Spring Creek Allegheny NF Fishing Info

[bearfisherman]

As much as geology has a lot to do with it, something else has happened recently - in the last 20 years. It could be that the soils, as poor as they are in that area, have completely lost an buffering ability and now the streams "spike" with precipitation events. Maybe it's something else.

But I know that the fishing has gone downhill. I know that there is a large catch and keep factor there, but there always has been. The streams don't hold stocked fish well anymore, and the wilds are all but gone.

 

[Mountainbrookie]

They do get too warm. I have taken temperature readings on Spring Creek, the lower section, that are 80+ during July and early August, sometimes as early as late June. During one of the few years we have a relatively wet, cool, summer (2009 comes to mind) the lower reaches of Spring Creek will hold stocked trout until fall. Millstone creek gets warm too but I have always been under the impression that it's more of a water quality issue there. I have never witnessed it firsthand but they say when it gets stocked in the spring the trout usually head downstream for the Clarion almost immediately. My success fishing the Clarion in this vicinity would suggest that to be true. I know the major branches of Millstone are literally red and very tannic.

 

[troutbert]

bearfisherman wrote:
As much as geology has a lot to do with it, something else has happened recently - in the last 20 years. It could be that the soils, as poor as they are in that area, have completely lost an buffering ability and now the streams "spike" with precipitation events. Maybe it's something else.

But I know that the fishing has gone downhill. I know that there is a large catch and keep factor there, but there always has been. The streams don't hold stocked fish well anymore, and the wilds are all but gone.

Those of you who have been doing the water sampling on Spring Creek, have you actually seen big pH drops with heavy rains and/or melting snow, and how low does the pH drop in these events?

 

[pcray1231]

A lot of streams, in my view, have actually gotten better. It's a little tough for me to tell, I'm still relatively young, so did the stream get better or did I get better at fishing it? It's especially true because I visit the area more rarely these days, so it might be years between my last visit to a stream and my next.

But, for me, many streams fish considerably better than they used to, and the occasional brown certainly shows up more than it used to.

Acid deposition has improved in NW PA. They keep good track and it's simply a fact, and it's the result of scrubbers on coal power stacks upwind. That said, it's still acidic. And was was mentioned, there's the effect of "using up" the buffering capability of the more infertile watersheds. i.e. acid rain effects are partially cumulative, and we're still adding, just at a lower rate. So my take is that whether the improvement in the acid rain situation corresponds to higher, or lower, pH in individual streams is highly variable. And one stream, which still has buffering capability remaining, may improve, while another a hill or two over, just exhausted the last of it's buffering capability and gets worse.

 

[Cornholio]

I used to fish that area a lot in my early days of fly fishing, but it has been ten years or so since I have gave that area a serious day of fishing. The vast majority of the fish in Spring Creek and Millstone creek are stockies. There is a tributary (or atleast used to be) to spring Creek that held Brookies, but as far as the main stem goes it gets way to warm for resident trout. I have caught smallmouth out of the lower end before and took water temps in the high 70's.
There is always that rare catch of a wild brown in Spring or Millstone, but I would assume the fish are travelers, constantly changing location with the seasons.

 

[troutbert]

Those streams do get warm in the lower ends. I took temps of 78F on both the East and West Branch, just above their confluence. And a temp of 80F on Spring Creek. And this was not at the worst of times. During severe weather conditions the temps would surely be warmer.

I saw lots of minnows in Millstone Creek. Streams that are highly acidified do not have any minnows.

 

[dryflyguy]

FWIW -

I've fished the lower part of millstone creek a couple times - just the last half mile above it's junction with the clarion. This was during the last 3 years now.
And I caught mostly, what appeared to be recently stocked fish. And I got the feeling that it was a put and take fishery - in that section anyway.
However, I also caught the largest tiger trout I've ever seen there. It was a beautifully colored fish of almost 16 inches in length.
I figured it had to have either held over in the creek, or swam up from the clarion

 

[Cornholio]

Dry fly guy, was there a chance that Tiger Trout was wild?

 

[dryflyguy]

Cornholio wrote:
Dry fly guy, was there a chance that Tiger Trout was wild?

I really doubt it. I didn't have my camera with me, but I remember it being very chunky with somewhat rounded fins.
But the colors were so nice, I figured it wasn't likely that it was recently stocked either

 

[Cornholio]

The reason I asked is because I was told by a fish commission officer that they haven't stocked them in a long time, but there is a lot of private stocking in that area.

 

[azjackstraw]

Anyone fishing this area this weekend? Depending on the water levels and fishermen, I plan on fishing SC Saturday morning.