Reckless Outdoors: Snow in April? You Betcha!

For the first time (that I can remember at least) I fished while it was snowing in April. Jake, Jared and myself woke up early on Monday with the intentions of fishing the West Branch of the Delaware. We had been hit by a ton of rain, but with the reservoir so far below capacity, we didn't think they would open it up. We were wrong. Right after I picked Jared up in Bryn Mawr, Jared (thankfully!) got a call from Steve from the Bryn Mawr shop and told us they were blowing out the West Branch, with water levels well over 1000 CFS. We hadn't even thought to check, so I immediately called Jake and told him what was going on. We checked a few other gauges and reports and after weighing our options, we decided to head to State College to fish the Little Juniata. We got on the highway and headed to Reading. Once we met up with Jake, we were on our way to State. We knew it would be raining, but as we got closer to the J, we were met with a surprise... it was snowing. As we climbed in elevation, there was even some significant accumulation. We got to the creek, got rigged up and started fishing. With cooler water temps and flows climbing steadily throughout the day, the fishing was kinda slow, but we all managed to catch quite a few fish on nymph rigs and streamers. The funniest part about it all was at the end of the day, there was a pretty solid Sulphur hatch and fish up and eating them here and there. We were all so cold and tired that we didn't even bother trying to re-rig and fish for them, but it was quite a sight to see. A Sulphur hatch in April is odd enough, but to see fish rising to Sulphurs in a wintry mix of snow and rain was pretty wild. Overall, it was a great day of fishing with two great guys. Let's do it again soon fellas.

My first of the day. Note the snow on the mountains.