PeteCz
05-24-2008, 12:01 AM
After many years of being closed (I'm not sure how many, actually) Sams Creek has been reopened for fishing this week. While this may or may not be news to many folks, judging by the wear on the footpaths along the stream there have been numerous folks up that way recently. After talking to a local guide near the trailhead, my suspicion is that many people may have fished Sams Creek over the last few years, even while it was closed.
Sdetoro59 and I headed up to the parking area at the end of the Middle Prong road about 3:30 this afternoon. We hiked up Defeat Ridge Manway (an unmarked, unmaintained, but reasonably easy to follow trail) to Sams Creek, about 1/2 mile above the confluence with Thunderhead Prong. We fished for two hours covering the next 1/2 mile of the stream. We managed to catch about a dozen fish between us. Not nearly as many as I had expected, but all were in great shape and were nice sized. They were caught on a variety of patterns (Yellow PAs, Yellow Stimulators, Yellow EHCs and a new favorite: the Yellow Foam Humpy-Trude). Steve has a few pictures of the brookies he caught, hopefully he will post them when he gets a chance.
While the fish weren't as cooperative as I had hoped (perhaps someone was up in front of us, or we weren't stealthy enough) the scenery was quite nice. Its a small stream. Only 5 feet wide in spots. And it has lots of vegetation. High stickin' and fly flippin' is more effective than casting in many areas. The canopy is so thick in spots that it felt like twilight at 4pm. There are some nice plunge pools and the footpath along the stream makes it convenient to skip over the roughest parts of the stream. After the first mile, the stream starts to get really small. Once we reached that point, we decided to head back to Middle Prong to finish up the evening. It could be that the best fishing was further up stream, maybe we'll try it another day...
All-in-all its a nice place to fish and the closest brookie water to Townsend. But in my opinion there are a lot of better places to fish, even for brookies. I'd love to hear other's opinions as more folks head up there and try it out.
(btw: we noticed quite a bit of boar rototilling heading up there, so keep an eye out for the pigs...)
Sdetoro59 and I headed up to the parking area at the end of the Middle Prong road about 3:30 this afternoon. We hiked up Defeat Ridge Manway (an unmarked, unmaintained, but reasonably easy to follow trail) to Sams Creek, about 1/2 mile above the confluence with Thunderhead Prong. We fished for two hours covering the next 1/2 mile of the stream. We managed to catch about a dozen fish between us. Not nearly as many as I had expected, but all were in great shape and were nice sized. They were caught on a variety of patterns (Yellow PAs, Yellow Stimulators, Yellow EHCs and a new favorite: the Yellow Foam Humpy-Trude). Steve has a few pictures of the brookies he caught, hopefully he will post them when he gets a chance.
While the fish weren't as cooperative as I had hoped (perhaps someone was up in front of us, or we weren't stealthy enough) the scenery was quite nice. Its a small stream. Only 5 feet wide in spots. And it has lots of vegetation. High stickin' and fly flippin' is more effective than casting in many areas. The canopy is so thick in spots that it felt like twilight at 4pm. There are some nice plunge pools and the footpath along the stream makes it convenient to skip over the roughest parts of the stream. After the first mile, the stream starts to get really small. Once we reached that point, we decided to head back to Middle Prong to finish up the evening. It could be that the best fishing was further up stream, maybe we'll try it another day...
All-in-all its a nice place to fish and the closest brookie water to Townsend. But in my opinion there are a lot of better places to fish, even for brookies. I'd love to hear other's opinions as more folks head up there and try it out.
(btw: we noticed quite a bit of boar rototilling heading up there, so keep an eye out for the pigs...)