Unique Technique Works For This Guide

Not many steelhead guides even Milton Fischer will guarantee clients a fish every trip.

And certainly, few would ever dream of encouraging someone to fly-fish for winter steelhead - the toughest, most exacting challenge in the already tough sport of winter steelhead fishing.

But Milton Fischer isn’t like most guides.

He might not guarantee a catch every trip, but he expects at least a hookup or two.

“You give me equal conditions and I think I have as good or better chance of hooking a winter steelhead as anyone with bait,” Fischer said. “In fact, I’ll follow you downriver and still find the fish.”

Fischer’s clients often sleep in and wait until everyone else has started downriver before they suit up and start casting. They know they have as good or better chance of hooking one of the Northwest’s silver rockets as anyone who arose in the wee hours.

In fact, Fischer’s record of daily catches is better than most other north coast bait-and-plug guides, who acknowledge his almost uncanny expertise with a fly rod.

Fischer has mastered a unique California fishing technique known as slack-line fly-fishing. The little-known method was perfected to fish for trout in small rivers.

Fischer has expanded the application to bigger fish in rivers such as the North Fork Nehalem, headquarters for his River House and Pleasure Outfitters.

Slack-line fishing is much like steelhead fishing with a jig, with the lure suspended beneath a bobber or float.

It can be done with most heavy-duty fly rods, but is most effective with a stiff, long rod that can gather lots of slack quickly.

Slack-line fly-fishing is best in relatively clear water. Fischer turns to bait and bobbers when the water gets murky.

When there are few anglers out, Fischer works regular steelhead runs like everyone else, but if angling traffic is heavy, he turns to water most steelheaders avoid - shallow tailouts, shallow riffles alongside deeper runs and behind boulders, in between holding water everyone else has fished through already.

“Sometimes they’re in garbage water,” Fischer said. “I think steelhead get pushed out of their usual holding areas by all the other boats and lures.”

Slow shallow water isn’t good for slack-line fishing.

“You want that steelhead to take the fly in an instant, on a whim,” Fischer said. “Quiet water isn’t good because it gives the fish too much time to think.”

False cast a few times to get plenty of line out. Lay the cast upstream from where you expect the winter steelhead to be. It should be directly or quartering upriver from your position.

Very quickly after casting, strip more line and with that long rod, throw two or three loops of line at the spot you just cast to.

You should have created two or three coils of line around or very near the strike indicator, and everything is floating downriver toward you in a puddle.

The puddle ideally surrounds the strike indicator, and the floating line won’t pass it or go slower. This is critical because if the strike indicator heads off in a different column of water than the flyline, the line will quickly overcome the lighter indicator, and your drift may never reach the target.

The portion of line that remains upriver from the strike indicator plays out slowly, and the line won’t reach its end before the strike indicator reaches the end of the drift.

Retrieve it by stripping line, and start another false cast or two to play the line out and dry off the indicator a little.

Cast carefully. There’s a lot of unusual weight out there, and the flyline tends to whip a tippet severely if too much power is sent through the rod. Allow plenty of time for the backcast to reach its end and the whipping effect will be minimized.

But not too much time, because the line could fall into the ground or water behind you.

Fischer roll-casts to put excess loops of line on the water. Pull line from the reel with your free hand and play it out as you raise the rod to the noon position.

Then sharply whip the rod forward, creating a loop of excess line that should carry to the water and form a circle. Practice at home on the lawn without leader to perfect this technique, and remember you’ll have to do it two or three times very quickly.

The trick in slack-line fishing is to drift the fly downriver, suspended six to eight inches off the bottom.

Allow the entire puddle of line to drift through the hole, keeping a close eye on the strike indicator. It should all be moving at the same speed.

If the indicator goes under, strip line as quickly as possible and set the hook. The longer rod is more effective because it more than doubles the amount of line you can gather quickly.

If you have tied the correct leader length, the fly will not hang up on the bottom, and every dip of the strike indicator means a fish has mouthed the fly.

Strip line both by pulling in line with one hand as you lower the rod and as you lift the rod sharply. The hand pulling the line should be working overtime.

Egg flies are typically tied with yarn and frequently catch on the steelhead’s sharp teeth long enough to allow you to strip line until the slack is out.

Once the fish is hooked and begins its run, carefully feed the slack line at your feet and then play the fish off the reel.

Don’t try to play the fish with the slack line.