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Annual river float trip
delivers good fishing
Last weekend, five of us camp regulars completed our
fourth annual summer float down the Allegheny River, and
this year we experienced unusual fishing success.
I arrived early Friday to cut grass and do camp chores.
By the time Todd and Brad pulled in at 2 p.m., I was
ready to go fishing. Those two were committed to
building a new camp shooting bench that afternoon,
though, so I went solo, down the road a mile to Magee
Run, a hatchery-stocked stream with wild trout in its
upper reaches. I had noticed on the way in that Magee’s
waters were medium-high and touched with color, and that
meant brown trout opportunities to me. Sure enough, I
caught seven hefty holdover stocked brownies in the
lower half-mile and two wild brookies upstream.
Next morning the five of us – Todd and me in my old
14-foot Sportspal canoe, Matt and Brad in kayaks, and
Brett in his fly-fisher’s float tube – put in at Dunn’s
Eddy under a hot sun and into a strong upstream breeze,
and began our eight-mile trip. Usually we just toss
lines in casually and concentrate more on paddling and
sightseeing, but this year we consciously hit the
smaller side channels around big islands, where currents
and eddies form promising fishing pockets. We caught
fish early and often and ended up casting lines
seriously all day long.
Brett got us started by catching a nice smallmouth on a
streamer only 100 yards from our launch point, and then
Matt started catching fish on a small Rapala minnow lure
and Todd began getting action on an orange shad Frenzy
Minnow. I switched from a crankbait to a small jointed
Rapala and ended up catching four smallmouths myself,
all in the 10-12-inch range. By days’ end we had caught
16 smallmouth bass, a camp record for the Allegheny, and
missed or lost at least 20. Summer river fishing doesn’t
get much better than that.
Good luck out there. And have a great week outdoors.
~ Don Feigert, 7-24-08
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