Where the Ducks Walk on the Fish

At the north end of Pymatuning Reservoir in Crawford County, there is a concrete spillway where, on a busy summer day, carp crowd the water so thickly that ducks and geese sometimes stand on their backs. The spot is billed “Where the Ducks Walk on the Fish,” and it has been drawing visitors since the reservoir was finished in 1934. It is one of the oddest sights in Pennsylvania, and it sits on one of the state’s better walleye and crappie lakes.

The story

People began visiting the Linesville Spillway in 1934, the year the reservoir was completed, according to a local news report, and roadside vendors selling bread appeared in the 1930s. Visitors throw bread into the flowing water, carp rush to it, and the fish pack in so densely that waterfowl step across them. A park estimate puts annual visitors around 400,000. The spillway was renovated in 2007. Wikipedia reports that the state parks agency planned in 2009 to ban feeding bread to the carp and ducks but later reconsidered, which comes from that one source.

Park officials say bread is harmful to birds. They also call the carp an invasive species that has taken over this part of the reservoir, which is a statement by officials, so we attribute it rather than state it ourselves.

Why it is remarkable

The park manager told Erie News Now that roughly 400,000 visitors a year is a figure some state parks do not reach “for their entire population.” Few places in Pennsylvania draw crowds to watch fish, and fewer do so on a spillway.

How it fits with the fishing

The spillway is at the north end of the reservoir, which is covered in our Pennsylvania lakes guide along with Raystown and Nockamixon. Pymatuning itself is a two-state lake of about 17,000 acres, with walleye, crappie, perch, muskellunge, bluegill and bass, and a license rule that depends on whether you fish from a boat or from the shore.

Feeding bread and fishing are separate matters, and the spillway has its own posted rules. Do not assume you can fish there. Check the signs and the park’s current rules before you cast.

For the lake as a whole the limits we verified from the 2026 Pennsylvania regulations book are walleye 15 inches with six a day, bass 12 inches with five, muskellunge 30 inches with two, and crappie 9 inches with 20. Boat anglers may use a Pennsylvania or an Ohio license anywhere on the lake, but shore anglers need the license of the state they are standing in. The 2026 advisories have no entry for the reservoir, so the statewide one meal a week applies to fish from it.

What visitors can take from it

If you go to see the carp, bring something other than bread. The state parks agency discourages feeding bread to wildlife, and officials say it harms birds. If you bring a rod, bring it to the lake rather than the spillway, and bring the right license for the shore you are on.

Sources and what we could not confirm

This tale rests on two sources: the Erie News Now feature “A Place Where the Ducks Walk on the Fish: The Last Word,” and the Wikipedia entry for Pymatuning State Park. Two sources agree on the core history. The 2009 bread-ban detail is from Wikipedia alone, and the visitor figure and the “invasive” label are park statements. We did not read a current park page on spillway fishing. If you know a better source, we would like to see it. More stories are on our Pennsylvania Dock Tales page.