Rain, Rain and More Rain

By Doug Swanson

In late June, my wife and I went to visit some Brazilian friends who have a family cabin on a western slope free-stone stream in the western Poconos in north eastern Pennsylvania. I love this stream for the skills it requires that seem so different and yet so similar to the conditions I encounter while fishing my favorite spring creeks in Wisconsin. Browns are the dominant trout in this stream but a few Rainbows and Brooks are occasionally caught. These Browns do seem to be more uncivilized than their Midwestern cousins (some would claim they are more sophisticated but I say, as an non-morning person, they are uncivilized) as they demand early morning and late evening hours’ presentations if they are to be caught. The steep nearby mountain sides and mostly clear water seem to focus the strength of the midday sun and send the trout into hiding until the sun disappears behind a western hill even on overcast days. Deep runs (4 to 5 ft deep) allow effective use of Copper Johns and Pheasant Tails albeit the normal stream flow depth approximates 2 ft with a flow of 200cfps (Kickapoo, near LaFarge is 125cfps). Most of the nearby cabins sit 10 to 12 ft above the stream on stilts as the spring snow melt or Hurricane rain impact can cause rapid water rise, the 70 year record being 1700cfps (Kickapoo – 475cfps).

We arrived late Friday and that night it rained. The patter on the cabin roof was nature’s sleeping pill. Saturday morning the stream was still clear but fishing was tough…the sun was out and there was no cloud cover.. Saturday night it rained again. Sunday morning the fish should have been hitting as it was heavy overcast and the stream had a slight cloudy look to it but not sufficient to spook or deter a feeding trout…the stream was beginning to rise but not much. We left our friends a little after noon with a light rain beginning and traveled over the mountains on back roads and then Interstates back to New York going through Wilkes-Barre. Monday morning I had planned to go to the famous Beaver kill in southern eastern New York but flash flood warnings scared me off so I drove instead to Pine Creek (Grand Canyon) in north central Pennsylvania. It rained and rained some more. Pine Creek was high and the color of salmon. Its tributaries were salmon….it rained some more. Armed with my DeLorme maps, GPS, and guide books I went looking for headwaters…each were salmon….US6 looked like a great fishing trail in a very uncongested part of the world. .but not this year…too much water. Tuesday was robin blue as I traveled across Ohio and Indiana albeit the rivers I crossed along I90 all seemed flooded. After 3000 miles of driving I went right to bed upon returning to Chicago.

Wednesday morning at 6AM, NPR’s Morning Edition woke me with stories of heavy flooding and deaths along the Susquehanna including Wilkes-Barre, Scranton, and Binghamton where I had just traveled and just over the mountain ridge from our friend’s cabin. CNN confirmed it. My computer and the USGS stream flow website confirmed my fears. Stream height was nearly 16 feet (up from 2). Stream flow was 38500cfps, 190 times normal and over 20 times the previous record.

I called the cabin. Our Brazilian hostess answered. She was on the second floor sitting on the window still looking for a helicopter to rescue them. The Sheriff had told them, via bullhorn, that the stream water, that was raging about the house and 100 yards toward the main highway, was too rough and fast to risk rescue by boat. The trout stream on the other side of the house was now flowing through or by their porch and onto the main level of the cabin. Power had gone off about an hour earlier but the phone still worked. My Brazilian fly fisher friend was on the roof with his camrecorder and also looking for help. Other flyfishing acquaintances had arrived on Monday and were caught with them in the Cabin but they were smart having parked their cars near the highway. Our Brazilian friends’ Taurus was now hood deep.

The Coast Guard Chinook did arrive on Wednesday afternoon. They got pulled off their roof hanging in a sling apparatus and slept in a clean bed that night at a modern hotel downstream a few miles but well above the nearby stream just before it flowed into the Susquehanna. By midmorning on Thursday, the streamflow was half the previous day’s new record and the cabin was still intact. The sheriff allowed them to return. Stuff like rugs and small appliances were too damaged to be saved. But our friends’ lost was not great, unlike their neighbors’. Mud was everywhere on the porch and the main level but cleanable. And the fly rod was still there hanging on the wall. By Friday, the stream was nearly back to its normal high water mark and still raging salmon colored water but was becoming background noise. Friends were arriving to help out. Somehow the door seal on the Taurus did not allow any significant amount of water into the interior of the car and the car started right up despite the engine being submerged….there was still the problem of making it across a gravel road that was 4 feet deeper and unusable even by a tractor and also a soybean field that was now a 100 yard pond to get the car to the highway. But Brazilians are resourceful.

But what happened to the trout??? Did they go into hiding before the chaos hit?? Will the stream be fishable anytime in the near future?? One thing for certain…the old holes and channels will be replaced by new ones…new water to explore.