Schuylkill River - Berks County - 4/16/2024

[tjsingle]

Hey Guys,

A buddy and me floated the Schuylkill in Berks County yesterday for a 1/2 day float. We were targeting smallmouth, but they didn't exactly want to cooperate. The water was definitely higher than we've fished it, but with all the rain we had its expected.

Conditions:
Flow @ Reading USGS Gauge: 2500 CFS and dropping
Water Temp: Felt like low 50's, didn't get a reading
Clarity: Water was pretty clear, but had a tinge of green to it.

Fishing started pretty slow for the first mile. We really didn't move many fish. We tried with bigger streamers and sinking line, but ended up downsizing to smaller flies. Downsizing helped. Pretty quickly we picked up a standard 12" stocked brown trout.

It got interesting when I picked up an 18" rainbow, while we pulled off to wade fish.

Later I picked up an interestingly patterned brown trout. Looks stocked to me, but had nicer coloration on it even a blue spot on the cheek.

We ended up pulling off at another deep hole and fished it picking up the first smallie and 18" fallfish.

As we closed out the float we picked up another couple of smallmouth and my buddy caught a brook trout that I suspect is wild. It has the right proportions and I know some of the tribs do have brook trout.

​

Honestly, it was a odd but fun float. We've never caught trout in the Schuylkill, but we only really fished it for smallies later in the year. I assume most of the trout made their way into the river via the higher flows.


Tom

 

[Andrwhite610]

Very cool. Especially the brookie! Some days in the summer I can get very high numbers of dink smallies in the riffles. My friends catch nice browns here and there on jerkbaits smallie fishing early winter. I fish the skook often around Reading. Although recently I’ve become more interested in heading to the Susky for smallies. Was this north or south of Reading? Nice to see the variety.

 

[mszoke1802]

I've floated the skuke in areas around Reading, never had a lot of luck but always nice to be out on the water.

 

[tjsingle]

Very cool. Especially the brookie! Some days in the summer I can get very high numbers of dink smallies in the riffles. My friends catch nice browns here and there on jerkbaits smallie fishing early winter. I fish the skook often around Reading. Although recently I’ve become more interested in heading to the Susky for smallies. Was this north or south of Reading? Nice to see the variety.

This was north of Reading. Yeah we've only really floated the Skook for smallmouth, we started doing it in June 2023. Usually we catch a good amount, with some bigger ones mixed in. Like you said, usually the riffles produce a lot of little ones.

The brown trout in the river don't surprise me that much, especially with all the tribs that hold them. Although we never really found the time to float the river in the winter

The variety was interesting, honestly kind of unexpected

 

[Oregon_OwlII]

Interesting collection of fish.

 

[wbranch]

Hey Guys,

A buddy and me floated the Schuylkill in Berks County yesterday for a 1/2 day float. We were targeting smallmouth, but they didn't exactly want to cooperate. The water was definitely higher than we've fished it, but with all the rain we had its expected.

Conditions:
Flow @ Reading USGS Gauge: 2500 CFS and dropping
Water Temp: Felt like low 50's, didn't get a reading
Clarity: Water was pretty clear, but had a tinge of green to it.

Fishing started pretty slow for the first mile. We really didn't move many fish. We tried with bigger streamers and sinking line, but ended up downsizing to smaller flies. Downsizing helped. Pretty quickly we picked up a standard 12" stocked brown trout.

It got interesting when I picked up an 18" rainbow, while we pulled off to wade fish.

View attachment 1641235471​

Later I picked up an interestingly patterned brown trout. Looks stocked to me, but had nicer coloration on it even a blue spot on the cheek.

View attachment 1641235470​

We ended up pulling off at another deep hole and fished it picking up the first smallie and 18" fallfish.

View attachment 1641235468View attachment 1641235469​

As we closed out the float we picked up another couple of smallmouth and my buddy caught a brook trout that I suspect is wild. It has the right proportions and I know some of the tribs do have brook trout.

View attachment 1641235467
​

Honestly, it was a odd but fun float. We've never caught trout in the Schuylkill, but we only really fished it for smallies later in the year. I assume most of the trout made their way into the river via the higher flows.


Tom

It looks like you got the ultra rare PA Grand Slam! Brown, rainbow, brookie, smallmouth, and fallfish all in the same day.

 

[wgmiller]

The entire Schuylkill watershed is an underrated fishery, IMO. It suffered the effects of mining and other pollution for many years, but has really rebounded nicely.

 

[tjsingle]

The entire Schuylkill watershed is an underrated fishery, IMO. It suffered the effects of mining and other pollution for many years, but has really rebounded nicely.

Agreed. It's pretty cool to be able to fish for all types of warmwater species and drive say 30 minutes to go fish for native brook trout

 

[acesedgley]

I was wondering what you were floating in and what access you used.
I live near the river in Birdsboro,but want to explore above Reading more.
Feel free to p.m. me if you feel like replying.

 

[tjsingle]

I was wondering what you were floating in and what access you used.
I live near the river in Birdsboro,but want to explore above Reading more.
Feel free to p.m. me if you feel like replying.

We've floated a variety of sections on the Schuylkill. There's a good map on the Schuylkill River Water Trail with all the access points. We floated it in my buddies raft

 

[acesedgley]

Thx!

We've floated a variety of sections on the Schuylkill. There's a good map on the Schuylkill River Water Trail with all the access points. We floated it in my buddies raft

Thx!

 

[pcray1231]

I do summer trips on a yak, between Auburn and Hamburg mostly.. Yeah, smallmouths galore, you could catch 100 of the 6-7 inchers if you wanted. Generally stick to larger stickbaits and such to kinda target the larger ones, which there are some. Nice variety of other species thrown in for diversity, and its a pretty roadless stretch with some rapids and chutes for fun too.

 

[Mike]

Between Hamburg and Rt 222 there are two locations of which I am aware that RT have shown up with some consistency when the river is warm. One makes sense because it is at a limestone outcrop. I can’t speak to the other one other than perhaps the trib that it is near remains a bit cool in summer.

From Reading downstream to Gibralter there are also at least two or three stretches that have produced RT in summer. The catches of which I am aware, including my own, have been unintentional, non-targeted catches while fishing for SMB. The problem with those situations is that the fish are pulled out of whatever coldwater refuge exists into water that is too warm for survival and the angler generally has no idea where the refuge is located, so release back into the refuge doesn’t occur.

Original sources of the fish (all trout species) are plentiful because of the number of stocked and wild tribs and river stretches in the drainage. Additionally, trout should have no trouble surviving from fall to spring in the normally warmwater fisheries, Berks Co and Schuylkill Co portions of the river. Given the river’s historical water quality and habitat degradation even in my lifetime, that’s saying something!