4.27.03 - Lehigh River - Lehighton to Bowmanstown

Water temp 54 F - flowing at about 1,300 CFS, beautiful day. Took our time and worked over some prime holes with nymphs, buggers and big wets while searching for some rising fish - missed a few with this method. We did finally find some rising fish and broke through. Boating two fish - browns about 14”. Very nice green body caddis (#12-14) hatch coming off from around 1:30 to 4:00. A few fish rising here and there but not consistent. It was good to see the bugs and a few fish going. Look for more fish to be looking up in the coming weeks.

4.26.03 - Penns Creek - Catch & Release Section

The grannoms are on - with still some hendricksons, quill gordons(??) and blue quills. Some hendrickson spinners in the air at dusk, however no spinner fall, since evening temps cooled too quick. (Maybe as the week progresses). Lots of rising fish to the grannoms throughout the day. Average size of fish caught were 14"-17" with a few in the 10-12" range. Also one sweet 16" bow was caught with a serious red stripe. Most fish were caught on the surface but the biggest fish caught/hooked subsurface....so what else is new for Penns. As the week moves on we should continue to see some grannoms around in the egg laying stage which should create good action with the above mayflys still hatcthing...Hopefully the spinners will fall in the evening to. Best bet for Grannoms next weekend would be upstream - above the tunnel, Poe Paddy area. Also have those March Brown nymphs handy and hi-stick the pocket water.

Upper Delaware River System

Saturday - Floated from Balls Eddy to Buck on Saturday. Long day on the water - 11:30am-7:45ish. Tons of bugs - especially in the West Branch, olives, little black stones, caddis - brown/black. No fish rising at all in the WB - as we got into the main stem, the bugs came and went and we did not see a rising fish until about dark prior to take-out. They were eating, I think little black caddis and there was also midge pupa in the water as well. And a lot of them as well - all over the surface film. Missed one there on a caddis. They were extremely wary of pressure. Pretty much threw streamers throughout the day - Aaron and Ryan with missed 3 nice fish on streamers - two hit it short or they missed setting the hook - both of these they saw come after the fly, which got them a little too pumped to set the hook arly I think. The third fish completely ripped off the entire leader - this was in the main stem so I bet it was a big fish. The leader was gone all the way to the knot to the fly line - surface explosion and all. The one fish we did get on a streamer was a beauty - 20" brown - sucked down the fly about 1.5" into its mouth. It came outta the main stem. Biggest fish to date in the boat this year. Nice job Aaron.

Sunday - We hammered down through from Balls Eddy to the now closed Orvis shop. Passed three drift boats in the first 15 minutes - the river is already getting lots of pressure. Nothing happening at all - not as many bugs as the day before. Water temps ranged from 43-49ish both days. Lots of sun both days, some wind Sat, more wind Sunday. A beautiful couple of days to be on the water.