Oil Creek, PA Fishing Report

Mike Laskowski (Oil Creek Outfitters) filed 4/22: “Right now Oil Creek is too high, too dirty and too cold for fly fishing. However, given the forecast this week, I am anticipating the creek level to recede and sta-bilize. There should be good fishing by the weekend.”

Mike Laskowski (Oil Creek Outfitters) filed 6-4: “The level of Oil Creek is up and then down, clear then dirty. If you hit it right, fishing can be good.”

Mike Laskowski (Oil Creek Outfitters) filed 5/18: “Oil Creek is at its best this week. Sulphurs are hatching and they provide some of the best dry fly fishing of the season.”

The information in the NW PA Fishing Report is based on the observations and opinions of individuals at the reporting tackle shops and expert area anglers. The information is relia-ble however it is not independently verified. If you have current fishing information or a picture of your catch from one of the waters in the counties of Crawford, Erie, Mercer or Venango that you would like to share, please send it to Darl Black at darlblack@windstream.net. In providing a picture, you are agreeing to it being posted in the Fishing Report.

The Landing Net by Darl Black

I talked with many anglers and tackle shop owners in the last few days. They are all agreed this was the absolute best opening day they have seen in a long time. Saturday’s weather was incredibly nice, the streams were not flooded and practically everyone was catching fish. I am no longer a ‘trout open-er’ kind of guy. I sure loved it back when I was a youngster fishing with Dad or in my teens fishing with buddies. Today, I simply don’t look at fishing for stocked keeper-size trout in the same way. However, visiting Deer Creek and Justus Lake on Saturday, and watching youngsters catch trout – many for the first time – sure brought back memories. I have no intention of taking up stocked trout fishing again, but it gave me pause. I loved the energy and excitement at the ‘kids-only’ section on Deer Creek, where for the opening weekend only young people could fish a limited pool that was ‘overstocked’ with nice fish and not have to compete with inconsiderate adults nudging them out as I witnessed elsewhere. Seems to me these children areas are something that more clubs, organizations or local government authorities should look into sponsoring on more area streams and lakes in cooperation with the PF&BC.

NORTHWEST PA FISHING REPORT

What’s biting in Crawford, Erie, Mercer and Venango Counties?

French Creek – Meandering through all four northwest counties

John Wilpula (Conneaut Lake); filed 4/15/12: “While most fishermen were out enjoying the trout opener, Mike Martin (Cochranton) and I once again were in pursuit of smallmouth bass on French Creek in kayaks – and the Creek was giving bass up readily on Saturday. Bass were really concentrated, likely due to the unu-sually low water levels for this time of year. Where we caught one, we caught several more. Best fish of the day was an 18-incher that was holding in a large eddy. All smallmouths were taken on Confidence Baits Birds in various colors rigged on a 3/32 ounce jighead. The Bird is a paddle-tail grub with a tail that floats up.” (See photo in Livewell)

Dustin Shay (Meadville); filed 4/16/12: “I found the big smallies on French! And walleyes are eating tubes all day long – can’t keep them off the jig; got one over five pounds. Expect the ‘eye bite to die before the season opens up for them in May. All the fish came on Trigger X Tubes.”

Venango County

Oil Creek

Mike Laskowski (Oil Creek Outfitters), filed 4/16/12: “This season’s trout opener was absolutely marvelous! Great weather brought high number of anglers to Oil Creek and other local trout streams. Everyone seemed to be catching fish and having a wonderful time. I cannot remember when I’ve seen so many an-glers on the streams! Oil Creek is fishing great – on both the DHALO areas and the regular regulation areas! However, the mix of hatches coming off has me baffled. Never in my life have I seen the combination of flies hatching on Oil Creek at this time of year. There are still some Grannom Caddis, plus Stoneflies and some Hendricksons. These and other early hatches are likely due to early warming – mixes I’ve never seen before. I’m afraid to predict what might be next. There has been good to great dry flying fishing on the Creek; of course it varies through the day depending on the hatch. Be sure to stop in the shop for the most current hatch information.”

Justus Lake

Darl Black (Cochranton), filed 4/15/12: “I drove to Justus Lake on my way to a meeting in Oil City to see what was happening. Incredible number of fisherper-sons out there for the opening day! One gentleman told me he counted 49 ve-hicles with trailers plus another 100 vehicles without trailers earlier in the day. Boats of all sorts were on the lake, including a Great Lakes offshore walleye-style boat. Young kids assisted by their parents were catching trout one after another around the ramp area. I’ve never seen the lake so busy, or so many ex-cited trout anglers!” (See photo of successful young anglers in Livewell)

East Sandy Creek

John Hummel (Franklin); filed 4/16/12: “Incredible weather, beautiful location, lots of fishermen, some fish were caught, and tons of fun – that’s how I sum up opening weekend of trout on East Sandy. With the wa-ter so low and so clear, the action was slow on opening morning. Add to that the commotion of many pairs

of boots on a small stream, and it’s easy to understand why the fish were shy to bite. We covered many miles of East Sandy over the weekend!” (See photos in Livewell)

Allegheny River

Dale Black (Oil City), filed 4/12/12: “I ran out on the river on the Oil City pool today to check a new outboard on my lake boat. Fished until dark, and caught a few smallmouths. But not the hot catches of early weeks. Looks like the cold snap this past week has shut down the bass on the river.”

Crawford County

Pymatuning

Dave Richter (Richter’s General Store); filed 4/16/12: “They had a real good weekend on Pymatuning for wall-eye, crappie and perch. Anyone that wasn’t out on trout streams must have been on Pymatuning. Walleyes are still hitting both shallow and deep. Those trolling deep water with plugs are catching walleye and big crappies. Guys are getting walleye drifting with jig and crawler in the middle depths. And the night crew is still catching them on shallow minnow plugs at dusk along the shore. Male walleyes are still milking. The crappie bite started back up this weekend with the milder weather. And they are still catching some of the biggest perch I’ve ever seen from this lake! I didn’t see any muskies come through the shop, although I know the muskies are currently spawning on the south end and some usually end up being caught by shore fisher-men. One local musky fishermen stopped by to say he caught a 48”, a 50” and a 52” musky in the past cou-ple weeks.”

Chris Hall (Espyville Outdoors); filed 4/16/12: “Walleyes seem to eating everything! I have reports from suc-cessful fishermen casting Rapala F11s, Shad Raps, Smithwick Rattlin’Rogues; dragging jighead tipped with crawlers; and trolling worm harnesses, Hot N- Tots and AFF Walleye Wizards. Most of the crankbait casting action has been in the evening while wading. The Hemlock Island area has produced a good number of ‘eye recently. There have been mixed reports as far as depths – some in 4- to 6-feet, and others in 12- to 14-feet. The perch bite over the weekend was excellent; minnow or a chunk of nightcrawler on a jighead. Anywhere along the south side of the causeway was productive. The rocks north of the Spillway, around Clark and Har-ris Islands and the island south of Andover have produced perch as well. The crappie bite has been mixed; some guys are finding them in deeper water, suspended off the bottom. A minnow on a plain hook under a slip bobber has been productive. I only heard of one musky being caught.”

Ken Smith (Sharon); filed 4/11/12: “I fished Pymatuning on April 7. Tough day with the wind howling 20 mph! I caught walleye, perch, bluegill and smallmouth bass before the wind got too bad. Got all of them from 15 feet of water over brush. Roadrunner with minnow did the job.”

Grady Codd (Mars); filed 4/11/12: “I fished Pymatuning last evening and fished until after dark. I caught a 25” walleye.” (See photo in Livewell)

Jeff Knapp (Keystone Guide Service); filed 4/13/12: “After a slow morning on PIB, we headed to Pymatuning to troll for walleye. We caught 3 keepers pulling plugs in deep water. But the really interesting catch was a number of large white crappies taken in deep stumps around 15 to 17 feet on our walleye cranks.”

Chub Hornstein (Meadville); filed 4/14/12: “Dane Wielobob and I fished deep brush on the South End for crappies on Friday the 13th. I took home 15 real nice crappies. We also caught 8 incidental smallmouth bass and one walleye – nothing of size. Earlier in the week, we were walleye fishing around Snodgrass area in a

boat and caught 5 good-size walleye while watching a horde of wading anglers jockey for positions on a large shallow point.”

Conneaut Lake

Chub Hornstien (Meadville); filed 4/14/12: “I’m not much into trout fishing, so on opening day I took my bass boat to Conneaut to test run it. On a whim, I grabbed one rod with a suspending jerkbait tied on. After run-ning the boat to make sure all was in order, I stopped to make a few casts – I really wasn’t planning to fish much. But I caught a nice largemouth right away. So I kept on fishing. In a short time I had caught 8 large-mouth bass, 4 smallmouth bass and 2 pike – all on the only lure I had with me – the Lucky Craft Pointer 78. The smallmouth bass were impressive size. Water temperature was 50 to 51 degrees.”

Woodcock Lake

Scott Kinard (Ellwood City); filed 4/15/12: “I took a trip to Woodcock Lake on Saturday, April 14. Despite the rain I wanted to try out the new Jackall Lures ASKA 60SR shallow running crankbaits. With water temp in the low 50s, muskies are active in the shallows and a lot of fun to catch on a 7’ medium action Denali crankbait rod! A good day all around – with both shallow cranks for musky and also with Jackall Squirrel deep-diving jerkbaits that fooled a couple nice walleyes.” (See photo in Livewell)

Canadohta Lake

Jerry VanTassel (Timberland Bait); filed 4/16/12: “The crappies started hitting at Canadohta this past week-end. They are biting in the canals and along the banks. The best bait is emerald shiners; we have them at the shop. Customers have also reported catching crappies at Conneaut Lake and Sugar Lake. At Spartanburg Mill Pond, they are catching and releasing pike one right after another. Of course for others, the trout opener was the big thing this weekend. We had an awesome opener here on the upper part of Oil Creek flowing out of Canadohta where everyone was catching trout.”

Little Sugar & Conneaut Creek

John Ensworth (John’s Bait); filed 4/16/12: “In terms of weather and anglers catching fish, this was the best trout opener I’ve seen. Out on Little Sugar, it seemed everyone fishing had limited out in the morning. Over on Conneaut Creek, it was exceptional as well. We were busy selling bait all weekend. Rosey Red minnows were in great demand by one segment of anglers. Others claimed Butter Worms were the ‘must-have’ bait. Everyone seemed very happy with the number of fish they were catching. Those that didn’t go trout fishing, headed to Tamarack Lake for bluegills.”

Erie County

Presque Isle Bay and Main Lake

Al Nacopoulos (B.A.C. Bait - Erie); filed 4/16/12: “The news up here today is the big wind. No one fishing to-day, but there were good number of anglers out over the weekend. They are catching nice perch on the North Pier in the mornings, plus crappies in the Marina both in the morning and evening. The smallmouth bass fishing in the Bay has slowed compared to last week – it got cold and windy early in the week. Also, word came in that they are catching perch out in the main lake in 30 feet of water.”

Mike Tome (B.A.C. Bait – Fairview); filed 4/16/12: “The word for today is ‘windy’ – stay home and rest up for later this week. We had a great weekend of trout fishing, with everyone catching the stockies in the tributar-ies and Fairview Gravel Pit. I stopped by the Gravel Pit on my way home on Sunday, and caught my limit for dinner in 30 minutes. However, all our streams are extremely low – looks like late summer. We need rain.

On the main lake, the perch have started early; anglers are on them straight out of Walnut in 28 to 32 feet of water – it’s the earliest I can recall the perch bite in the lake.”

Gary Heuble (Poor Richards); filed 4/16/12: “There’s a mix of things going on up here. On the main lake, an-glers are catching lake trout out of Northeast in 50 to 60 feet of water; a customer stopped by with a 7 pounder the other day. The Fairview Gravel Pit is on fire for trout; between 3-CU and PF&BC, they stocked over 10,000 trout in the Gravel Pit; normally only gets 3,500. There are still a few steelhead in the streams, but nothing to get excited about.”

Mark Hughes (Saegertown); filed 4/10/12: “I was on PIB last week on Good Friday, but smallmouths were hard to come by – the few I caught were on a tube jig. Largemouths were a lot more cooperative – I caught 25 green ones on a Rattle Trap late in the day.”

Britt Stoudenmire (New River Outdoor Co.); filed 4/15/12: “We made our annual Erie trip from Virginia earli-er than normal this year, fishing Saturday – Tuesday, April 6-10. It was awesome. We caught and released over 500 fish, with 12 smallmouth over 5 pounds and four over 6 pounds. We doubled over 60 times – it was insane! Never seen anything like it! Every fish in the lake was at 20 feet and biting. We went into PIB once, but ran back out on the lake – west wind allowed us to fish the lake protected by the peninsula. Our thumbs were gnawed to the bone. Great trip! We are coming back in late April.”

Darl Black (Cochranton); filed 4/15/12: “Outdoor writer Jeff Knapp and I both needed to work on smallmouth photos for assignments before the Erie season changed to C&R on April 14. We had planned to go earlier in the week (when Britt Stoudenmire was there) but backed out when we saw the high wind forecast, settling instead for Friday, April 13 with 5 mph breeze forecast. Quoting Knapp ‘Same old story: a few days late and several hundred bass short.’ On the 13th, Jeff and his partner fished for three hours on PIB with only a couple bites and decided to head to Pymatuning. Dale Black and myself decided since we drove this far we were go-ing to stick it out. At 5:00 PM we called it day with only six respectable smallmouths and six 16” largemouth in the boat. Every fish came on a blade bait in relatively deep water – 9 to 15 feet for the largemouth and 12 to 20 feet for the smallmouth. It was an educa-tional experience for Dale, who had never fished a blade bait before. Reef Runner Cica-da was the best blade for the day.” (See photo in Livewell)

Bill Logan (Pleasantville); filed 4/15/12: “I took a friend to PIB for bass on Friday, April 13. He had never fished bass – only catches panfish. He has a shoulder problem that gives him trouble setting the hook, but he managed to connect with four bass on a tube jig. At age 63, it was the first fish he ever caught on artificial lures. I caught 14 bass – six smallmouth and 8 largemouth. I got 2 on hair jigs, one on a Rapala X-Rap and 12 on the same Galida Grubz – never lost it. I caught one largemouth in 21 feet of water.” (See photo in Live-well)

Thomas Watral (Erie); filed several reports --

Friday, April 13: “Stopped by Perry’s Landing and South Pier. Lots of large perch taken on Eagle Claw Perch Rigs and Powerbait Perch Jigs tipped with honey worm or live grub. Also, some nice crappie being taken at Perry’s Landing on jig-n-minnow. Headed to Cascade Creek to watch the stocked trout chase minnows and jump for bugs.”

Saturday, April 14: “I headed to Cascade Creek at 8 AM with my step-dad. He caught four nice brown trout each about 12 inches on minnows. I started out using minnows and caught 10 trout in less than half than an

hour. Then I switched to my Cortland Fly rod and a Hare’s Ear nymph and caught 10 more brown trout and several steelhead. Not a bad day of trout fishing, but I would rather be perch and crappie fishing.”

Saturday, April 14: “My dad caught four golden trout in French Creek near Union City. He caught them on a 2-hook rig with split shot in the middle. He said the creek was low and clear; you had to stay back from the bank so not to spook the fish. My brother-in-law went to Fairview Gravel Pit; he said the trout were hitting as fast as the bait hit the water. His set-up was Eagle Claw 8-pound test line, and a bobber 2 feet from the hook; he had his limit in an hour.”

Sunday, April 15: “I went back to Cascade Creek this morning until the rains came. Using a fly rod and Scien-tific Angler 5-weight line with a yellow stone fly, I hooked into 17 trout – the biggest about 20 inches but the others were 8 to 9 inches. Then I went to 4 Mile Creek. I hooked into at least 10 silver steelheads, but lost them due to light leader. They must be making a late run as they all looked in good shape. Stopped by the docks to check on the perch fishing – good ones being taken on the west side of the dock.”

Mercer County

Various Trout Streams

Laurie Frantz (R&L Bait); filed 4/16/12: “The shop was so much fun this weekend with many folks coming in and out – buying bait and talking about catches. Of course the main target was trout, and several nice ones were brought in for the in-store contest. Jason Sherry caught a 24-1/2”, 5 lb. 13.4 oz. rainbow trout from Sandy Creek. Ken Kopp caught a 22-1/4” 4 lb. 13.2 oz. Palomino from Woodcock Creek. The favorite bait this year seemed to be red trout worms – I completely sold out of them. The next favorite was butter worms, followed by wax worms, meal worms and maggots. A few anglers were using fresh or salted minnows. Of course not all my customers are into trout, so they were headed to Shenango Lake where the crappies and bass are hitting.”

Deer Creek

Darl Black (Cochranton); filed 4/14/12: “Opening day of trout, I stopped by the special children-only section on North Deer Creek. Boy Scout Troop 254 had camped near the creek. In addition to fishing other sections of the stream, the scouts were set-up to help serve hot dogs to all the other youngsters and scouts fishing the special project area. Not only were there local children fishing the site, but families from Pittsburgh and even Virginia had returned to PA for the opening. I watched for about 30 minutes; it appeared that every child hooked one or more nice trout – even if they didn’t land every one!” (See kids photos in Livewell)

Shenango Lake

Ken Smith (Shenango); filed 4/11/12: “I fished Shenango on Tuesday, April 10. The north wind limited me to fishing only the north shoreline but I found a few brushpiles holding crappies. I fished a swimbait that a friend from Ohio makes called a Big Joshy Swimbait. I caught over 30 fish, including largemouth bass, catfish and perch. I kept 17 crappies over 10 inches – the biggest three were 13 inches. Water depth varied from 8 to 17 feet.” (See photo in Livewell)

Lake Wilhelm

Bob Mohra (Fergie’s Bait); filed 4/16/12: “Anglers are catching some bluegills and crappies, but sort on the small size. A few bass are being reported, too. Hopefully with the new walleye management program for Wilhelm (stocking of larger fingerlings), we will see a vast improvement in fishing success in the future. We need lots of big walleyes to eat those gizzard shad.”

Grady Codd (Mars); filed 4/11/2012: “I fished Wilhelm this week. I caught a nice largemouth on a Strike King Tour Grade Football Head Jig with a Rage Craw trailer. It came from 7 feet of water right at dusk.” (See pho-to in Livewell)

Fishing Reports Coming Soon.