mt_flyfisher
Well-known member
I often fished Penns from the mid-1960’s to 2000, but then fished it infrequently until 2018 during which I spent the summers in Montana. I have begun fishing it more during the past half dozen years. I fished it mostly from the trestle just upstream of Poe Paddy to a couple miles below the tunnel.
Based on my observations of fishing that section of Penns, there seems to be more trout there now than I recall from several or more decades ago, and (don’t hold me to it, as my memory isn’t completely certain) I believe there were a couple years, probably in the early 1970’s, when that entire stretch of water was opened to regular fishing, with no special regulations. During that period of time, I saw guys keeping stringers of nice trout, and there seemed to be some larger fish being caught.
Probably the best fish I ever saw taken there (and killed) was (I estimated at the time) a brown that was all of 20”+ and 4#, caught on #16 Adam’s dry late in the evening. My friend caught a brown above the trestle at dark one night that was about 20”. Both of these fish were in the late 1960’s or early 1970’s.
For a couple years during the early 1970’s I used to run into an old guy from time to time who owned property adjacent to the Poe Paddy campground on Tunnel Road. He and his wife sometimes camped on his property or in the Poe Paddy campground, and we often met them at our campfire in the campground in the evening when we also camped there.
He said his father had once owned the camp along the railroad tracks just beyond the end of the tunnel, and rode the train from their home near Lewisburg to their camp. That could have been in the 1920’s, or maybe the 1930’s. He said the train would stop right at their camp to let them off, and later to pick them up when they returned home. There’s no way to prove it, but he said he once caught a 30” brown at the lower end of Broad Water.
I can’t say for sure or not that during the 60 years that I’ve fished Penns whether the trout have gotten smaller, but there have always been plenty of nice trout to make fishing a wonderful experience. On the other hand, there certainly seems to be more fisherman fishing there than there than there used to be, more of whom are much less respectful when fishing near others. (But that’s a subject for another day).
Based on my observations of fishing that section of Penns, there seems to be more trout there now than I recall from several or more decades ago, and (don’t hold me to it, as my memory isn’t completely certain) I believe there were a couple years, probably in the early 1970’s, when that entire stretch of water was opened to regular fishing, with no special regulations. During that period of time, I saw guys keeping stringers of nice trout, and there seemed to be some larger fish being caught.
Probably the best fish I ever saw taken there (and killed) was (I estimated at the time) a brown that was all of 20”+ and 4#, caught on #16 Adam’s dry late in the evening. My friend caught a brown above the trestle at dark one night that was about 20”. Both of these fish were in the late 1960’s or early 1970’s.
For a couple years during the early 1970’s I used to run into an old guy from time to time who owned property adjacent to the Poe Paddy campground on Tunnel Road. He and his wife sometimes camped on his property or in the Poe Paddy campground, and we often met them at our campfire in the campground in the evening when we also camped there.
He said his father had once owned the camp along the railroad tracks just beyond the end of the tunnel, and rode the train from their home near Lewisburg to their camp. That could have been in the 1920’s, or maybe the 1930’s. He said the train would stop right at their camp to let them off, and later to pick them up when they returned home. There’s no way to prove it, but he said he once caught a 30” brown at the lower end of Broad Water.
I can’t say for sure or not that during the 60 years that I’ve fished Penns whether the trout have gotten smaller, but there have always been plenty of nice trout to make fishing a wonderful experience. On the other hand, there certainly seems to be more fisherman fishing there than there than there used to be, more of whom are much less respectful when fishing near others. (But that’s a subject for another day).
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