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Penns Creek
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| Penns Creek’s 35 miles of trout water make it Pennsylvania’s longest limestone trout stream. Many people associate Penns Creek with Penns Cave--Pennsylvania’s only water cavern, where tourists glide through the dripping darkness in long, metal, motor-powered boats. The stream exiting the cave, called “Upper” Penns Creek, is small--averaging 15 to 30 feet wide. This is the coldest section of Penns Creek, and though the state stocks this section with rainbow trout, very good numbers of wild brown trout are also present. Upper Penns flows for approximately 13 miles from Penns Cave to the town of Coburn, where it is met by two pure limestone streams, Elk and Pine Creeks--fine wild brown trout fisheries in their own rights—which widen Penns from 75 to 100 feet across. Another important addition at Coburn is the maze of rocks, boulders, and gravel that fill the stream bed from this point downstream, providing excellent habitat for trout and aquatic insects. Nearly every species of caddis, stonefly, and mayfly that exist in the eastern U.S. lives in Penn’s Creek, creating a hatch-matching paradise. This 11 mile section, downstream to Weikert, is rated Class A wild trout water--Pennsylvania’s highest designation--and it is not stocked. Trout average 12-13 inches but 14-16 inch fish are common and larger fish are a real possibility. Much of Penns below Coburn is rimmed by Bald Eagle State Forest’s 195,624 acres. This vast tract of wild, public land provides beautiful scenery and a wealth of wildlife. |
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| The Story: (Courtesy of Charles R. Meck - Pennsylvania Trout Streams and Thier Hatches - 2nd Edition) |
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Fourth of July on Penns Creek, the famous but sometimes frustrating limestone stream in central Pennsylvania. By 10:00 A.M. the temperature had barely reached 58 degrees, and a fine drizzle fell. At the lower end of the catch-and-release section on this holiday, no one was fly-fishing except me. Two other fair-weather anglers had returned their gear to their cars seemingly disgusted with the depressing weather. I was the only nut remaining on the entire stretch of that productive water.
I put on a heavy jacket and headed up the anbandoned railroad bed toward the R.B. Winter estate, where I entered the fabled waters. The water level was almost perfect even though it had rained for several hours and was still drizzling. As I often do whein I first enter almost any trout stream, I speculated that this might be one of the best fishing days I would ever experience. In this case, it was!
Swallows cruised near the water's surface, crisscrossing upstream, downstream and across stream. Just in front of me thousands of Blue-Winged Olive Duns floated, half-dazed, swirling around in an eddy. Normally this species (Drunella lata) takes off rapidly from the surface when emerging, but the unusually cold weather today prevented the duns from escaping quickly from the water. Five, ten, fifteen trout rose in a small riffle in front of me.
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