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Fish facts
First lines in: The Pennsylvania trout season begins at 8 a.m. Saturday for all counties across the Commonwealth.
Creel limits: From Saturday until midnight on Labor Day, Monday, Sept. 5, Pennsylvania fishermen will be able to keep a limit of five trout measuring at least seven inches in length daily. From Tuesday, Sept. 6 until Dec. 31, the daily creel limit is three trout.
License fees: The annual Pennsylvania fishing license for fishermen ages 16 to 64 will cost $25.47 this year, an increase of $2.50 from a year ago. The trout stamp will cost $12.47, also an increase of $2.50 from a year ago. The total cost of a license and required trout stamp this year will be $37.94 for fishermen ages 16 to 64. Senior fishermen ages 65 and over can purchase a license this season at a cost of $13.22, an increase of $2.25 from last year. Those fishermen will also pay $12.47 for the trout stamp. Senior fishermen ages 65 and over can also choose to purchase a lifetime license this year for a fee of $76.97, which is an increase of over 20 dollars from last year's price.
By John Hartsock
jhartsock@altoonamirror.com
The preseason stocking of trout has been moving along without a hitch this year in Blair and surrounding counties.
Despite a modest increase in the price of licenses across the board for every Pennsylvania fisherman this year, business at area bait and tackle outlets has been brisk as usual.
The only proverbial fly in the ointment leading up to this Saturday's 8 a.m. 2023 opening of trout season across the Commonwealth might be the weather forecast, which calls for rain, at least locally.
"Hopefully, the weather will hold out, but it's looking like it might be a soggy start,'' Blair County Waterways Conservation Officer Frank Mehalko said. "It looks like we're going to be getting some rain on Friday and Saturday.''
A relatively dry early spring, along with the help of volunteers, has made the formidable job of stocking area streams much more manageable this year for Mehalko, who has also been stocking streams during the preseason in Bedford and western Fulton Counties, due to current officer vacancies in those areas.
"Things have been going pretty good,'' Mehalko said of the area's preseason stocking schedule. "It's been running pretty smoothly. My schedule has been pretty jam-packed, as I've been covering a couple vacant districts, along with Blair County.
"But we've been fortunate -- the streams have been pretty stockable,'' Mehalko added. "And I want to thank all of the volunteers who have come out to help with the stockings. Without them, we couldn't get the stockings done.''
Mehalko said that the majority of the trout that have been stocked in area streams have been of average size, but some streams received brood trout - bigger, more mature fish that are used for breeding purposes - and golden trout (also known as palominos), which also tend to be much larger and more elusive.
For the first time in a decade, the cost of both a Pennsylvania annual fishing license and a trout stamp has increased for every fisherman.
The increase has been a modest one - a total of $5.00, or $2.50 for both the license and the trout stamp - for fishermen ages 16-64. A senior license for this season for fishermen ages 65 and over can be purchased at a cost of $2.25 more, while the price for a senior lifetime fishing license for those 65 and up has increased by over 20 dollars from last year.
Both Tim Baker, general manager of the Unkel Joe's Woodshed chain of stores, and Creg Strock - owner of the Aquatic Imitations sporting goods store off Route 22 two miles east of Hollidaysburg - don't believe that the slight increase in the cost of licenses has, or will take any toll on the number of licenses that are sold.
"It doesn't seem like it has affected the number of licenses that we've been selling,'' Baker said. "It seems like we're selling the same number of licenses here that we have in past years.''
That's because no single purchase anywhere is as cost-effective as the value of a fishing license for a person who enjoys fishing.
"For the access that you get, (the license) allows you to fish all of the different places all over the state,'' Baker said. "(The license fees) go toward very worthwhile things like the stocking of the fish, and maintaining boat launches.
"If you're an outdoorsman, the value of that (license) is still there (despite the slightly increased cost),'' Baker said.
Both Baker, who works out of the Unkel Joe's store location in Altoona's Pleasant Valley Shopping Center, and Strock, say that sales of bait and tackle at their establishments have been going well this preseason.
Strock said that his busiest day of the year at the Aquatic Imitations store - at which he also offers specialty fly-fishing supplies but does not sell fishing licenses - is always the Friday before trout season, and that waxworms are the most popular bait purchased there.
"Our store usually closes at 5 p.m., but I'll be here until 8 p.m. on the Friday night before the first day of trout season,'' Strock said. "That Friday is always our busiest day of the year.
"Waxworms - especially the tubs of waxworms that number 250 in each tub - have always been our most popular sales for opening day, along with fathead minnows,'' Strock added. "PowerBait is also a go-to for those people who don't like handling the live bait.''
Baker said that garlic-scented PowerBait has become an increasingly popular purchase for trout fishermen, and it now comes in a variety of colors.
"For some reason, the garlic-scented PowerBait has been very popular this year - a lot of people think that the garlic scent really makes a big difference for catching trout,'' said Baker, who also mentioned that his supplies of the 250-count tubs of waxworms always sell out fast.
"Our sporting goods department has been doing very well this year,'' Baker said. "Our sales have been good. We've been able to get a more consistent stock of supplies this year, and I think that has helped.
"It seems like some of the supply chain issues that we had been experiencing in the two years following the onset of the pandemic have evened out a bit more now, and those issues are not affecting us as much now as what they had been,'' Baker said.