On Monday at Summer Camp Nick D., Paul Y., and I went to the Nature center during the afternoon open merit badge session to take the fly fishing merit badge. When we got there the counselor (Mr. Dave Bryan of the Cradle of Liberty Council area) assigned to that merit badge only knew a little about fly fishing and asked us if we had any adult leaders who might be able to help him out. We went back to the Troop 55 camp area and got Mr. Reuss to help the counselor teach the class as he knows a lot about fly fishing and had already caught a couple of fish on Sunday night.
Over the rest of the time at camp we had 4 meetings and in those meetings we fished, tied knots and on the last day tied our own flies. After the 1st meeting Wesley and Mitchell P. saw how much fun we were having and joined our class. The river we fished on was called Big Bushkill Creek and we fished just below the Resica Falls. It was a nice spot on the river by the Indian village with great pools to fish and lots of room to cast. Mr. Byan was really nice and his son Connor and a boy named Calvin also took the merit badge with us. The hardest part about the merit badge was learning how to cast and catching a fish. We caught a variety of fish (brook trout, rainbow trout, brown trout and sunfish). Mr. Reuss caught a 12” brook trout on the first night.
My favorite part about the merit badge was the actual fishing and tying the flies because you could make them look like whatever you wanted to. Fly fishing has been the best merit badge I have taken so far and I hope to go fly fishing again soon. If you have the chance to take this merit badge and love fishing, or want to learn how to fly fish, I would highly recommend it.
By Daniel R.
Dragon Patrol
Click Here to View Some Pictures of the Fly Fishing Merit Badge
