Clarks Creek and Brookies

[Wild_Trouter]

I remember the "old" Clark's as well. For me, that was the 80s and 90s, and was definitely a destination stream for me. Nothing like going there in the Summer with ants and beetles, and sniping lots of rising fish. An added bonus was large migratory browns headed upstream from Dehart Dam in the Fall. I tagged a few of those, and can tell you, that during the 80s and 90s, native brookies (never caught any >7") were alive and well in upper Clark's. I have not been back since ~2009 based on what I saw/how it fished, and doubt that I'd ever go back unless things drastically improved there. It's a shame given its location, that the powers that be are maintaining status quo.

 

[Bamboozle]

I remember the "old" Clark's as well. For me, that was the 80s and 90s, and was definitely a destination stream for me. Nothing like going there in the Summer with ants and beetles, and sniping lots of rising fish...

My favorite thing about Clark's was how cold the water was in the dead of summer which in turn cooled the air around the stream at least 10-20 degrees like air conditioning.

In later years before I stopped going, it was one of the only places I'd go trout fishing in August. I'd get there at first light and fish past dark using nothing but terrestrials & midges, wading the entire beat I fished without getting out of the water once, staying nice and cool...

I miss having that option the most...

 

[Andrwhite610]

I am intrigued. I think I will check out the Appalachian trail to the reservoir this spring. I’d check it out this weekend but guess it’s closed for stocking until opening day. 😜

 

[Bamboozle]

I am intrigued. I think I will check out the Appalachian trail to the reservoir this spring. I’d check it out this weekend but guess it’s closed for stocking until opening day. 😜

Section 4 from the Victoria Furnace parking area to the SGL shooting range parking area is Catch & Release Fly Fishing Only and open NOW...

This is the section most people are referring to when they complain about the fallen trees and general screwing up of the stream. If you want to get an idea of what we are talking about, that's where you should fish or at minimum take a walk...

IF you check out Sections 2 & 3 after Opening Day which are under Stocked Trout Waters regulations, AVOID going on or near any stocking dates because it can be a zoo, especially now that the fly guys are avoiding Section 4.

I made that mistake ONCE with Section 4 by not checking in advance. After that, I NEVER went close to a stocking date which may explain why I preferred fishing Clark's in the summer... 😉

 

[mgmunson]

Seems like another example of the PFBC and private entities loving a nice stretch of water to death. The brookies are gone bc of the stockers. They get outcompeted and forced higher and higher into the headwaters of our waterways. The downed hemlocks may have also had the consequence of increasing water temps to above lethal limits for ST.

I drive past Clarks a decent bit. I fished it once and that was enough for me. Plenty of tight mountain streams out there that aren't also the victims of reckless stocking and over-promotion

Careful, you're flirting with a ban talking like that!

I, for one, miss the brookie bros advocating for ST. I think there are some uncomfortable truths that have been missing from recent discussions re: stocking, brook trout, conservation, etc.

 

[Duriensbane]

Well i was just personally hoping for a decent catch, maybe 1 or 2, honestly ill visit the stream again, mostly because my balance is really good and i dont mind hiking around stuff. And my friend and I had a good time. But be warned, if you look at the PFBC website, the lower limit of the FFO area is posted, and posted really well. We entered in the first major clearing near a trickle of a UNT. Which takes you right towards a decent hole where i caught my first fish of the day, not sure whats below that, but id guess youd probly run into a few stockers, but as you move up the stream there are plenty of decent holes, then you get to a small bridge which has like 20 or so fish sitting in it, they dont take much, but there are atleast (will change after stocking) 2 or so 14in rainbows and a bunch of 10-12in browns right there. From the trail end towards the dam there is 1 fully jammed up deadfall dam, 100% no pass-through for fish which raised the water by about 5 feet on the pool side. Not sure if the state will bust it open or not, but that'd be where the water is getting warmed up in the summer and its not that far from the spillway.

 

[Bamboozle]

... But be warned, if you look at the PFBC website, the lower limit of the FFO area is posted, and posted really well. We entered in the first major clearing near a trickle of a UNT...

I'm confused...

I though you said in your original post that you fished Section 3 ("just above the end of the FFO section") and the following weekend from the AT upstream, (also Section 3)...'

Now you are referencing the "lower limit of the FFO" which is at the Victoria Furnace parking area between section 4 & 5...

Did you fish that too and is the bridge you are referring to the SGL bridge upstream of the lower limit of the FFO?

 

[troutbert]

From the trail end towards the dam there is 1 fully jammed up deadfall dam, 100% no pass-through for fish which raised the water by about 5 feet on the pool side. Not sure if the state will bust it open or not, but that'd be where the water is getting warmed up in the summer and its not that far from the spillway.

A 5 feet deep pool along with cover from downed trees is a BAD thing? I haven't seen the pool you're describing, but I'd think that a deep pool and cover from the logjam would translate into good fish holding water.

So much of Clarks Creek (and many other streams) is dominated by shallow water and limited cover, which is poor fish holding water.

 

[Nocktavius]

Careful, you're flirting with a ban talking like that!

I, for one, miss the brookie bros advocating for ST. I think there are some uncomfortable truths that have been missing from recent discussions re: stocking, brook trout, conservation, etc.

I like fishing blue ribbon wild trout water filled with browns and rainbows as much as anybody (definitely not a ST bro, although getting banned would probably just result in less time wasted on here and I really didn’t like the way things went down with those native fish conversations).

But Clark’s looked and fished like a classic Brookie stream before all the “fly fish only special regs 10 truckloads of mushmouths“ business started a few years back. And all the publicity that came with it. You couldn’t talk about fly fishing in south central PA during the 2010’s without somebody yelling “You ever fish Clarks?!”. For a stream that size, it was never going to work out well. The adelgid just accelerated the inevitable out there.

 

[Dr.J 1952]

I live in Pittsburgh but fished Clark’s once in May 2007. The only way I remember is because I used to keep fishing logs. I believe I started near the shooting range and went downstream. I recall fishing small drys under low trees. My log says I landed 11. I fished a big pool around 3 pm but by then the fish were getting picky. Overall, I had a good time and thought it was a nice stream. Sad if it’s gone downhill. I thought it was a DLHAO stream. Did they change it to a FFO or am I mistaken?

 

[troutbert]

But Clark’s looked and fished like a classic Brookie stream before all the “fly fish only special regs 10 truckloads of mushmouths“ business started a few years back. And all the publicity that came with it. You couldn’t talk about fly fishing in south central PA during the 2010’s without somebody yelling “You ever fish Clarks?!”. For a stream that size, it was never going to work out well. The adelgid just accelerated the inevitable out there.

Clarks Creek has been a stocked stream and a special regs stream for a very long time, right?

 

[SlateDrake94]

I am intrigued. I think I will check out the Appalachian trail to the reservoir this spring. I’d check it out this weekend but guess it’s closed for stocking until opening day. 😜

I trashed Clarks until I tried the app trail stretch. I hit a good march brown hatch in May and later had a decent day in July. Only thing I caught in the FFO are chubs and a 4 inch brown. And It's flat and boring.

 

[TimMurphy]

Clarks Creek has been a stocked stream and a special regs stream for a very long time, right?

Dear troubert,

Yes, it was a stocked stream. But it had populations of both wild brown and brook trout when I moved to the Harrisburg area in 2001. If I had a dollar for every time I drove up to the Appalachian Trail parking area and did informal angler surveys once the season opened and got the response, "They sure stocked a lot of dinks this year," I'd be a rich man.

Lots of people would walk by with stringers of pasty stockers and complain about the bright and beautiful 7- and 8-inch wild fish they kept because they thought the State wasn't doing its job and stocking "dandies."

It was a very good stream back then for people that walked a bit. But given what it has become today I wouldn't have even bothered with it like I did when I was 40 years old. I'm glad I did bother, but sorry I won't again.

Regards,

Tim Murphy 🙂

 

[TimMurphy]

The area near the Appalachian Trail access looks like a normal, typical PA freestone stream running through the woods.

The wide, flat sections further down always looked strange and it was a puzzlement as to WHY the stream looks so completely different in that section.

But, I've figured out the reason (I think). In that section, you'll notice that the banks are very high, which is not the case further up. Looking at the eroding cut banks, you'll see that the sediment is very sandy. IMHO what you are looking at is several feet of sandy legacy sediment that was deposited behind a dam built for the old iron furnace. Those high sandy banks do not continue further down the stream, and further up you also do not see that. The explanation IMHO is that sandy legacy sediment began behind the dam and continue up as far as the old dam had the stream impounded.

The stream is incised into that sandy legacy sediment, and does not have access to its former floodplain. So, in high flows the water erodes laterally, creating a wide, flat, mostly straight channel, with lots of sandy substrate.

Dear troubert,

I've said this before, and I'll say it again. Clarks Valley flows through 2 sandstone ridges. It's not legacy sediment, it's erosion at work. If man had never set foot in Clarks Valley until today the stream would still feature a sandy mostly flat feature-less bottom.

Regards,

Tim Murphy 🙂

 

[6xAdams(Jones)]

I've caught more than a few brook trout on Clark's, all stockers, all 8' - 10", all caught in Section 4, the FFO area.

Like Tim it's been long time since I fished Clark's although not 20 years, but I'm not in hurry to go back...

I don't take pictures of fish anymore but here's one from Clark's ALMOST 20 years ago:

View attachment 1641234457

Eight feet, ten inches?! 🤣

 

[lestrout]

Yo Tim - thanks for that very informative and revealing PA map showing the geologies. I have noticed a lot of different streambeds in our fair state.

 

[Duriensbane]

I'm confused...

I though you said in your original post that you fished Section 3 ("just above the end of the FFO section") and the following weekend from the AT upstream, (also Section 3)...'

Now you are referencing the "lower limit of the FFO" which is at the Victoria Furnace parking area between section 4 & 5...

Did you fish that too and is the bridge you are referring to the SGL bridge upstream of the lower limit of the FFO?

Yes, i went 2 weekends in a row, fished the FFO section first, followed by the trail access section the following.

 

[Bamboozle]

Eight feet, ten inches?! 🤣

I wish... 😉

 

[JimKennedy]

Dear troubert,

I've said this before, and I'll say it again. Clarks Valley flows through 2 sandstone ridges. It's not legacy sediment, it's erosion at work. If man had never set foot in Clarks Valley until today the stream would still feature a sandy mostly flat feature-less bottom.

Regards,

Tim Murphy 🙂

View attachment 1641234469

All of the sand makes a lot more sense to me. If I'm following this correctly, Clark's flows out of a Pennsylvanian formation consisting of sandstone, red shale and gray shale, and into a Mississippian formation of red and gray sandstone and shale. That explains why the creek usually doesn't get muddy, since sand just settles out.

Way back when in the late 1970s and early 1980s, Clark's was a wonderful place. I learned proper nightcrawler technique from my dad down on the kids section at Stackpole. Then we would go up to fhe fly section and I learned to fish little nymphs and beetle patterns. It's very disappointing to see the tangle of deadwood, but I do enjoy paying a visit to the creek every season or two.

And when a kid is in tow, that kids section at Stackpole is number 1 on my list.