Pacemaker Fishing Forum

The water levels and flows have been way down on the streams I’ve been fishing so I tried a new river for me this morning. I ventured out to Western Maryland and hit the Savage River. The Savage is known to be one of the finest wild brown and brook trout streams in our area. It’s supposed to have some deeper pools and pockets so I thought I’d give it a try. In addition, it was my first trip out with my new Echo Shadow X, 10.5 ft 3 weight that I bought for tight line nymphing.

The stream is pretty small so I immediately went to plan B when I found someone fishing already in the spot I had picked out. My second choice was free and it was a pretty stretch of water.



Some stone art right at the riffle I chose to fish.



It took me all of 2 minutes to break in my new rod when I hooked up with a feisty 15” brown that turned out to be my biggest of the day.



Within minutes of releasing that one I picked up another in the same pocket.



I fished for about 4 hours and managed to pick away and land 6 fish. This was the smallest one, so I have to say that the quality of the fish was good. I was hoping to catch a brook trout but didn’t see one today.



I stopped at the local fly shop when I was done. It’s a great little store in the middle of nowhere, right at the stream. I had a nice chat with the guy there and he assured me that I did well for the low and slow conditions. As I was getting ready to head home I stopped by the lot again to have a look at the stream from the suspension walkway. There was a nice “spinner fall” going on but only saw one fish rise there. As I was driving out I crossed a bridge and stopped to have a look. I saw several fish rising so i threw in the waders again and fished dry flys for a bit. I had one take but missed him and had a couple of refusals. The clear slow water made it tough to get close.

All in all a great day on the water. The only negative for me today was that I fed the trees pretty well. Turns out they like nymphs too.