Acid Rain and Un-surveyed streams

[PAgeologist]

Tumbling Run I believe is underlain by a quartzite and/or metarhyolite formation - neither of which is going to provide a whole lot of alkalinity or buffering capacity.

 

[FarmerDave]

PAgeologist wrote:
Well, if the Millstone watershed is worthwhile (if it meets our criteria), I may end up doing some projects there to get it restored some day. If it is part of the Allegheny or Ohio River basins its my area. Right now, I got a major one on the Blacklick in Indiana County and several others that I am a part of. Once some of those clear out, I will be looking to pick up some new ones.

Maybe I will take a trip up there soon to check it out just to get out of the office.

Trib of the Clarion so it is indeed the same Basin.

But IMO a more worthwhile stream would be Tobey Creek, the one in Clarion County. Not the one in Elk and Jefferson Counties which has already seen significant improvement. There has been some work done, but still a long way to go.

 

[troutbert]

bearfisherman wrote:
FD,

I have seen many of the same things in the Upper Millstone watershed. While you would think that area would be decent for natives, many of those streams are just dead.

The whole watershed has gone downhill in the last couple decades. The main stem and east branch used to have lots of natives - I haven't seen one in years.

In the Millstone Creek drainage, what do you think caused the decline?

 

[FarmerDave]

bearfisherman wrote:
FD,

I have seen many of the same things in the Upper Millstone watershed. While you would think that area would be decent for natives, many of those streams are just dead.

The whole watershed has gone downhill in the last couple decades. The main stem and east branch used to have lots of natives - I haven't seen one in years.

I looked at some maps and East Branch is the one I was thinking about. But there are also one or two on the upper part of West Branch closer to Marienville that are pretty ugly.

I can't prove it, but it looked to me like more than just acid rain (on east and west).

As far as declining numbers of natives over the past 20 years in East Branch Millstone goes, it is likely a result of effluent from white trucks if you know what I mean. IMO of course,

Note: I am not talking about he headwaters of East Branch. Bear is most likely way more familiar with that. I never fished it.

 

[MHanes]

Sediment is a problem in Millstone.

This entire area has pretty much lost the majority of its buffering capacity over the last 20 or so years when it comes to acid rain. Acid rain seems to cause a slow and steady death.

Many of these streams were never great for wild trout but they did have fishable populations. Its funny the stream on the southern side of the river in this area are all a lot more productive.

But as has been mentioned before the Clarion Watershed is terrible for wild trout so please fish else where! 😉

 

[bearfisherman]

That was my thought on it - the soils have just lost their buffering ability to any sort of acid precipitation, or snowmelt runoff. While the increased traffic due to gas development might have some recent effect on it, this has been a problem for more years than that.

We had a spot on the East Branch that used to be one of our go to spots for legal-sized natives. Haven't caught one there for years now.

I don't think that the swamp helps much either with summer warming.

 

[FarmerDave]

bearfisherman wrote:
That was my thought on it - the soils have just lost their buffering ability to any sort of acid precipitation, or snowmelt runoff. While the increased traffic due to gas development might have some recent effect on it, this has been a problem for more years than that.

We had a spot on the East Branch that used to be one of our go to spots for legal-sized natives. Haven't caught one there for years now.

I don't think that the swamp helps much either with summer warming.

The swamps certainly don't help with the warmup, but they do tend to raise the PH somewhat. Or so I have read. Chaz could likely comment on that. I know he has read a lot of studies.

That whole area kind of sucks when it comes to buffering. Even the man made ponds are too high in acid to product much more than stunted perch and sunfish.

Same is mostly true for the other side of 66.

Beautiful area, but kind of sterile.

 

[MHanes]

yeah the entire area is terrible stay away stay away! You will never catch quality trout in the national forest its totally a waste of time to try! 😉

Head to around Pittsburgh I hear the wild trout fishing is awesome there.

 

[FarmerDave]

MHanes wrote:
yeah the entire area is terrible stay away stay away! You will never catch quality trout in the national forest its totally a waste of time to try! 😉

Head to around Pittsburgh I hear the wild trout fishing is awesome there.

Yea, or Ohio.;-)

 

[pcray1231]

lol.

I'm not real familiar with Millstone, but do agree with you FD on the Salmon Creek drainage. That one would be worth a look too. There is one decent trib (Little Salmon), but just decent, not great. The Branch also has a few wild fish, but is far from good. But most of the tribs should hold brookies and don't, and the main stem itself won't even hold stockies for very long. And while it is overfished after stockings, harvest isn't the main issue. They leave. And you can verify this by fishing around the mouth, it is a non-stocked section of the Tionesta that becomes a hot spot a few days after they stock Salmon.

Ashame, too, because Salmon is a relatively large stream that has good structure and does stay cold. The Branch, too.

I don't really know that the problem is acid there, but always suspected it.

Troutbert, I too have fished Swift Run, with similar results as Swattie. It has fish, but it's not very good.

 

[bearfisherman]

I can remember helping to stock Millstone a few years ago when the fish were brought in from the Bellefonte hatchery. We would throw a bucket of fish in, and they would turn and run downstream as soon as they hit the water.

Growing up in limestone water and then getting thrown into that acid water had to be shock to the system.

 

[greenghost]

I used to hang out in that area (Cook Forest) years ago. I would fish for natives in Toms, Cathers, Maple, Coleman Run and many others. One of the first times I ever fished the Sulphur hatch was on Cathers. It seemingly brought every fish in the stream to the surface.

I began to notice a change in the late 70s early 80s. Fewer bugs. Less fish. Sterile streams. Got to be so bad I quit making the trek up that way. Last time I was there was 15 years ago.

 

[FarmerDave]

pcray1231 wrote:
lol.

I'm not real familiar with Millstone, but do agree with you FD on the Salmon Creek drainage. That one would be worth a look too. There is one decent trib (Little Salmon), but just decent, not great. The Branch also has a few wild fish, but is far from good. But most of the tribs should hold brookies and don't, and the main stem itself won't even hold stockies for very long. And while it is overfished after stockings, harvest isn't the main issue. They leave. And you can verify this by fishing around the mouth, it is a non-stocked section of the Tionesta that becomes a hot spot a few days after they stock Salmon.

Ashame, too, because Salmon is a relatively large stream that has good structure and does stay cold.

Agree 100%.

The Branch, too.

Agree about 75%.;-) It's a beautiful stream and cold, but the parts of it that I fished were fairly flat and lacking structure. No idea why, but it is the reason I didn't explore it more.

I don't really know that the problem is acid there, but always suspected it.

Definitely acid. There was some years where the Fish Commission didn't even stock it because the PH was too low. And notice they only stock brook trout in there. Browns would probably die within a half hour or so. Not always and not everywhere of course.

Little Salmon might be marginally better, but I don't remember every fishing it. I can however tell you that every trib of Salmon creek that is listed as having reproduction is Class D including Salmon, Little Salmon, and The Branch. The information I am looking at is over 12 year old (and proprietary;-)), but I doubt much has changed.

All that said, some of my best native trout fishing has been in small class C and D streams.

As far as the Millstone drainage goes, using the PFBC lists, East Branch has no natural reproduction in it or in any of it's tribs. West Branch has 3 small tribs with reproduction and none of those are on my old list. All within a national forest, too. By now, if there were ANY trout found, it would be on the list.

The drainage has been described well in this thread. Silt problem, and would dissolve Sandfly's mower in under a year. Somebody should crop dust the entire ANF with Tums.

I've only ever fished the Millstone drainage for stocked trout because it was convenient at the time. And stocked trout is all I ever caught. And the last time was probably 6 or 8 years ago.

Beautiful scenery, but... I'm not joking, either. A real shame.

 

[FarmerDave]

greenghost wrote:
I used to hang out in that area (Cook Forest) years ago. I would fish for natives in Toms, Cathers, Maple, Coleman Run and many others. One of the first times I ever fished the Sulphur hatch was on Cathers. It seemingly brought every fish in the stream to the surface.

I began to notice a change in the late 70s early 80s. Fewer bugs. Less fish. Sterile streams. Got to be so bad I quit making the trek up that way. Last time I was there was 15 years ago.

Didn't you notice the posted sings on Coleman, Shrec? ;-)

 

[greenghost]

FarmerDave wrote:


Didn't you notice the posted sings on Coleman, Shrec? ;-)

Dave, back when I fished it, there were none.

 

[FarmerDave]

greenghost wrote:

FarmerDave wrote:


Didn't you notice the posted sings on Coleman, Shrec? ;-)

Dave, back when I fished it, there were none.

Oh really. I fished it back in about 1978 and there were posted signs, so there! ;-)

Not all of it was posted then. We have had discussions about these streams years ago, so I am just funnin with you.

 

[greenghost]

I guess I fished it in 1977 then. :-D

 

[Chaz]

Swattie87 wrote:
A stream that strikes me as being another one that suffers from poor natural buffering (but is not in an AMD area) is Tumbling Run (E. Branch Antietam trib) in the southern part of Michaux SF. While there aren't necessarily a ton of great streams in that area, there are many that have wild Brookies in them. Tumbling Run is a classic looking, steep, and fairly decent sized plunge pool stream...but there's no Brookies in it. Frustrating when you're looking at pretty much perfect Brookie habitat in every bathtub pool. The stream bottom on that stream is a very fine white gravel, bordering on really big sand in places really...which given the absence of Brookies I assume is a poor natural buffer against acidic conditions?

That area of the state has quite a few infertile streams, I'm not sure why, but it's probably AMD. But then AMD doesn't just come from coal mines.

 

[Chaz]

FarmerDave wrote:

pcray1231 wrote:
lol.

I'm not real familiar with Millstone, but do agree with you FD on the Salmon Creek drainage. That one would be worth a look too. There is one decent trib (Little Salmon), but just decent, not great. The Branch also has a few wild fish, but is far from good. But most of the tribs should hold brookies and don't, and the main stem itself won't even hold stockies for very long. And while it is overfished after stockings, harvest isn't the main issue. They leave. And you can verify this by fishing around the mouth, it is a non-stocked section of the Tionesta that becomes a hot spot a few days after they stock Salmon.

Ashame, too, because Salmon is a relatively large stream that has good structure and does stay cold.

Agree 100%.

The Branch, too.

Agree about 75%.;-) It's a beautiful stream and cold, but the parts of it that I fished were fairly flat and lacking structure. No idea why, but it is the reason I didn't explore it more.

I don't really know that the problem is acid there, but always suspected it.

Definitely acid. There was some years where the Fish Commission didn't even stock it because the PH was too low. And notice they only stock brook trout in there. Browns would probably die within a half hour or so. Not always and not everywhere of course.

Little Salmon might be marginally better, but I don't remember every fishing it. I can however tell you that every trib of Salmon creek that is listed as having reproduction is Class D including Salmon, Little Salmon, and The Branch. The information I am looking at is over 12 year old (and proprietary;-)), but I doubt much has changed.

All that said, some of my best native trout fishing has been in small class C and D streams.

As far as the Millstone drainage goes, using the PFBC lists, East Branch has no natural reproduction in it or in any of it's tribs. West Branch has 3 small tribs with reproduction and none of those are on my old list. All within a national forest, too. By now, if there were ANY trout found, it would be on the list.

The drainage has been described well in this thread. Silt problem, and would dissolve Sandfly's mower in under a year. Somebody should crop dust the entire ANF with Tums.

I've only ever fished the Millstone drainage for stocked trout because it was convenient at the time. And stocked trout is all I ever caught. And the last time was probably 6 or 8 years ago.

Beautiful scenery, but... I'm not joking, either. A real shame.

Yeah acidic streams. Strange thing is there were mayflies in them when I fished them but I didn't catch anything in them.

 

[FarmerDave]

Chaz wrote:


Lots of caddis, too. We will have to have a discussion on those streams some day.

As Spring Creek and Millstone go (the ones in the ANF), for the most part I have only fished the main streams where they are stocked. there is at least one exception in the Spring Creek drainage which in my opinion is not nearly as bad, and I caught quite a few. I don't know the name of that trib, but I could find it again.;-)

My guess is most of the Spring Creek tribs, although impaired, still have some reproduction. Just not a lot of it.