Left Pittsburgh at 4:30am and headed straight for Poor Richards Bait shop to stock up on egg sacs, single eggs and streamers. Erie had more snow on the ground through Serritania than I thought there was. Forecast was calling for a warm up with light rain showers. The snow melt off was more than expected that bumped Elk Creek overnight so when I made it over to Elk around 9am I found the water conditions not in my favor. I made the long drive so I figured I would work some drifts hoping to find some stuff. My first stop at 7am was at Crooked Creek which may have broke my trip. Crooked Creek had some flow but it was also murky. No fish were located in the few spots I tried. At the time not knowing the status of Elk, I figured I would have better luck so I made the move which I regret. I should have stayed a Crooked and work harder and traveled more downstream.
Elk Creek had a good flow going around 6.3 CFS which is pumping water. I started at Rick Road access and fished the holes down to KOA Campground. I tried just about everything in my tackle with 3 split shots due to the high flow.
I managed to roll a fish in one hole but he got off near the bank. I worked the tail end of the drift in the 3rd picture above and hooked up on a orange bright color egg sac pictured below.
Like Doug said – it’s still fishing and not all trips will be in my favor. When conditions are tough like it was a wrong decision on starting can mess up the day. If I would have started at Elk lower on the stream I may have had better luck from what reports I saw later in the day. Anglers found fish but it was mostly early in the morning before the streams got out of control.
The next week should boat good fishing but the streams are going to be unfishable the next few days. Right Erie is getting alot of rain and snow coming in tomorrow with accumulation expected. We could really use a fresh run of steel in the streams and looking at the gauges I would say fish should move around.
I plan to get back up twice in the next two weeks. I just need to have a good game plan and keep an eye on the water flow.
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