12. Fishing streamers with a floating line (12 of 20)

- [Tom] In smaller streams, where you don't have the luxury of mending line or using a sink tip line to get the fly deeper, you often need to use a heavily weighted fly on a floating line with a longer leader. You need to get the fly quickly into those deeper pockets. Sometimes, especially in slower water, fishing unweighted streamers on a long leader can dredge up trout even in bright sunlight.
You know, you don't always want to just throw a streamer to the bank and rip it back to you, even from a drift boat. There are times when the fish aren't on the banks, or the fish are deeper, or it's bright sunlight, and it's just not going to work. So, you got to have a few other things in your bag of tricks, like dead drifting a stream, or fishing it deeper and slowly with just a little bit of motion.
So, to do this, you need a weighted streamer and maybe two weighted streamers, or a weighted streamer and a split shot, or two weighted streamers and a split shot, you need to get down. And it's easiest in most water, believe it or not, with a floating line, you want a floating line with a relatively long leader, maybe 9 to 12 feet long so that you can get those flies down.
You have a lot of control with a floating line, and you can manipulate those flies a lot easier with a floating line, and you can see your strikes better. So, to do this, of course, it varies in what kind of water you're in, but you basically want to try to throw your streamer or streamers at an upstream angle, and don't give them much action. So, you want to throw them upstream, you want to keep a tight line all the time.
So, you want a strip line back to you, and then occasionally maybe give it a little twitch by stripping line a little bit faster, and then letting it settle, but it's not a constant stripping motion. You want the fly to move a little bit and then to tumble in the current. So, whatever you need to do to keep a tight line, keep that fly drifting in the current, keep it deep, and then every once in a while, give it a little twitch.
Come on, fish. ♪ [music] ♪ Oh, there is one.
- [Jeremy] There it is.
- Whoa.
- Want to hit the anchor?
- Wow. That flying rooster [inaudible] through the water.
- He took off. Oh, jump. Going to be another jump too. I think, maybe, maybe another jump. No, I thought it was going to be another jump, but I guess not.
It's not a huge fish. Just got a lot of spunk.
- [crosstalk], Tom.
- We were just talking about how slow it had gotten, tough fishing streamers in the middle of a bright, sunny day.
- Thank you, Jeremy.
- You're welcome. ♪ [music] ♪