then at the trestle down a short distance above the 62 bridge. The fast water at the end of the fly section seems to lack holding cover. Really, nothing will get very much better until more deep holding cover appears on this stream. They might as wel dump legal sized stockies in there to give us something to catch until Oil creek comes down later in the spring.

Syl

 

[streamerguy]

I agree with you both in regards to the holding water issues, at least in the upper third of the FFO section. And those fingerlings are definitely moving, I've gotten a bunch upstream of the regs area and I've even talked to someone who reported catching a bunch in Big Sandy. And fwiw, the better water on that stream is still getting stocked with adult stockies, plus the added fingerlings that wander out of the FFO section. It's best to just let it be, and leave the good holding water for the wild fish.

The PFBC did survey all the streams in the program before this past fall's stocking. Really interested in seeing the results...

 

[PennKev]

streamerguy wrote:
And those fingerlings are definitely moving, I've gotten a bunch upstream of the regs area and I've even talked to someone who reported catching a bunch in Big Sandy.

There were easily a hundred fingerlings in the hole underneath the first bridge above the FFO area almost immediately after the first stocking.

Funny thing about Big Sandy. Oil Creek TU had tried to get the PAFBC to stock fingerlings there years ago.