"A compendium of member news, notes, observations, fly fishing secrets, and incantations of our favorite sport, the streams we fish, and the people we fish with."

October 7, 2001: A friend had invited me to join him on a tuna fishing charter since last year and finally after 4 tries it we made it out last Friday October 5th.  The 3 previous trips were cancelled due to bad weather. Five of us left out of Ocean City, MD about 6am on the 57 foot "Instigator" captained by Dave Wentling with son Josh as the mate.  After a 2 hour bumpy ride we arrived at the area know as the "Hot Dog".  We began drifting with 4 rods out, chumming and chunking. Nothing and the other boats nearby were not catching anything either. We moved to a second spot and anchored. At this stop we were able to hook 3 bluefish and a small shark, but no tuna. On to a 3rd spot where we drifted again-nothing.  It was 2pm and because of the lack of fish and the increasing winds, it was time to head back to Ocean City.   No tuna steaks this trip!

On Thursday afternoon, I stopped at Indian River inlet to see how the striper fishing was doing. There were a lot of boats and guys fishing from the jetties. Not too many fish being caught. I spoke to a fly fisherman that was heading home for the night. He did not catch anything but said he has had some great days there when you can throw just about any fly and catch stripers up to 24 inches.
Lance Morien

August 5, 2001: I fished the Susquehanna River Thursday night , Friday and Saturday,  August 2-4, at several spots from Shamokin Dam to just below the mouth of the Juniata River.  My brother Randy, and fly fishing friends Doug and Jack from Rochester, NY joined me on the trip.  

Overall we caught a fair number of smallmouth but the fishing seemed to be affected by the cold front ,changing weather and the Friday night flash food warning which thankfully did not happen.   

At times, a certain fly would work great for a couple of hours, then nothing.  We had a lot of fun at the Siebert's Island access on Saturday morning.  Fish were taking poppers and chartreuse/white Clousers.  I even caught 2, 15" walleyes on the chartreuse/white Clouser!  I did the best Saturday afternoon from 3-6pm on the west side of the river just downriver of where the Juniata River comes.  

Just when I reached the river, I saw an elder bait  fisherman leaving with his limit of smallmouth, some of which looked in the 17-18" class.  He said to me, "Don't catch them all ! " I said, "Wow that's some stringer of bass. Did you get them on crayfish?" "No, hellgrammites."  I immediately switched flies to a hellgramite pattern and caught a number of nice bass till I left because of a thundershower coming into the area. 

Flies that worked good for me were: blue/silver Clouser floating minnow, red and white hackle fly, chartreuse/white Clouser minnow and the hellgrammite.
Lance Morien

July 14,2001: I fished the Heritage Section of the Little Lehigh on July 14th from 07:30-11am and did great on a black bead head midge(#22) prior to the trico spinner fall. I fished the faster water since most fly fishers were parked in prime spots awaiting the trico spinners. I switched to a trico spinner tied to #20 patriot dry as an indicator. Some of the fish went for the patriot!
Lance Morien 

July 6, 2001: We were in Grand Cayman for our family vacation but I couldn't resist checking out fly fishing opportunities. I went out for bonefish on July 6 with Captain Ron Ebanks to a flats area on the southeast part of the island.  My 14 year old daughter Chelsey joined us. It was a gorgeous morning with a slight breeze, 80 going up to 90F and a high tide. We would have walked the flats but because of the high tide we used his boat.  It wasn't long before Captain Ron spotted some bonefish from his platform in the rear of the boat where he quietly poled us along. Even with my polaroids I had a hard time spotting them from the from of the boat but the Captain told me where to cast my shrimp pattern anticipating  the direction of the bonefish.  Sometimes couldn't get my line out to the location fast enough.  We saw numerous bonefish, but no strikes. Once my line landed directly on a group of 4-5 fish and boy did they leave in a hurry.  They are indeed worthy of their name "green ghosts of the flats".  The Captain fixed up Chelsey with a spinning rod and a piece of squid but she did not have any takes. Just before reaching the dock, we came across a small section of water that was cloudy.  Captain Ron said fish were working in that area and to just cast my fly into the cloudy water.  After several casts, finally a strike and the line screams off the real. The fish jumped way out there, then came back towards the boat jumped a second time-it was a "baby" tarpon.  On the third jump, the tarpon won and freed himself from the fly. Before leaving, we went out to the reef and let Chelsey fish with bait for awhile. She caught several small "grunts" then we headed in around noon.  Regardless of the results, I will remember the trip since it was my first time bonefishing.
Lance Morien

July 1, 2001: Joe King and I went up to the Little J at the last minute on Thurs and Fri, June 28-29. Got there about 1:30 PM Thurs. Water temp was about 70-72 degrees and off color.. perfect. Caught a couple of dozen in the PM. No big hatch in the late PM. Next morning lots of Tricos and midges. The water below and above Barree bridge was boiling. We each got about three dozen brown trout before we quit at 5:45 PM. Mine were mostly on #26 griffiths gnats or green weenies. My largest was 14 inches. Most were in the 10 inch range. Joe got a bunch on pheasant tails. Slowed down around lunch time and then it was sporadic. Nobody there. Saw 3 other fishermen, all in the evening. What a place!

June 8, 2001:  Fished the Heritage Section of the Little Lehigh from 4:30PM to 9:15PM. Fished the first few hours downstream of the flyshop. Caught 1 on a black #16 nymph and missed 2 others. Things came alive at 8:00PM and I landed 11 fish all on a sulphur emerger in about an hour time.
Lance Morien

May 27,2001:  I traveled to Puerto Rico last week on business and, of course, had to mix in a little fishing with business, but it should be the other way around. I took a guided trip with Captain Omar Orraca out of San Juan. Before we got started, he prefaced the outing with "Fishing's been slow, it's been too hot".  We fished a channel that connects Laguna San Jose with Laguna Torrecelia right near the San Juan airport.

I met Captain Omar at his dock at 3pm and fished til 7pm. The wind was perfect to drift the boat along the shoreline while I cast Clousers tight againt the mangroves and, more than I'd like to admit, directly into the mangroves.  After about a half hour of casting, I hooked and landed a small 5 pound tarpon. It jumped twice and fought well for a small one.

The rest of the day was tough. We saw fish surface near the shore throughout the day and I had 3 other strikes but did not hook them. We saw one fish surface that Captain Omar said was in the 70 pound range!  It was a great experience, my first in salt water.  Captain Omar said the best month for tarpon in that area is December. So, if you travel to PR, give it a try!
Lance Morien

April 28, 2001:  Got some rare time off to fish.  Went to the East Branch of the Brandywine.  Fished from the big stone wall up to the paper mill.  Olive body caddis of various sizes were everywhere.  Fish were rising at the wall but were very particular in what they took.  I went fishless on larger sizes until I scaled down and began getting refusals on a size 18. I kept switching patterns to find what the fish wanted and each wanted something different, as long as it was an 18.  I eventually took 6 there.  

I moved up into the faster water where the fish were not as picky, size 16,garden-variety Elk Hair caddis and a bushy Stimulator rewarded me with another 6 fish.  At the paper mill, the trout got picky again, so I returned to an 18 Henryville Special and took 3 more.  This was a day that can make your whole season!  Everything seemed to work.  I wish there were more outings like this one.
Tight lines from a friend at Valley Forge TU,
Tim Hough

April 27, 2001:  Fished the fly stretch of French Creek from 9 to 12:30 on Friday morning. Stream in excellent condition. Water Temp.- 52 degrees at 9:30 am. Had good luck on gray and tan caddis on the surface. Size 14, 16, and 18 on the quiet water. Dead drift fishing the edges of runs and close to the bank as the morning went by. About 10 am. caddis started hatching and the the fish were turned on for about an hour and a half. Caught several nice size rainbows and browns. Fish seemed very healthy.
Frank Wilson

April 26, 2001: Rich Wildermuth and I took a day off and played hooky up at Clarks Creek north of Harrisburg. It took awhile for the fishing to get going but when it did it was awesome. The afternoon brought out a major number of what looked like #10 March Brown mayflies. The fish became hungry and rose readily all afternoon to large adams parachutes and dark spinner patterns. I found it best to float them downstream to the holes that had sun on them. Rich and I had a banner day with about 40 fish between us including a 15 inch brookie that Rich caught on a dead drifted wooly bugger. Saw only three other fishermen. Water was moderate, gin clear and 50 degrees as usual. A beautiful sunny day and how better to spend it.

April 23, 2001:  Joe King, Scott Ziegenfuss and I had a great time fishing the Little J and Spring Creek last weekend. Good flows, nice weather and hungry brown trout helped. We caught most of our fish on brown midge pupae tied serendipity style #20. My biggest was a 16.5 inch brown that took me way into my backing. The most unusual fish taken was a 12 inch brown which I somehow lassoed with my dropper fly and brought him in without ever being hooked. Does that one count?