I've read that report, too. I wonder about the PFBC, though, and how accurate their reports are.
For instance, I ran into a guy from there this summer at a gas station in the morning. He saw the drift boat and came over to say hello and asked where we were fishing. I told him the Yough and he wanted more specificity because he'd been electro-shocking the river. I told him where we were putting in and he said to me that there were very few trout in that section of river. "Not a fishable population" were his exact words.
I thought he must have been joking or mistaken. But he wasn't. I was actually a bit worried. I hadn't been fishing this piece of river because of the low, warm water, but things had changed and I had decided to give it go. So I drove there thinking that maybe the heat or something else had caused a kill this summer. Needless to say, this PFBC guy who was in charge of counting fish on the river was absolutely wrong. Not even in the ballpark.
It was a bluebird day, but in spite of that, after seven hours of fishing, we still put over thirty trout ranging in size from 7-20 inches in the boat So any report that comes out of the FBC on the river is automatically suspect in my opinion. If anyone works for them and would like to comment, feel free. But that that information is going to come out in an official report and that someone got paid to be that incompetent is criminal. Is the whole organization that ineffectual?
As for fertility, if we're using that word to describe hatch density, then no, the river does not compare to some of the better hatch streams and rivers across the state. That being said, there are plenty of bugs, baitfish, crayfish, aquatic annelids, freshwater shrimp, and sowbugs in the river to maintain a nice population of trout and bass that grow to exceptional size.
There are hatches, and they generally come off like clockwork every day at the same time, and you can find trout eating every stage of that particular bug if you know when and where to look.
I don't know many people who've spent more time than myself chasing trout on the Yough. Is it a hard river to learn? Definitely. I learn new things about it constantly. And fishing being what it is, there are going to be tough days. But I personally haven't fished any other Pennsylvania trout water that is more productive in terms of quality fish on a day in, day out basis than the Yough.
That's all.
Ernie couldn't be more spot on with this reply. Are there day's when the Yough might stump even the most educated angler? Of course, but what stream doesn't? This past spring/summer on the Yough gave me some of the best fishing experiences that rivaled any good day I've had on a Central Pa stream....heck any stream I've ever fished and I've fished quite a few ( 4 years at PSU Main missing classes for hatches) What everyone is forgetting here is that 2 years ago the State had an excess of 25,000 fingerlings that were 7-9 inches instead of the dinkie 3-5 inchers they usually put in mass quantity on the Yough. That year not only did they stock their typical 250,000 some 3-5 inchers but sometime that summer they dumped an additional 25,000 that were slightly bigger. Well.....anyone that has fished the Yough this year (and caught fish) would notice an abundance of 14-16 rainbows that were identical to each other. Those were the fish from 2 years ago, they grew to that size in just 2 years. Call me stupid but the survival rate for a trout at 7-9 inches is going to be A LOT higher then the little guys they typically put in. Instead of stocking 250,000 little guys why not put in 100,000 of the 7-9 fish, make it 1 trout over 20 inches a day (similar to the San Juan) and you have yourself a World Class Fishery. The buglife is there....even at the damn you have a consistant BWO hatch most nights...the further down you go toward Ohiopyle the more bugs you get. The dry fly fishing was spectacular most of the season and sounds like it is picking up again. There were more fish this year then any other year in recent memory....this naturally creates more competition for food. The results were staggering.....Mayfly hatches I've scene in the past that went "Uneaten" were all of a sudden getting sucked in one by one on a daily basis by juicy 14-16 inch rainbows....because of the higher fish counts creating the competition for food! Even though I watched countless people taking way too many fish out of the Trophy Trout section this summer it sounds like a good amount of those 14-16 inch trout survived. Hopefully in the next few months a few of the guide services will be able to speak their mind to the Game Commision and open their eyes to the Potential of this Great River and manage it the way it deserves to be managed. As far as the report goes that recently came out........WOW what a laughing stock, maybe they should of concentrated on the riffles where trout like to go when oxygen levels are low 🙂
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