Questions: Steelheading in the Spring

[STEELHEADKID]

Heres how we explain the steelhead bite to our clients. Basically as long as your not fishing eggs hooksets are free because you can set the hook on anything that seems fishy and not jerk your bait off unless fishing eggs. However if you learn to set the hook on fish you will catch a lot more steelhead because your bait is not consistantly being jerked out of the "zone." Before I start explaining what the bite looks like the size of the lead you choose has to match the water your fishing. I have a box filled with precut pieces from 3in all the way down to about half in. I generally use the 1/4in and 3/8in diameters of solid core lead. You want your lead when your drifting along to tap the bottom once every three feet or so. Now your drifting along and every three feet you feel your weight tap the river bottom which is evident in your rod tip. Your lead may hang up on the bottom and this will be a dead steady pull and your rod will slowly bend over, lift up on your rod and try and free your lead to continue the drift or break off. So once again your drifting along feeling the bottom every few feet and your rod tip begins to pulse almost like you have hooked a rubber band stretching and contracting that is a fish! Set the hook hard once and begin to fight the fish. Another key component to successful drift fishing is to have your lead pre cut and punced and your leaders pretied. That way when you break off you can get back in the water as quickly as possible and maximize your fishing time!
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