It's been a few weeks and I was curious to see how the Little Skuke was doing. I am constantly imagining that unicorn brown that I know is in there somewhere! I met up with a fellow PAFF member, Adam.  He met up with me before and I started him on the basics of pinning for trout. Since he struggled a little and got the skunk last time, he was a little hesitant to put down the fly rod. After a few hours of no solid hook ups, he quickly switched to the pin and began nailing fish after fish. He was starting to make it look too easy. After a few more hours of snow and fish, it really sunk in as to where the fish were and how they were holding in the water. That in itself would help with his flyfishing as well. I caught  2nice browns 12-14" and we both caught a ton of rainbows ranging from small fingerlings up to 20 or so inches. Around 5pm, we called it quits. I was standing on an overcut that I've stood on many times before. It gave way and I landed in 6ft of freezing cold water. Needless to say I did not bring an extra set of pants. No visit to Cabela's today!

I give thanks to my family for putting up with my addiction to fishing. Although you can't blame me, it's in my blood. This morning, I met up with a fellow PAFF member. He's been a fisherman his entire life and is new to his new passion... fly fishing. Due to the cold weather, I decided to show him  CP'ing for trout instead. This was very new to him and as expected, he needed to get the cast down. After an hour or so of some one on one lessons, we were off to the water. Water levels were a little low and crystal clear. No fish came to hand today. We were only out for a couple hours, but he was like a sponge. He absorbed everything he experienced and I am sure he will be putting some of that to good use someday when he hits the stream on his own with the fly rod.
After we parted ways for the day, I passed a small road that runs along the headwaters of the stream. I knew of two good pools that I was sure held fish and that it would only take a few minutes to obtain some slime on my hands. 15 mins later, I landed a nice little brown. Maybe 6-7" at the most. a few minutes later, I managed to land a small bow... parr marks and all.

I am currently in the market for a decent waterproof camera.  I have a bad habit of losing anf breaking them. The last one I bought takes terrible pictures. I lost it, bought another cheap one, and then found the last one I lost.
I'm thinkning about getting a Go Pro so hopefully there will be some cool videos being posted soon. Today, we tried a few sections of the Brodhead. This creek has always drawn me to it. After a few hours of the skunk, we tried the Busk Kill.  A few hours of no action, finally something hit and it was pretty decent. However, it never made it to the hand. Alright... only a few hours of sunlight left and no fish slime on the hands, it was time to catch some fish. On the way home, we stopped by one of my favorite little spring creeks. We only had an hour left until sun down. In that hours, I managed to net 4 small browns and 2 small bows. Well it seems as though the browns were done doing their thing as they were all skinny with very little girth to them at all.

Sorry folks, no pictures today. It's difficult to have the camera ready when you've got a gem in your hands and it's trying to get back in the water so it can breathe. On that note, I forgot to mention on my last post that the storm actually did some good for spawning trout. Sandy cleaned the trees and the streams of unwanted leaves.
It made for some good fishing and also gave the trout leaf free spawing areas. Today, we decided to hit the Li'l Skuke. For those who do not know the river, it's a tributary to the main stem, the Schuylkill River. Located just a little north of Cabela's in Hamburg. There is a Delayed Harvest Artificial Lures Only section that is approximately 2 miles long and holds an abundment amount of browns, brooks, and rainbows. This section is overseen by Trout Unlimited and there are reward signs along the stream where TU is willing to pay $50 for any information leading to the arrest and conviction of anyone illegally fishing there. Neat concept, but I doubt it works. Knowing that, we'll keep an eye out and write down any plates, etc. We rarely run into many anglers there and most are fly fishing. We've seen a few spin/baitcast guys there and but very few bait-n-wait guys.  Now on to the fish...
The water was a little off color and up a bit due to the rain that had just seized. It was around 9am when we hit the river and action started off slow. We should've gave the fish some time to warm up and went to Cabela's 1st to grab some supplies. But we were there so we started off just checking out the changes that Sandy had made. After changing our offerings numerous times, we determined  that the higher water required a different shot arrangement and a larger float. I started off by reversing the shot order so that the larger shot was at the bottom and the smaller shot was up top. I immediately hooked up and it was a nice brownie. The gentleman that was with me quickly changed up after my 5th or so fish and also began to hook up. It was on! We caught numerous wild browns all 8-14" in length and stocky bows up to 16". 2 of the rainbows were expelling eggs and one milted all over my hand.  It was good to see the river was in good shape and the trout were back to doing their normal fall routine.

Today started out as a recon mission. After Hurricane Sandy, we wanted to check out some local waters to see hour much the wind and rain changed some of our favorite spots. We were also interested to see how the fish made it through the storm. Although we did not receive the 10+ inches of rain that was forecasted, we did get the 80 MPH winds which caused a lot of downed trees and power lines. After a few days with no electricity and no communications, it was nice to get  out for the day. There were alot of trees down, but none that did any damage to the Saucon. In fact, Sandy removed some of the trees that were there from previous storms. It was also nice to see that the storm removed the majority of the leaves from the trees and the the streambed. The water was crystal clear and cold. The browns were more than willing to come out and play. No rainbows today, but the quality of fish more than made up for the lack of variety. Hooked up with some juvies with parr marks and on up to 12-14" adults with some in full prespawn colors.