High Water in PA

Headed out to fish today, despite lack of promise in the day. It had rained for
about 48 hours straight, sometimes pretty hard, so I figured the water would be
a mess. The Tulpehocken was beyond discolored, it was running high, hard and
muddy, with large tree parts moving downstream with it. A quick retreat was
made to the Local Trickle, where I figured I could at least avoid drowning. It,
too, was murky and running fairly high, but I get few free days to fish, so off
I went. Shortly into it, I noticed the infrequent rise by a fish here and
there. I tried a few items that seemed to match the bugs I saw: Slate Drakes,
little Olives, green caddis, no luck at all. The fish kept coming up, at odd
intervals. I swatted a Cicada off my hat as I trudged though the woods. Freed
another from my hair and picked two more off my vest before the lightbulb went
off.....they're tagging Cicadas! Dumped the contents of vest onto a grassy
area, finally locating the small tub I stashed 3 fake Cicadas in. I picked one
which I had originally thought had too much orange. Lobbing the monstrosity
near a sunken log, the thing floated about two feet and Wham!!, a solid little
brown. Back upstream to a larger fish that had shunned me an hour before.
Second cast was rewarded with a 14 inch fat brown. To make a long story
short(er), I went upstream and took about 15 trout, all on two Cicada
imitations(lost the first one). Most were still floating when the trout hit,
but two or three fish took the sunken fly. A peculiar fishing day, but a good
one, nonetheless.
Tom