We’ve been having some unseasonably warm weather this month, especially the past few days. By “unseasonably warm” we mean that yesterday, February 24, was in the 70s. The day before was in the 60s. That kind of warm.

However, there’s currently a cold front moving in right now and the temperature tonight is supposed to be 30 degrees colder than it was this morning (59 this morning, 29 tonight). The coming week is supposed to be back in the upper 40s and low 50s, slightly more seasonable.

There’s always a light at the end of the tunnel.

Yesterday I decided to take advantage of the weather and a day off and head out to Penns Creek to see what I could do. Being stubborn and knowing that Penns has some streamer-eaters, I took the 7-weight and threw streamers for a few hours.

Loaded for bear. Or whales. Or sharks. Whatever you want.

It was a beautiful day, but the fish just weren’t having the meat. The picture above shows my foam patch of everything that didn’t work – I tried heavily weighted (the two sculpin helmet patterns), barely weighted (fish mask minnow, center), mid-weight (small dumbbell eyes – crayfish and sculpin), and no weight (slider head take on a Swingin’ D 2.0). Two other fishermen (one spin fisherman, one fly fisherman) walked up from downstream as I was fishing – the spin fisherman was using a lipped stick bait and had moved fish, and the fly fisherman had taken two “small ones” on nymphs. The only action I had was a smaller fish almost jump out of the water for the dumbbell-eyed sculpin pattern (which will be featured in a post soon).

When I got back to the parking lot, a gentleman and his son pulled in to fish. We talked about how I did and what I heard from the two gentlemen who walked by me, and when the father saw my fly patch he exclaimed, “Wow, were you fishing for whales?” Sometimes it’s okay to go fishless if you’re going for a shot at the big ones.

There were some little black stoneflies flying around (size 14), and I heard from the two gents at the parking lot that the report they received from the Feathered Hook in Coburn was that smaller flies were working better. We should be seeing some Blue-Winged Olives coming soon, and a few people have been seeing some already. The water temps are still on the cooler side (Penns was 51.5 yesterday, other streams are going to be similar and a bit cooler with the cold front moving in).

Colder temps shouldn’t keep you from fishing, though. Get out there and have some fun!