Potter County Fishing Report: Return to Upper Kettle Creek

A month after "Trout Whisperer" Bob Volkmar guided Captain DiPaola on the upper reaches of Kettle Creek, you'd think the idea of returning in the late summer would be an exercise in futility.  But conditions signaled anything but that, when Bob, Bob's Lab "Blue", and I headed back to take another crack at the native brookies.

The persistent rains this summer have kept these gems of streams in excellent fishing condition. When we stepped in the water around 0830, air temps were in the high 60s under partly cloudy skies, with water temps between 58-60 degrees.  According to Bob, the water was higher than the previous month's outing.

I'll refer you to Capt. DiPaola's blog post a month back for details on this particular stream.  For the 3 1/2 hours that we spent on the water, Bob and I each caught around 8-10 fish.  A few were the 3-4 inch dinks that amazingly will take on a size 8 hopper, but we also caught a decent number of 5-6 inch brookies, with two going an easy 10 inches.  Since there was plenty of water, we fished together, alternating fishy-looking spots.  And for the most part, every spot that looked like good holding water held a fish or two.  As for flies, Bob fished with a hopper pattern, while I was using a foam hopper with a Rainbow Warrior dropper.  Interestingly, most of my hookups, including the two 10 inchers, were caught on the dropper.

Small stream fishing at its best; Potter County at its finest!

Tight Lines,
Mikey D Fishing