Cicadas on the Fly

Cicadas are the longest-lived insects in North America. Because of their life spans, people call them the 17- and 13-year locusts. Only a short part of their life cycles are spent above ground. It is this adult stage, however, that is important to fly fishermen.

Cicada nymphs live 2 to 24 inches underground. In April of the year of their emergence, they begin burrowing to within about an inch of the surface where they stop and await the proper time to emerge. When the adults first emerge, they are whitish in color. You may see hundreds in a very small space. However, they soon turn darker to an almost black body with orange ribbing and reddish-orange, veined, glassy wings. The adults are poor fliers and many fall into streams, rivers, and lakes. Only the males sing, and their singing can be heard for miles. In most locations, cicada activity ends by late June or early July. In southern states it may be earlier. As I mentioned before, the adult becomes important as food for trout, bass, and other fishes including carp-yes, I said carp.

Charlie Meck was the first one to tell me that carp were rising and taking cicadas on Bald Eagle Creek in central Pennsylvania. He was fishing a cicada imitation for trout when he hooked a carp that took him over 30 minutes to land. I was fishing for trout on a northcentral trout stream when he told me this, and I immediately headed for Bald Eagle Creek to try for carp.

When we arrived in midafternoon at a large, flat pool, the first thing I saw was a carp cruising a few inches below the surface about 60 feet from shore. Then I noticed about 30 others cruising in the same general area. As I stood watching, several cicadas landed on the surface and were immediately sucked in by the leviathans.

I hurriedly assembled my fly rod, shortened my leader to 3X, tied on a deer-hair imitation, and gently cast ahead of the nearest cruising carp. As it approached to within a foot of the fly, I gently twitched it. The carp slowly swam up under the fly and sucked it in. When I struck, all heck broke loose! My reel screamed as the carp ripped off all my fly line and most of my 100 yards of backing! After a 15-minute battle I finally netted the first carp I had ever caught on a surface bug. All the time this was going on, Charlie was taking photos.

Although trout fishing is my first love, I must admit that pound for pound carp will outfight any other fish I have ever caught fly fishing. This includes trout, bass, Atlantic salmon, bluefish, tarpon, and snook. As a result I gave up the trout angling and fished only for carp during the rest of the cicada emergence. That only lasted a week. On my best morning I only caught eight carp and had two break off. That was all I could stand. My arm was so tired and cramped I could hardly hold the rod. In fact, I had to hold the butt against my stomach to play every fish.

I knew about the fighting qualities of the carp because I had caught many during the seven years I worked at the Penn State Forestry School in Franklin County, Pennsylvania, from 1935 to 1942, and more recently in Sayers Dam in Centre County. These carp were not caught on artificials.

I have made the remark many times that carp were "poor man's salmon." If they would jump and could be caught consistently on artificials, they would be much more popular here in the U.S. where the majority of our 60 million fishermen look down on this great fish. It's too bad that all anglers don't get a chance to hook into one of these battlers and find out for themselves the brute strength these fish possess.

I was talking with some dyed in the wool trout fishermen the other day and told them about the great sport I had with the carp. One immediately gasped and said, "I can't believe George Harvey would give up a day of trout fishing for carp." Well I did and I will again when the various cicada broods emerge in Pennsylvania.