PA Steelhead

[Red Owl]

I realize things vary from year to year but as a general rule, if you could pick any 2 week period of the year to fly fish some of the PA steelhead streams (Elk, etc) what weeks would you pick? Thanks.

 

[Ard]

Right now is the time I went out that way.

Ard

 

[jaybo41]

Erie Steelhead are fall run fish for the most part though we do get a few that seem to come in in the spring. Fish start staging somewhere in September and will come in until ??? There are fish in the streams though April.

If you're traveling a distance to get there, just pick two weeks that you like to fish and commit yourself to going. Fishing conditions are highly dependent on weather, more so than many other areas I've fished. I've left for the tribs with ideal conditions only to get there and be forced to sit and wait because the streams are blown out. This is a 2 hr or less drive for me.

What's also important is understanding the weather's impact on the streams, reading the weather, looking at maps, etc. You can find a stream to fish in a neighboring state that might not have been negatively affected as much if at all as the ones in Erie. Sometimes those streams are more ideal.

In short, the best time to go is whatever time you can get away and do it. Being able to leave at the drop of a hat I guess is what I'd say is most ideal and if you're like me that's not always possible.

 

[Red Owl]

I did some salmon fly fishing last year and it seems the salmon run say mid September to mid Oct as "prime time", what you are saying is that steelhead are different in that they come in and stay in the rivers for a long period of time?

 

[jaybo41]

Being that the Steelhead from PA are fall run fish, if your goal is to try and hit a run, it's going to be somewhere from September-November. This past year, December was the month that saw the most amount of fish enter the systems so many of the fish came in later than usual. I'm sure some of these fish die in the tribs, but they will migrate back to the lake once the weather gets warm and then come back into the tribs in the fall.

 

[kuch]

This is absolutely true about the fall. There are still some fish to be found in the tribs but not for long as the weather is beginning to warm quickly.