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Fishing: Creek cleanup will not happen overnight
Fifty years ago, Green Drakes disappeared from Spring Creek in Centre County after someone from a Penn State University chemistry lab dumped cyanide into the water. The big mayflies haven't been seen there since. "A bunch of us tried to reintroduce them by planting nymphs in the stream and duns in the foliage," said Dan Shields, of Lamont, Pa., who wrote about the incident in his book "Fly Fishing Pennsylvania's Spring Creek." "We even netted thousands of spinners from another stream, but they never took hold. We tried for three or four years, but it was no use." Although the recent train derailment and chemical spill on Sinnemahoning Portage Creek in Mc-Kean and Cameron counties was much bigger and more deadly, experts are cautiously optimistic that insects will rebound on what had been pristine, wild trout water, but predict a long, slow process.
Dog days best to fish mighty Kern
I love to fish for big rainbow trout. Now I'm not talking about planted fish that weigh two-to-the-pound, but huge, 19-26 inch long holdovers running 3-7-pounds that have spent several years swimming free since their release from a DFG planting truck. These fish feed on shad, crappie and whatever else floats into their river lie or deep-lake strata where they grow big, fat and sassy. .
Trout on the Upper Mo. need a helping hand
If you ever float the Missouri River between Toston Dam and Townsend you'll surely enjoy a delightful float away from major roads and have the opportunity to observe the area's abundant wildlife. You'll probably see many species of birds, including the majestic bald eagle, and if you're lucky you may see an osprey plunging into the water after a fish. Muskrats and beaver are common along the banks, as are whitetail deer, and you might even see a family of otters. The one thing that probably won't distract you on your float is the quiet slurp of a brown trout rising to a grasshopper under the overhanging willows, or in late October the crash of a hook-jawed male brown during his spawning ritual.It wasn't always this way. If you talk to a trout fisher who frequented this beautiful stretch in the early 1980s you will hear stories of huge brown trout trying to leap the overflow of Toston Dam, or of landing an 8-pound brown hooked on a streamer stripped through a fast riffle.
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