2025 Turkey Day Spey Day 2

 

Here it is day two of Turkey Day Spey and it’s the last day. The drought has not been kind to the USA and not to the Great Lakes Region. I spent part of the day in Cuyahoga Valley National Park “CVNP”.

I chose to fish the Cuyahoga River “Hoga” today and she was in amazing shape for being low.  The river has always had good flow even in the dead of summer lots of different gradients.

The river was gin clear in two feet or less, but two feet or deeper she was green.  I saw several shad pooled up in the shallows I would imagine because of the cooler temperatures.

I would fish my sinking leader with 12-pound test tippet at the end along with a simple shiner fly pattern. The Skagit line is a 440 grain short head Freightliner by Scientific Angler. The leader set up was an Airflo steelhead sinking leader 1.5”/second.

I finally saw other anglers today. Two of the anglers were locals and one pinner was up by the bridge and did not come down.

The Hoga has a lot of silt, sand, and muck issues. Her banks are in bad shape from all the erosion. The Hogs River basin is rich and fertile for agriculture here in the CVNP.

I got to the river at 1030 am and with the highs today being 37 there was no reason to get there early IMHO.

I was ok with the slow day after all I always have zero expectations of hooking a fish.

It’s nice to be on a section of a river and not see trash and other footprints except for all the wildlife.

I could have fished another river, but I did not want to fish around other people.

Take care folks and be well!