Yesterday evening I got caught up in a heavy snow flurry on Highway 18 at the Tiger Mountain Summit. I thought to myself, winter is here early… and it won’t be long before frigid early mornings, launching my drift boat, and Winter Steelhead fishing!
Instead of calling it a day, I ended up in my workshop, digging out all my steelhead gear to take inventory. I found a few packs of WFO Egg Clusters that I had bought, stashed and forgot about. They looked too good to shelve, and I ended up tying a roll of leaders. These unscented artificial egg clusters should be the ticket when I’m fishing on rivers that don’t allow bait. But they look so good, I’m fishing them everywhere.
I tied up a full roll of egg cluster leaders with a small Cheater to add some buoyancy. My buddy that fishes Steelhead a bunch suggested that another way to rig them was like a bead. I took his advice to heart and am going to experiment with a pegged cluster as well.
My drift fishing leaders were tied with Owner 1/0 Octopus hooks on 20 pound P-Line fluorocarbon and a size 12 Cheater. My pegged leaders were tied with Owner 1 Octopus hooks on 15 pound P-Line fluorocarbon, a Beau Mac rubber bobber stop and a small sequin. I couldn’t quite get the rubber stop to thread on the 20 pound, hence the line downgrade.
Western Fishing Operations is a local company that is already known for their awesome Steelhead Worms, it’s great to see them developing new stuff for us gear junkies. I’m hoping to report back to you all that they worked well! They sure do look like they will!
Sockeye Salmon – The Red Salmon
