Transcript: Central PA Fishing Report with TCO Fly Shop State College
S5, Ep 101: Central Pennsylvania Fishing Report with TCO Fly Shop
2023
http://www.thearticulatefly.com
Transcript
Marvin:
[0:04] Hey folks, it's Marvin Cash, the host of the Articulate Fly, and we're back with another Central PA Fishing Report with George Costa of TCO Fly Shop in State College. George, how you doing?
George:
[0:14] I am amazing as always, Marvin, how are you this week?
Marvin:
[0:17] You know, I'm just living the dream and trying to stay out of trouble.
You know, it's kind of funny, you're probably almost 20 degrees cooler than we are down here in the mid-Atlantic. What are you seeing on the water?
George:
[0:28] Yeah, temperatures have been pretty good this week as far as air.
We've only been in the low 80s. Nights have been pretty cool.
It's supposed to be, um, some point this weekend, I know they were talking about getting down to the low 60s, 50s at night. Um, and daytime temperatures only been in the 80s.
So temps have really not been a concern for us much on the water.
Uh, the past few weeks, we've also had plenty of rain and plenty of precipitation.
We had some blowout conditions a few days back over the weekend.
We just got a big blast one night with some almost a half an inch, three quarters of an inch of rain. So a lot of our streams right now are still kind of high and dirty.
Individually, Spring Creek is dropped back down the fishable levels.
It's still a little off color, but it's fishing today and should continue to fish, barring more rain, which we might get tonight.
And the weekend is looking pretty clear, so it should fish over the weekend.
Penns is still really high, really off color. That's kind of unfishable right now.
Little Juniata has come back into shape, so that's the fishing with a little bit of color.
Same thing on Fishing Creek. It's up and it's 30, but some of the smaller streams are fishable.
Pens is definitely still blown out. So, depending on what we see tonight, conditions, as far as rain goes, conditions might be not amazing this weekend, because we're already kind of high on the water.
In terms of bugs, it's been pretty much the same thing. Trichos have pretty much winded down.
[1:51] Terrestrials, crickets, and beetles, and ants, and those greenie weenies are really going to be your go-to patterns right now.
Not an awful lot of aquatic mayfly activity this time of year.
We should start seeing maybe those fall isos in the next few weeks.
They usually start late August, early September. We'll get a little back to them, and a handful of white flies on some of the smaller streams around here, but nothing really too crazy.
Other than that, streamer fishing should be good once we can get the water down a little bit and it clears up a little bit. That's probably going to be good this weekend with the higher water.
So opportunities are there, but not amazing conditions for this weekend coming up here.
Marvin:
[2:30] Yeah, but better than cutting the grass.
George:
[2:33] Yeah, we've got to do that too, you know, it's just a little too much for me, I'm kind of tired of cutting the grass. I'd like a little dryness here.
Marvin:
[2:39] Yeah, well, you say that now and then I'll talk to you about shoveling snow in about three or four months.
George:
[2:45] Don't get started on that, that's closer than we think.
Marvin:
[2:51] So, got a funny question for you. Brunner sent one in, you know, asking if it's worth targeting chain pickerel and if so, kind of suggested flies and rigging. and rigging?
George:
[3:02] It's absolutely always worth targeting pickerel or any other fun fish that you want to catch. We do have some pickerel around here in central Pennsylvania.
A couple of our lakes have them. Look for those little weed beds and those little stream outflows and some of the more marginal water, the non-trouty water does have some pickerel around here.
And yeah, it's definitely worth getting out there and trying to catch a different fish and not focusing on trout for a while, especially this time of year.
I think Bly's sco and technique for them, it's pretty straightforward streamers.
I like smaller things like clousers or small deceivers, something that's going to kind of get down into that water depth, but a little clouser, a little white or white and pink clouser tends to work good for pickerel.
And you definitely want some sort of, you know, either heavy fluoro or a light wire tippet on that because they will rip right through some leaders to tip it. So like a 10 or 15 pound smaller diameter wire will work for most of our pickerel around here.
Really not more than 20 inches. Most of them are 12 to 16 inch long little guys, but yeah, they're a fun little fish to catch. Change it up, try something new, I like it.
Marvin:
[4:03] Yeah, and so just from a leader design, I suspect you probably run something that's relatively short and level to your bite wire?
George:
[4:10] Yeah, you don't need to do anything fancy for it, especially if you're fishing like a sinking fly, I'd say like four or five feet of maybe 20, 15 pound, and then like a six to seven inch stretch of wire is all you're gonna need.
You don't need to worry about, you know, tapered line, especially if you're going to be fishing something that's going to sink or using a sink tip, um, for those fish, um, straightforward leader is all you're going to need.
A couple, you know, four feet. That's about it. Yeah.
Marvin:
[4:35] Well, there you go. And you know, folks, we love questions at the articulate fly. You can email them to us. You can DM us on social media, whatever's easiest for you. And if we use your question, I will send you some articulate fly swag.
Marina are drawing for some cool stuff from the shop at the end of the season.
And George, before I let you go, do you have any kind of special events you want to let folks know about? You can always let them know about ours and stuff.
George:
[4:57] Oh yeah, the hours are always the same. Everyone knows them by now.
But as far as events go, yeah, we got some good classes coming up this fall.
We're going to do a steelhead class, probably a couple of tying classes mixed in there. If anyone's not taking the dive in the fly tying yet, we should have a couple of classes getting lined up. Check out our website for them.
Other events, I got a great trip planned for Antwerp Island.
If anybody wants to come fishing with me in the Bahamas next, Mark, check out the website under the travel tab. I'm going to be to be hosting a trip out there. So that's gonna be a blast.
And other than that, just a lot of good sales this fall. Check out TCO's website, tcoplyfishing.com.
We've got a lot of stuff going on sale. We're kind of rotating all the summer stuff out, getting into the winter stuff. So there's plenty of opportunities to snag up some good products at a really good price right now.
Marvin:
[5:46] Well, there you go. Well, listen, folks, you know, even if the conditions aren't excellent, it's better than cutting the grass. So you owe it to yourself to get out there catch a few.
Tight lines, everybody. Tight lines, George.
George:
[5:57] All right, take it easy, Mark.