Middle Creek Lancaster County 10/9/2020

[JeffP]

I fished Middle Creek tonight. There are plenty of trout left after a brutal summer. Plent of fish rising. I saw a lot of white midges and a larger white mayfly about a size 10. Would anyone know what that might be. I believe I saw the dun and the spinner. The spinner moved very fast right above the water and there where some vicious rises. This is the first I have really fished lower Middle in the fall. The fish were very picky. I hooked about half a dozen but only landed one. I also fished 2 days ago and saw much the same thing. I really came back to try for a big one that was rising when I had my spinning rod. The whole had a lot of flies on it tonight but no sign of him. I really think a survey would find some surprising results.

 

[The_Sasquatch]

JeffP wrote:
I fished Middle Creek tonight. There are plenty of trout left after a brutal summer. Plent of fish rising. I saw a lot of white midges and a larger white mayfly about a size 10. Would anyone know what that might be. I believe I saw the dun and the spinner. The spinner moved very fast right above the water and there where some vicious rises. This is the first I have really fished lower Middle in the fall. The fish were very picky. I hooked about half a dozen but only landed one. I also fished 2 days ago and saw much the same thing. I really came back to try for a big one that was rising when I had my spinning rod. The whole had a lot of flies on it tonight but no sign of him. I really think a survey would find some surprising results.

This is amazing to me that you're still finding trout this late in the stream. I lived near Middle Creek and after June it always seemed to go dead. I probably wasn't fishing it high enough!

 

[JeffP]

Sasquatch where did you fish it? I am shocked too but I'm way down on lower Middle. I probably saw 25 plus trout and I only his a couple holes. I really had meant to get some temps this summer, but I was scared that the summer would have wiped them out. Some suggested it was trout movement but they are in the same holes I left them in June. I may take tomorrow and do some wading and actually walk the creek especially in the area I caught wild browns in the spring. The only spring I really checked out was one that crosses Middle Creek Road was just about dry.

 

[The_Sasquatch]

Oh I fished lots of stretches of it when I was a kid. And I always thought that the stretches that were in the more wooded areas closer to the game preserve looked promising, but I NEVER caught trout in there after June, maybe early July. And I always wondered about it above the the reservoir, but never bothered.

I mean, you have to figure its getting a shot of cold water from Elder's Run and Furnace Run. Both of them have native trout. So, the stretches between those two tribs, that would somewhat make sense. But man. Down where Middle Creek Road crosses it? That's really far down.

But heck, I've caught a rainbow or two in the Cocalico in the dead heat of summer fishing for smallies! So stranger things have happened.

 

[Swattie87]

Elders Run and its 0.5 sq mile watershed has about the same flow rate as I do about 45 minutes after consuming a tall Miller Lite. 😛int: Not sure it’s making a significant cold water contribution to anything.

Furnace (with Segloch’s flow included) would make a decent contribution though. Furnace is probably 2/3 the size of Middle at their confluence. IIRC there was some recent discussion about several limestone springs entering downstream of there too.

 

[JeffP]

The dam kills Middle through the wooded section. Below Elders there were always some fish left in the fall. I would say most of the larger holes would have a fish or 2. The small hole where Elders runs in would usually have a couple in the fall. What we called Hershey's hole by Golden Witch always had a handful in the fall.My friend caught a 24 inch brown in some thin water below Hershey's one October. It's still on his wall. The large hole above Mt. Spring Road always had 2 or 3 as did the bridge hole. From our house (Corner of Forest Hill and Kleinfeltersville) downstream to the turnpike bridge always had scattered fish to make fall interesting.
Having said that, lower Middle is impressive. This spring I explored quite a bit, caught natives and noted a half-dozen decent sized springs. There are quite a bit of trout left in Middle. The habitat is great. There are a few farmer's dams bet they don't seem to hurt too much. Even where the stream is wide, it is tree-lined, rock-lined, and deep. If I can figure out how to re-post a thread I will. I had pictures of the springs and some wild browns I caught. Sulfur hatch was impressive and I saw many other species. The stream was absolutely pounded this spring and there are still fishable amounts of trout.

 

[JeffP]

Elders is small. We caught a lot of Brookies there in our younger day. A few brief surveys while walking the dog, have not turned up much in recent years. My brother did talk to someone this spring who said he caught a bunch so maybe its doing ok. It has been timbered a bunch in the headwaters over the past 10 years or so. Not sure why the state has done this.

 

[wgmiller]

The_Sasquatch wrote:
I probably wasn't fishing it high enough!

Perhaps you needed a little more "THC groove", eh? :hammer:

 

[The_Sasquatch]

JeffP wrote:
Elders is small. We caught a lot of Brookies there in our younger day. A few brief surveys while walking the dog, have not turned up much in recent years. My brother did talk to someone this spring who said he caught a bunch so maybe its doing ok. It has been timbered a bunch in the headwaters over the past 10 years or so. Not sure why the state has done this.

I last fished it in 2013ish, and caught a "good" amount. It wasn't a stellar day, but you wouldn't expect it to be in that stream. But I'd say it was the kind of catch you'd expect to have on a stream like that.

 

[JeffP]

Just updating with 2 more trips to lower Middle. My buddy and I fished last Saturday but only for a couple hours. Saw a decent amount (including a 15- incher) but didn't catch any. We fished streamers and ants. It was a cold morning so it probably would have been better if we had started at noon.
Yesterday a friend texted me 2 pictures of browns he caught on lower Middle. I was at my niece's soccer game, but was able to join him for 45 minutes as it was on my way home. When I got there, another car was parked next to his and he reported catching 6 including an 18 inch rainbow. It was in the same area that the landowner's son reported catching an 18 incher in August. His 2 and those 6 were all in an area a bit downstream from where my earlier report included seeing a lot of trout. While I fished with him he caught a rainbow up from Lincoln road. I didn't see as many as I had the last couple times but with the leaves and windy conditions it was harder to see in the water. I fished with an ant and black-nosed dace but came up empty. My friend (not a fly guy) said there were fish rising in a number of the pools where he started at further downstream. I continue to be amazed that lower Middle is still fishable. I bet if the Donegal or Octorara were not fall stocked, you would not see the numbers I have seen here. I think with the good hatches I saw in the spring, it could definitely be a delayed-harvest stream. Again, this stretch was really pounded this spring.

 

[salmonoid]

JeffP wrote:
Just updating with 2 more trips to lower Middle. My buddy and I fished last Saturday but only for a couple hours. Saw a decent amount (including a 15- incher) but didn't catch any. We fished streamers and ants. It was a cold morning so it probably would have been better if we had started at noon.
Yesterday a friend texted me 2 pictures of browns he caught on lower Middle. I was at my niece's soccer game, but was able to join him for 45 minutes as it was on my way home. When I got there, another car was parked next to his and he reported catching 6 including an 18 inch rainbow. It was in the same area that the landowner's son reported catching an 18 incher in August. His 2 and those 6 were all in an area a bit downstream from where my earlier report included seeing a lot of trout. While I fished with him he caught a rainbow up from Lincoln road. I didn't see as many as I had the last couple times but with the leaves and windy conditions it was harder to see in the water. I fished with an ant and black-nosed dace but came up empty. My friend (not a fly guy) said there were fish rising in a number of the pools where he started at further downstream. I continue to be amazed that lower Middle is still fishable. I bet if the Donegal or Octorara were not fall stocked, you would not see the numbers I have seen here. I think with the good hatches I saw in the spring, it could definitely be a delayed-harvest stream. Again, this stretch was really pounded this spring.

Neither Donegal or Octorara are fall stocked; only Muddy Run is stocked in Lancaster County in the fall (the reservoir, not what you could accurately nickname as half the other streams in Lancaster County). Donegal supports some natural reproduction and there might be a trib or two on Octorara that does as well, but I'd be really surprised if the West Branch has much in the way of holdover. I could be wrong - there are some nice wooded stretches, but the geology is very different than Middle Creek, where clearly there is limestone bedrock and springs and that helps add shots of cooling water. Octorara is predominantly schist.

It's neat to find stretches of stream that support trout life in areas that were maybe written off or overlooked by most.

 

[JeffP]

Agreed! My friend fought an 18 incher to the bank on Sunday. I made a stop at the bridge on Wissler Road and a nice trout sitting right there. May go looking for some spawning activity this weekend.