Spring Creek

B

Brown71

Active member
Joined
May 15, 2013
Messages
285
I don't get up to Spring Creek as much as I used too, though I always enjoy fishing it. Friday (3/12) we met a few longtime fishing/hunting friends up there from out of state. Water was near perfect, greener than normal.

We always do pretty good there, but Friday fished really well. We had 5 guys fishing and everyone caught 10 or more fish. 2 guys were over 20 fish landed. But, we caught 0 bigger fish, largest was about 15 inches.

So, my question for the folks that fish it more often, are you getting any bigger fish with any frequency? I used to get a big one or two every trip up, now its been a few years since I got a bigger fish in there. And I tend to fish bait most of the time, so naturally big fish come a little more frequently. All 5 of us were fishing bait on Friday, and they all are very experienced anglers, so was interested to see what others take are on the biguns in there.

Thanks
 
I used to catch fish in the 18-20" range every so often. In the 1980 to maybe 2000 we we're catching nice fish with average size of probably 12" and many in 14" range. Then we saw the onslaught of year round pounding of the stream. Thee was hardly a day that someone or many people were not literally fishing every riffle or hole with fish sizes dropping overall. This has been mentioned by myself and others on here before. One theory is that being caught and handled repeatedly eventually causes the fish to die. So then many never get to be more than 8-10". There is no doubt in my mind that the average size of the trout in Spring is much smaller. No doubt it holds good numbers as you say but I just don't get too excited by those little fish. Penns still has some nice fish but I think that it is also headed that way. The bigger water over there tends to protect the fish more. I don't really think anything can be done about it. And just a theory of course.
 
Larkmark, yes that makes sense. We got a fair amount of 12-13" fish, but only 1 or 2 bigger than that. Thanks for the input.
 
I rarely fish subsurface so I do wonder about that as a factor. I am talking dry fly fishing mainly.
 
Yes, I hear what your saying....regardless of size the shear numbers of fish in that waterway is pretty awesome.
 
larkmark wrote:
One theory is that being caught and handled repeatedly eventually causes the fish to die. So then many never get to be more than 8-10".
Click to expand...

IMO, The mortality related to C&R is like compounding interest. The percentage of fish that die from an individual incident of C&R is very low, but when a single fish is C&R'ed 20 times the percentages start to work against that fish. I pulled number 20 out of the air, but I'm sure some fish on Spring come close or exceed that in their lifetimes, perhaps greatly exceed it.
 
A Penn State study estimated that trout in Spring Creek are caught and released an average of 6 times per year.

That was based on trout population info from electrofishing, and angler use and catch rates.
 
I'm no expert on spring creek but in general I have a different point of view. Each system has a certain biomass it can support depending upon conditions like food, prime holding water, water temp, etc. In places like spring there is so much competition for these things it's very tough for fish to grow big. These leads to alot of fish under 12 inches. I actually think that things like a slot limit would lead to some bigger fish, how much bigger I don't know. I hear the stories of the good old days of big fish and would bet the numbers were lower but the biomass was pretty steady. Of course there could be some environmental impacts that can change a river but I don't think catch and release fishing pressure is the main cause.
 
Suppose no one fished Spring Creek for the next 10 years.

What do you think the population structure would be like?

More big trout? Or less?


 
6 times a year seems incredibly low
 
1. I think Larkmark is right on about Spring Creek.

2. Response to t/bert's Post #9 -- I think a nice population of various age classes of trout would develop, with many more top-end fish than there are now, perhaps rivaling the type of trout population that existed in the 1980s and early '90s. It would be interesting to see. '

I doubt that the PFBC would do it, but it would be interesting if the commission blocked off a section of a mile or so of creek and allowed no fishing for about four years to see what would happen.

3. I also wonder if Spring Creek can withstand all of the development in its watershed or whether the horror of strip malls, etc. that is occurring in the State College area will cause its demise. It is really unpleasant to ponder this.
 
troutbert wrote:
Suppose no one fished Spring Creek for the next 10 years.

What do you think the population structure would be like?

More big trout? Or less?
Click to expand...

Assuming no environmental changes I would say there would be little change to fish size. Whatever slight increase in size you get from the disruption of eating from being caught would be offset by less fish being killed by fisherman.
 
C&RDFFO (catch and release dry fly fishing only)
 
larkmark wrote:
6 times a year seems incredibly low
Click to expand...

I agree, particulalry when you consider how many people fish Spring and how many people claim high catch numbers. But then again, thats an average so there are some fish that get caught more and some that get caught less.

P.s. A 3 year old fish would have been caught 18 times based on the 6 times per year average. So my 20 number is not far off for lifetime C&R incidents.

Who thinks a fish actually has a good chance of surviving being C&R'ed 30 or so times in the 5 year it would take to reach a fairly large size?

P.p.s. I also still support the slot limits as they are still a potential aid in bolstering large fish numbers through reducing competition while protecting fish that achieve a certain size. I dont rule out carrying capacity issues on Spring Creek.
 
rrt wrote:
1. I think Larkmark is right on about Spring Creek.

2. Response to t/bert's Post #9 -- I think a nice population of various age classes of trout would develop, with many more top-end fish than there are now, perhaps rivaling the type of trout population that existed in the 1980s and early '90s. It would be interesting to see. '

I doubt that the PFBC would do it, but it would be interesting if the commission blocked off a section of a mile or so of creek and allowed no fishing for about four years to see what would happen.
Click to expand...

The PFBC will certainly not do it, and it would be impossible to enforce, and I'm not advocating it.

I just posted that as "thought experiment," a different way of thinking about the question of the effects of angler mortality on the number 14 inches and larger trout.

To me it seems obvious that if no one fished Spring Creek for 10 years that you would have far more trout 14 inches and larger than you do now.

One reason that seems obvious to me is from experiences fishing places that were very lightly fished.

The other reason is just the math. Trout are getting caught 6 times per year. Supposing the mortality rate per C&R incidence is 4%. It takes about 5 or 6 years for a trout to grow to "nice" size. The numbers start adding up.

 
I just brought this up to a fly fishing friend who used to fish Spring with me years ago.
I hypothesized that the intense fishing pressure resulted in 'eventual' hooking mortalities. Even if hooking mortalities are low, given enough opportunities, eventually the trout get killed somehow by the angling pressure. And there are very few places in Spring that trout can go where they can escape fishing pressure.

John shared a complementary hypothesis about trout moving out of pressured areas until they get pushed out of more safe water or forget or whatever, and then move back into the shallows. In big rivers, the trout can get away. Trout in the Little J and Penns can escape pressure like the trout in big rivers out west.

I started fishing Spring about 25 years ago. I used to catch 12-14" trout. Now, I usually catch fish under a foot. THat's with better habitat and water quality than when I started fishing it.
Penns and LIttle J. still carry gator-headed hogs.
Syl
 
Spring Creek is a lovely trout stream. The majority of the stream, however, does not have big fish habitat and holding water..I agree with Ryan, I think there are too many fish in Spring. I enjoy fishing it, but there is A LOT of pressure. I think the population actually needs thinned out if you want bigger fish.
 
Spring has been no kill for years and the actual habitat hasn't changed much. I can't speak to water quality. With all else being about the same the only thing I can think of that drastically changed was it now gets a heck of a lot more pressure. There were loads of fish back years ago but just way more medium and big ones. It was my favorite stream for about 20 yrs but when all the pressure increased and the fish got smaller that changed. I rarely go there now. Also it seems to me that there are a lot less fish in the lower end than there used to be. From about the big cement bridge on down I see less fish during hatches. Would be interested to hear what others think about lower end.
 
I wonder what would happen if there were no barriers to movement on SC and the population had unfettered access to BE, all of SC and it's tribs.

I've had the same experience there and it's the primary reason I rarely fish it anymore. There is a huge population of dinks basically. I've gone explicitly to hunt bigger fish and they're there, but not in great numbers IMO. At least not relative to other places.

Interesting thoughts on C&R mortality. Probably a mix of a lot of factors, C&R mortality being one.

Lark, my personal opinion is the fish in the lower end don't stay in the lower end of SC year round. I personally think there's a lot of movement down into BE and the other way around to some degree too.
 
Spring Creek is famous for small trout...lots of trout but small. Like catching the same fish over and over and over again. Are there big trout there? Sure! Just they are very few and far in between. There are bigger trout elsewhere not too far from there.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Latest posts

Montana Angler Fly Fishing
Montana Angler Fly Fishing
Harman's North Fork Cottages


Real Time Data From
the USGS Site

Share this page

Back
Top