TodayLots of big bass at Gifford Pinchot
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Article RatingWe camped last weekend at Gifford Pinchot State Park, about a twenty-minute drive from Carlisle and around an hour from our farm near Shippensburg. We probably used about 10 gallons of gasoline in our small motorhome, maybe a little less.
So, with the increased cost for state park campsites, out-of-pocket cost for the weekend ran somewhere around $84.
That’s less than one night in a motel and I know I wouldn’t have seen the two deer in the woods behind our campsite if I made coffee in a motel room instead of on the Coleman stove behind the motorhome.
Gifford Pinchot State Park encompasses a nice size lake with populations of bass, bluegills, muskies, northern pike catfish and hybrid striped bass along with several other species I haven’t caught yet. The lake itself is a great way to spend a day near home with the expectation of catching a trophy size fish.
Of course that doesn’t mean you’ll do any better than we did fishing from shore with youngsters or rowing around nearby weedbeds, but on Sunday morning my friend, Bob, and I rowed along the shoreline casting lures and small deer hair poppers catching bluegills large enough to filet. While we were drifting along, a big bass boat slipped by and I asked the fellow on the front seat, if he was doing any good.
The gentleman said he was fishing in a small club tournament and caught one 14-inch bass, which was an inch short for Pinchot Lake regulations as a Big Bass Lake. About then he recognized me and I realized who he was. For 31 years I sold farm equipment to first his dad, Bill Finch, and later to his son, Brad. Brad caught the bass fishing bug years ago and there he was sitting in the bow seat. It was good to see him and we talked about farming and equipment along with commodity prices before we realized fishing is more important. He still runs the Finch Services Hanover Store for the family business and obviously he still enjoys casting for bass.
Before he left, he told me that Pinchot Lake is a big bass factory producing and his club frequently fishes it. I told him I never caught a really big bass from the lake but my son Cris hooked a bass well over twenty inches long one summer, while on leave from the Air Force Academy. We used to fish the lake at night for hybrid stripers, casting buck tail jigs near whichever swimming beach was open. The baitfish would come in to feed on the nymphs and larvae that the swimmers kicked up and the stripers came in to feed on the baitfish.
The Fish and Boat Commission still stocks fingerling hybrid stripers in the lake through and egg exchange with I believe South Carolina. I was recently told that Pennsylvania trout eggs could no longer be shipped to out of state hatcheries so hopefully the commission can adjust their budget a little to still secure striper and hybrid striper eggs for their stocking program.
Gifford Pinchot State park is one of many that offer easy access to a fishing lake or stream. They all seem to be well maintained with clean showers and restrooms. All offer playgrounds and plenty of places to walk and hike and many sites offer electricity but they do seem to crowd their sites closer together than those state campgrounds I’ve visited in other states.
