Central Pennsylvania Trout Still Showing Strong

By: Isaac Zettle

It rained nonstop in July and August in Central Pennsylvania. Our water levels were so high that most of our creeks flooded. Some rose into major flood stage. We had more than two weeks of nonstop rain. Then it took about two weeks for the water to come back down to fishable levels. However, our water levels have returned to just above normal and trout fishing in the region is good.

Many anglers thought that our trout got washed away in the floods and as bad as it looked on TV I understand why. Fortunately, they are still here. Some out the trout got moved around and the rivers and creeks may have changed course, but they are still loaded with rainbows and browns. I’ve even seen a few golden rainbows around this week.

Because we had such a wet summer I’m expecting good fishing throughout the end of summer and fall. We are suppose to get more rain, which I believe will keep the water in our streams cool enough to keep the trout biting. When the water gets low and clear, and warms, the trout are more skittish and tougher to get to bite. Fortunately, we don’t have that problem this year. In fact, all of our streams still have some color to them.

All of our big trout streams are fishing well. This includes Bald Eagle Creek, Spring Creek and Penns Creek. As a bonus Poe Valley Lake continues to fish well for trout as do the inlet and outlet streams. Meanwhile, pressure is down. We’ve been fishing a few days a week and haven’t run into any anglers. On the other hand, we’ve been catching a lot of trout. Stocking has been done since May, but there’s plenty of big trout left in the streams still.

We are in kind of a heat wave right now. It’s been upwards of 100 the past week. This has forced us to look for the coolest water to find the trout. I’ve been fishing the riffles and deep holes. This pattern should continue until fall temperatures arrive. After that the fish will start to spread out.

In the past few weeks Pink Shrimp Fire Balls and Gold Label have been two of my favorite baits. I’ve been using one Fire Ball on a size 12 Eagle Claw hook and two to three Gold Label eggs on the same hook. Because the water is slightly off colored we can get away with using six-pound Stren mono line. Eggs have caught the most trout for us, but our biggest trout this summer have been caught on Feed Pellet Brown Fire Bait.

Editor’s Note: Isaac Zettle operates Zettle Outdoors. To follow his adventures please visit https://www.facebook.com/TrophyChasersOutdoors.