Walnut Creek, Erie Co. 10/03/09

[ryguyfi]

Woke up at 4, on the stream at 7. Fished from 7 till 4. Parked at the access and walked up to the chutes. Went a little bit past the farthest chute, which is pretty tall and didn't see any fish up there. Didn't mean there aren't any, but no visable signs of any to me. Water was at a good level but stained. Visability was just a few inches. I found a nice run at a lower chute and fished next to a russian guy who was hooking fish pretty often. It looked like he was tipping his nymph with a meal worm or maggot. I had a few hookups in that hole on a blue egg and black stonefly nymph. I think I have some bad tippet and snapped 3 off there. I was fishing with 2 other guys and they weren't having much luck either so we went down to the real nut house in the project water hoping to find more and willing fish. I was expecting more people, but it was still fairly crouded. I saw a decent amount of hook ups and some fish roped, but there just doesn't seem to be that many fish in the stream. I had one more hookup by one of the log jams and 2 days later still can't get the skunk smell out. My brother in law landed 3, and my other buddy landed a small brown. Saw several browns landed, one nice one which was 20"+ with a nice hook jaw. I don't recall too many fish being caught in the 5-6lb range. Almost all the fish were LARGE and put up great fights. Looks to be a good year in terms of size.

I saw a few boats outside of the mouth, so that means they're trolling for the staged fish. I would estimate that not even 10% of the fish are in the streams so far. I had a ball even though I didn't catch anything and can't wait for the JAM in a few weeks. I need to go get some new tippet, I think mine was dry rotted.


Ryan



P.S. for those of you driving on rt 79 watch out for the construction. There were 2 times, once on the way up, once on the way down, where there was no warning and LITERALLY there was construction barriers right in our lane. The only warning was one sign about a mile or so behind it. It was very confusing but worth a laugh as the driver had to make some last minute swerves to avoid smashing some PennDot barriers.

 

[AmishOutlaw]

Nice report Ryan! I leave in 201 hours, can't wait. Thanks for the heads up on the rt 79 barriers.

 

[jaybo41]

Thanks for the report Ry, I've made the trek north many times and have come back with nothing. As long as you had fun and learned something from it, it's never a waste. If nothing else, you got some early scouting done. Sounds like more rain is needed but when they do make a run we're in for some nice sized fish. I have read this from several here and also on other forums. This is definately exciting news!

Watch out for the State boys during construction and from about Meadville on up to Erie. I always saw them sitting there waiting or having already pulled somebody over.

Tight lines!