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I want to try to salmon, brown trout trolling in Lake Michigan out of my kayak. I keep looking at the flies that they troll and they are crazy simple looking, but don't want to recreate the wheel. I'm not finding good info on tying. Anyone have ideas on the best way to approach these type of flies?
Any tips would be appreciated.
Here a link to see what I am after: https://www.poseidonflies.com/collections/coho-candy
That looks like a short spinnerbait skirt on a large treble hook. I have never seen one personally, coho fishing pretty much sucks in the SE USA.
heres how to tie them
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kON7lwMtkgA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ddinigJg18
Those flies are trolled behind a downrigger. I don't think anyone uses them in the spring when the browns and salmon are in close enough to fish from a kayak. Crankbaits in silver and green or silver and blue are common to represent smelt and alewives though other colors are sometimes better. I've had good luck with a 7" countdown Rapala in silver when wading. All of this is leading up to saying that you want to tie big streamers in white with some olive or blue topping. Tinsel probably helps. Think deep Clouser minnows, deceivers, grizzly hen matukas etc.
Thanks for the thoughts guys. No downrigger on the Hobie. I do see many people trolling cranks and spoons. The drug for me is the big tug and the thought of big trout trips my trigger so to say.
I did see that young man tying some flies. Just not sure that is the best way to approach this. It was hinted at that many people tie these with mylar rope and then fray the rope after they are tied in a similar way that I would take some yarn and fray the fibers for a wooly bugger tail.
Note that this project is for trolling the great lakes, I think that some of these same techniques would make great stream and river flies.
Again, I think that these are very simple flies, I just don't tie on a treble usually and don't think that tying each of the three hanks of mylar between the treble are done individually for each of a 3 color fly ( applying 9 hanks of material.) After a lot of research, something like this, but still not sure that this is the best way either: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lrDSP4-eel0
I see no advantage to the trebles and many disadvantages. I ran my charter boat out of Kodiak for many years and have put many, many tons of silver scales on the decks! I use a lot of different flies for silvers and I cannot imagine standard single hook streamers not being better.
Disadvantages:
> Trebles do not hook as deeply into the fish as singles and the trebles have another hook or two to lever against the shallow hooking of the first. You will lose many more fish on trebles.
> Trebles are far more dangerous flying around on deck. I have a long history of removing hooks and trebles are always much worse as they seldom hook just once.
> Oftentimes the treble will "stitch" the mouth shut and the fish will run out of gas quickly. SIlvers are by far the most delicate salmon and anything approaching rough handling will often kill them. They also roll a great deal on the line and regularly wrap their own gills closed with your line.
> Trebles are not as effective at hooking fish, compared to singles. I tie double hook flies for nostalgic reasons and have fished them a lot, they fish better than trebles, but not as good as singles in my anecdotal experience.
As to tying them, do not overthink it! ;) Just place one color in a bunch on the hook, take a soft wrap and spread the stuff out manually as you wrap. If you are worried about durability, reverse-tie the materials in and pull back and wrap down. If using the Flash items in the link they can need something like that.
Be careful with those trebles... a friend lost an eye to a treble salmon fishing.