I’d heard two very favorable reports recently on cooperative steelhead on Oak Orchard River.  If it weren’t a longer drive, I certainly  would prefer to fish there.  Oak Orchard and the Salmon River continue to be the most consistent steelhead waters in NYS this time of year.  It’s a personal angling irony that these two superb fisheries require a several hour commitment.  Not having time to drive West, I opted for a short afternoon trip to our local creek.

A pleasant light snow was falling and there were no anglers present in this lower stretch of Irondequoit Creek.  Will and I fished for an hour, without seeing or connecting with any fish.  I have a lot of confidence in my dark stonefly nymph w/ a tiny chartreuse bead head.  It is a consistent prospecting producer fly for winter steelhead.  Will fished a smaller sucker spawn imitation.  Nonetheless, it was beautiful to walk along the snow covered banks and get outside.  Next, we moved downstream to a tiny culvert hole that sometimes contains fish.  After repeated casts and catching every loose twig in the hole, we hiked downstream.  Will managed to spook a small, darker steelie in a riffle.  It promptly hid under an ice shelf and we never managed a cast to it.  Finally, we drove to Linear Park to check out the action.  We fished for another 3o minutes, then called it quits.  No strikes, no fish, plenty of icing up of our rods and line, but a pleasant day overall.  One center pin angler showed us a picture of a hefty, dark colored fish that he landed earlier in Lower Linear Park.  Otherwise, things seemed fairly slow.  We were also surprised by the wind gusts.  Today felt cooler than the anticipated  20 degree forecast.  Those pocket hand warmers sure are nice and it was a treat to get outside on this early February day.