Got out with the flyrod for the first time this year. Went 1 for 5 on steelhead tough keeping them hook up with small flies. This one was 33" 10+ pounds

That is bad ass! I've always liked to fly fish, but here in the past few months it has been all I've used to catch everything from browns and bows in Arkansas, to bream and bass at home. It's something about having to play out even the smaller fish that makes standard tackle somewhat boring in comparison. Post some more pics of fish as you catch em. I Love looking at trout pictures.

Nice steel head, They are a challenge to land on a fly Rod for sure,

Awesome fish!! Especially on a fly rod!

I use a 9ft 8wt flyrod and these fish run around wherever they want. I find I have better success using smaller flies my go to set up is a yarn fly egg pattern and a 1" beaded wolly bugger trailing 6" back. Sometimes they hit the egg sometimes they go for the wolly. I lost a 20 minute battle with one and anther 10 minute battle with a fresh silver. She jumped and did a sumersault 2x before running in a deep hole and shaking the hook. hopefully the weather stays cool and we get a little rain to keep the fish in the tributaries longer before they head back to the big lake. Steelhead are my favorite but I get out in the fall for king salmon as the average fish is over 10lbs and many are 15+ and you can catch them up to 30 lbs a 1" beaded wolly works well for those monsters as well.

green or black for wolly, chartruse or peach is my favorite for egg color

^^^ this. Its a rush we get to fish them right in the city my favorite spot is brewers stadium park in the lot and walk 20 yards to the river. Salmon and steelhead hit like a freight train and can spool you in a heart beat if you don't palm the spool quick enough. The one in the picture I had to chase 150 yards down stream before I was able to land them. If the get you in the fast current they got the upper hand and you gotta horse em out or they will just sit there

The Midwest lake Michigan in particular has a great trout fishery. World record brown trout (several 30+ lbers) have been caught in the last few years. Michigan has a lot of great tributaries and is said to have a phenominal steelhead run. Trolling on the lake is fun during summer there's a 5 fish limit and on a good day you can fill up a cooler there's a lot of charter boats that will get you on fish. I take it for granted sometimes because its a 10 minute drive to fish em.

Not a steelhead by any means. But he absolutely destroyed a popper and my old 3 wt fly rod made it one hell of a fight

Very nice.. I bet he did put a hell of a fight on that 3 wt.. Looks like a bamboo from the pic..

Yea it's an old e eggington and sons (or atleast that's what I concluded after tirelessly researching it) made in the 40's.. It could be a show piece but that rod has seen hundreds, if not thousands of fish landed and instead of retiring it after a recent fly trip I went on, I decided to fish er till the bamboo just can't take it no more.

Awesome man.. It s definatly a classic piece for sure..

Nice fish bt.

Well the river finally went down some and the river is now flush full of steelies. Went 3/3 today and kept 2. Only stayed for about 2.5 hours. Fun day at the river all 3 were around 30". It's peak run right now so fishing should be good for another 2 weeks

Nice work puddler those are a Couple of pigs right there. What's your favorite way to cook steelhead?

Tonight I tried blackened it was ok but not as good as blackened salmon. The best way I found is cook em in tin foil with skin on skin side down. Cover the fillet in ranch dressing and add liberal amount of pramesan cheese seal and cook for 1/2 hour at 350. Can use the same method but use butter sliced lemons onions and peppers. Deep fried is decent but I prefer tin foil method the best.

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This one gave me the best fight of the year this morning. Jumped out of the water no less than 6 times made 5 or 6 long powerful runs. Not the biggest I've ever caught but it definetly had some shoulders on him.

Steelhead fishin still hot for you guys up there?

Nice fish btw puddler

I havent fished it since the end of april There was probably fish in the rivers for a week or 2 after that but we got so much rain it was unfishable. The steelies are back in the big lake now so I will have to wait till september to chase the fall run species 20-30 lb chinook salmon the big brown trout a few coho salmon and the tail end nov/dec will bring some steelhead that can be caught throughout winter here and there until the big push in spring. We have 3 different types of steelhead from what ive heard one type is a fall spawning fish one is a mid winter spawning fish and the most abundant is the spring spawning fish.

Some pan size rainbows from the bighorn this weeknd..

Damn that bottom one looks like one of those European rainbows that eat all the mice

nice fish...Ive caught a couple fat ones like that on some small streams after a rainfall. The fish had nearly a lb of worms and crawlers that they were gourging themselves on.

They were stuffed with small chubs, and stone flys.. It is still fairly cold for this time of year so,not much dry fly activity.. I caught them on a size 10 yellow stone fly and a olive wolly bugger..

Did some fly fishing over the weekend, weather has been crazy warm for a few days. So took advantage of it.. Caught some fish and even had some dry fly action late in the day.

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lord have mercy i'm jealous. weekend after next i'll be doing the exact same thing. Great pics and keep em coming as the season breaks into full swing in your neck of the woods!

I def miss it, never encountered any big fish, they just didn't have big ones there in Tennessee where i fished. They may have had some big ones but I never caught any

Put some new line on the flyrod a couple days ago. I had some cheap stuff that I got when I first started fly fishing. I spooled up with rio gold this time and man what a difference. This stuff cast like a dream really rockets through the guides. I went down to the river yesterday since the ice finally went out and hooked up with a small buck bout 20". It took a fast run and 2 jumps later it spit the fly back in my face. Not many fish in the rivers yet we need some rain as there wasn't much of a snow pack so the flows aren't high enough and water is still cold the fish haven't made a big push yet. I went back tonight and hooked into a nice buck in the first 20 min. Put up a nice fight and I took him home for dinner tonight. Hit on a gaudy yellow pink and chartruse may fly pattern

Bout a 5 pounder

I am in the market for some new line for my 8 wt, I will give the rio a look. Great fish to knock the dust off the fly stick for the season. I was on the little red in arkansas this past weekend and the water was high high. 12 ft leaders with split shot and triple nymph rig was about the only thing that worked. Did manage to catch 10 or so decent bows and got wrapped around a rock and broke off by a really nice brown that probably would have been my biggest so far. I took the girlfriend on this trip and I think it's safe to say she is hooked on fly fishin

Great way to start the year off puddler.. X2 on the rio line, I really like rios fluorocarbon tippet as well.