I’ve been chasing some nice Chain Pickerel lately and have found a wire bite leader to be a necessity for me.
I have settled on an Albright for the mono to wire connection but a simple knot that draws up nicely to the hook eye is a pain. I’ve been using a Palomar because it doesn’t involve a lot of wraps but the coating on the wire I use makes the knot bind at the last minute so I gotta figure there is a better option.
Any tricks or suggestions other than skipping the coated wire or wire altogether?
What I do for pike fishing is ‘pre tie’ short wire leaders. I’ll use either 17 or 20 pound leader material and keep the length down to around 3-4 inches (I use the beading wire sold at the craft shop, then ‘camoflage’ it with several colors of sharpie markers-not sure it matters to the fish, but I like them to be less visible).
I use a duncan loop knot on the end where I’ll tie my tippet.
For the ‘fly’ end, I use several options. Either a duo lock snap, a cross lock snap, or just a small split ring (works best, especially if you are a bit ‘hardware shy’). I attach whichever with the same duncan loop knot as on the other end.
I don’t want a knot that is tight to the fly’s eye, as doing that with wire restricts the action of the fly too much for me.
Nice thing about this, I just use my ‘normal’ knots to tie the leader to the tippet, then I can easily change/replace flies as the toothy critters tear them up.
Works well for pike, which aren’t in the least leader shy. I’ve never even seen a pickeral…
I chase pike and muskies on the fly. With the supple, knotable, braided wire available today…e.g. Tygerwire or American brand,try this… It’s never failed me.
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The knot!
It’s called a Jig Loop. Tie an overhand knot about 2-3" from the end of the wire tippet BUT don’t pull it totally shut. Leave it “just loose enough” to insert the end of this wire back into. Now put the tag end into the hook eye.
Now push this tag end through that overhand knot…that you left loose “enough” but not too loose, right?
Now, take and make a 1/2 hitch just behind that overhand knot and snug it up. and make a second 1/2 hitch again behind this one but this time puller her tight with a pair of pliers!
Done! If it turned out right…and sometimes it doesn’t, depending on how tight that overhand knot was…you’ll end up with a neat little “jig loop” that your fly can swing freely on!!!
If it didn’t turn out just perfect don’t sweat it. Fish it anyhow. And I find it best to try to tie a few of these in the plain cheap mono before I go fishing…for a test!
Really, it’s simple.
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It’s not a knot that “draws up nicely” but rather allows the fly freedom to move.
I was using coated wire yesterday for bluefish
Albright knot with a uni-knot lock (think ‘improved’ like the improved clinch) to the leader.
Figure 8 knot to the fly
I learned Larry Dahlberg’s use of nylon coated wire as a bite tippet. He connects the leader to the wire with an Albright knot. Then tie on the fly by running a couple of inches of wire through the eye, twist it several times and then take a lighter or match and heat the nylon coated wire. This will cause the nylon to melt and and cross link itself, making an almost indistructable connection.
Practice it until you don’t set the nylon on fire and I think you will find it holds very well.
To change flies just snip off the fly and use the same method to tie on the next one.
This works quite well and saves a lot of time and material.
I have also used this above method for many years and found it to be the easiest method for me. Caught many 10lb Pike without any breakoffs and once the fly is destroyed, it certainly makes for a quick change up. I tried other knots, but found them a pain at times and lost fish because of my inexperience in tying them. I enjoy the easier less time consuming methods when I’m on active fish. Trick is to only melt the plastic coating, not set it on fire!
The jam knot that Jeremy describes works great if you want a loop. If you want a knot that draws up tight go with a basic figure eight knot. It will not come undone or pull out. Real easy to tie.
A Regular figure eight knot is what I use for rock climbing. It had better not come undone. I havn’t tied it any differant when fishing the few times I’ve used it and haven’t had any issues.
Erich
I think repeating what has been said before is OK…maybe even desirable since it shows more support for the point.
I do think it is classy to give credit to the previous poster.
Dudly,
Didn’t mean to step on any toes. I just didn’t see your reference earlier to the figure 8. If I would have, I would have given credit where credit was due.
To connect the wire to the mono leader I us a small, high quality black ball bearing swivel (I like the Spro brand) . Connect swivel to mono with a palomar knot. Connect wire to swivel with figure 8 knot. Connect wire to fly with a two turn non-slip loop knot, which works well with all of the knotable coated multi strand wire that I have tried.
I have used this for pike as well as toothy saltwater critters. I have gone through a week of 9 hour pike fishing days without ever needing to change the mono part of the leader.
Works great and I don’t need to cut back the leader to change wire. The swivel does not interfere with casting. It also has the the benefit of preventing twists in the leader that may develop from casting some flies. Wire changes are much faster to accomplish. Don’t use a silver swivel because sometimes fish will hit that instead of the fly and cut through the mono leader.
