I was just getting ready to fish on Elk Creek, about ½ miles below the Lincoln Falls Bridge in Sullivan County. It was the same area mentioned in last week’s column where Linda & I actually petted a wild deer. There is a huge swimming hole where I started, just at daybreak.
There were two very large brown trout which were just lazily swimming together. They had to be at least 24 inches in length. I just watched as they circled the pool twice and then disappeared for the day. Having done a lot of night fishing for trout, I knew there was zero chance of ever seeing them let alone catching either of them during daylight hours. It was stunning to see these large fish; I can still remember most of the details of that day. I have always wondered how long they lived and what was their age when I saw them just that one time. I have been back to that same spot several times since, always just at daybreak; but I never saw them again. Still, considering that I will be age 69 tomorrow, it is one of my top 10 memories.
It was 1971. We got over 18 inches of snow during Thanksgiving week; it seemed that all of it was on the ground for the first day of buck season. I lived in Williamsport at the time. Three of us hunted in the same area that first day. It was almost all uphill, over ¼ miles on a farm lane just to get to the woods. It was a great area for deer hunting.
I took watch along a stone wall, sitting on a rock seat someone built in years past. Larry was on my left maybe 100 yards from me. John was on my right, about 150 yards from my watch. Legal shooting time was about 0642 that morning. A huge buck appeared just 25 yards below me; it was easy to see that he was legal and with the snow, plenty of good light for shooting. I do remember seeing an orange flash in the scope when I shot. Then things got interesting in a hurry. What does one do when another legal buck shows up and the hunter has just shot at a buck 15 or 20 minutes ago? It was a quandary for me. We will finish the story next week.
Jim Collins is an outdoor writer for this newspaper. To contact him, email jimcollinsinsurance@frontiernet.net ; or write to him at Outdoors With Jim Collins, 87 Windfall Road, Alba, PA 16910.