MJL

Like Rover mentioned, I always try to use the heaviest line possible to minimize the length of time needed to bring in the fish. With that said, when I started steelheading, dropping down to 2lb mono was fairly common. With float rods like the old House of Hardy or Lews, you could literally bend them into an 'O' without snapping the line. Nowadays when the fishing gets tough, I either drop down to 4-5lb leads or break out the spinning tackle and toss spinners to the fish (I often carry 2 rods with me). I wouldn't call 1 guy using 2lb leads a trend.LOL If anything, a lot of the guys I see out on the rivers are using 6-8lb leads and faster tapered rods.

Nice fish. Definitely well deserved after some tough fishing.

Pg 80 (3 of 6) Rainbow trout, Brown trout and Pacific Salmon open all year Credit River and tributaries - City of Mississauga from the south side of Hwy. 403 bridge downstream to Lake Ontario Erindale park is within that open year round stretch

Hey Berge Let me know if you and Silvio are going to be around my neighbourhood this weekend. It would be nice to see Silvio get into some fish too (He knows I'm joking...I hope)

I've seen fish swim up a boat ramp and into a parking lot so I would have to agree with you on that statement.LOL

Thanks guys Who says I don't dabble around with the opposite sex. None of the ones I ever meet know what a double haul is or know how to slice up some fresh sashimi.LOL With that said, I'm not the one who has to spend time talking about my feelings to someone else at home on the phone when the rivers are prime and the steel are running You up for round 2 tonight?

Those ling are nifty! Fantabulous report Ben. I wouldn't mind dropping one of those ling in a deep fryer and having a taste. They look meaty!

Happy B-day Beans

I've never fished it but a quick search on google came up with a list of species found in Carruthers creek and rainbows was one of them. I'm not sure if they're the migratory ones (steelhead) or they stay in the rivers in the headwaters all year round (resident). Before you head out , check the regs to make sure your backyard isn't a sanctuary this time of year.LOL

This afternoon my friend calls me up saying he has an emergency with his aquarium filter and needs help ASAP. I was well prepared for a situation like this…Not only did I have my buckets, siphons, water conditioner and towels ready, my steelhead tackle and bait was also on standby…It just so happens that my friend lives down the street from a trib with steel going up. The emergency that my friend had was nothing more than a filter with dirty impeller shaft. Cleaned the filter and off to the river I went. Fished from 1pm-2:45pm. The river was clear with a beautiful emerald green tinge to it. Stuck a roe bag on the hook and my 2nd drift in, I got this small beautiful hen. Testing out the zoom on my new super-zoom camera It was windy as heck out and the cold east winds blowing up the river made the fishing a slightly uncomfortable experience. Fish were still hitting but I was a little too trigger happy with the hooksets and couldn’t get another one to stick – They had a talent of crushing all of my roe bags without getting hooked. I moved downstream to a more sheltered spot out of the wind. Got to the next spot and methodically worked a large pool. After a few dozen drifts with a variety of baits (roe, jigs, pink worms, white worms, live trout worms and flies), I hooked into something with weight to it. For 5 minutes the fish slowly bulldogs around the hole without too much excitement. After 5 minutes it realizes it’s hooked and goes nuts. It tried to jump and tail-walk but I guess the water was still too cold for it to make it fully out. It did make a few mind-blasting runs when I thought it was almost done. I met another angler, Steve who was gracious enough to get his hands cold and wet tailed the beast for me. His buddy Carlo took the picture. Success at around 13-14lbs (maybe a little more ) …The shoulders on that fish was massive. Both Steve and I plus one big buck It was a great 2hrs of fishing this afternoon. Victor and I headed out for a few hours this evening to the same spot but unfortunately no fish were hooked. Hopefully I can put him onto fish the next time so he can catch his first steelhead on a float set-up – At least our lines weren’t freezing up which made skunking a little more bearable. Hope you enjoyed

Can’t go wrong with French blade spinners. Almost all the spinners I regularly use and keep in my bag are made with French blades in various colours. Here are about half of the ones I use…My dad has the other half in his vest. I made my own spinners almost identical to the Riverwood spinners out of necessity for fishing long, deeper runs and pools (2 top left spinners in the pic). The brass body gets the spinner down and keeps it down – They don't tend to ride to the surface like some other spinners do in faster conditions. Those Riverwood spinners do look like they’re going to be great fish producers.

I must be the only one on this board to have problems gaining weight Well done CC. Definitely a well deserved and beautiful fish.

Beautiful piece of steel there. I looooove tossing spinners for steelhead. The way they smash them is unreal - Definitely no mistaking a hit...Almost like hooking into a solid snag and suddenly having it go ballistic at warp speed.

Beautiful pics Dobee. Love the scenery. Can't think of a better way to break in the new stick. Congrats

Great catches FishinFool! Those fish certainly look like browns to me...As for the debate on whether to stock Atlantics VS steelhead/pacific salmon, I thought they were trying to reintroduce them since the 80's (at least in Wilmot creek) with little to show for it. I've also read that Atlantic salmon suffered from thiamine deficiencies when they feed mostly on a diet of smelt and alewife. Both smelt and alewife contain an enzyme which breaks down thiamine (vitamin B-1) which results in low reproductive success. Not sure what other baitfish there would be in Lake Ontario that Atlantics could eat.

So much chrome (drool) Beautiful pics and great report. Also was nice meeting both you and Kemper the other day.

Great reportage Fidel. Thanks for sharing

If the word epic was to be banned on OFC, we wouldn't be able to use great words like epicenter, epicyclic, depict, depictions, orthoepically and epicurism in our postings (should we ever find a reason to use these words)

Congrats on the new PB! All of those fish are stunning. I caught my PB condom from that stretch yesterday - Unfortunately nothing else was landed (at least nothing I wanted to touch).

Those plastic casting bubbles work great. I used them with dry flies a few times and although I didn't get any trout, I got bucket loads worth of chub, shiners and the odd baby smallie. One tip someone gave me when fishing dry flies with those casting bubbles is to put vaseline on the line above those floats so you can mend your line a little easier on the drift.

Maybe not but I'm sure they felt a little violated Great job guys. Those fish look absolutely mint.

Last year I caught a carp/goldfish hybrid. Later in the season I saw large goldfish spawning within the mass orgy of carp where I caught it. Not sure if carp/goldfish hybrids can spawn successfully...I wouldn't be surprised if they did considering all the ornamental types of goldfish available on the market.

Solopaddler takes people he doesn't like to rivers that aren't fishing well.LOL j/k Great report and the scenery is absolutely beautiful. Definitely would love to take a few drifts in those rivers in the near future.

Depending on the type of water you’re fishing, you can fish the flies beneath a float or you can try your hand at bottom bouncing them (which I do both for my steelhead fishing) In faster runs and pocket water, I like bottom bouncing flies (provided the bottom isn’t incredibly snaggy). The easiest way to rig it is crimp enough split shot 16 inches above the fly to let the presentation drift along bottom. Too much weight will have your rig sitting stationary on bottom (you don’t want this). Too little and you won’t reach bottom (you don’t want this either). I normally have my finger on the line (or hold it with my left hand) and feel the tap-tap-tap of the shots bouncing bottom to let me know if I’m in the zone – If I feel something spongy I set the hook (it’s a little hard to explain what a take feels like). For my own bottom bouncing needs, I normally tie on a 6-10lb mono or fluoro leader to my mainline using a uni-to-uni knot or a double surgeons knot and crimp split shot to the tag end where the leader and mainline are knotted together…Similarly if you’re using a swivel, you can crimp split shots on the tag end of the mainline to swivel knot – If you snag up on the shots, they’ll slide off and save you from re-tying a whole new rig. Check you’re line and hook often because a bottom bouncing rig generally goes through lots of abuse bouncing along the bottom. For float fishing flies, rig them like you would a roe bag. Hard to explain but there are lots of tutorials on rigging if you google it. Everyone has their own way of rigging their float set-up. Someone posted a link to a shotting tutorial not too long ago. You probably can find it if you search through the archives. Hope this helps

I owned one briefly - I think the one I had was made in Russia. I paid $16 for it new. Got it mostly as a novelty toy and a loaner reel...Used it once. Tolerances were poor. It wobbled when you spun it and my 8lb mainline found its way into the back of the spool. I landed a few dozen suckers with it though. I sold it to my friend who insisted it was a prototype JW Young Great Lakes Steelheader reel. I told him otherwise (more than once) but he offered me good cash for it and I sold it to him. He sold it shortly afterward.LOL You're better off with another reel. Perhaps something like an Okuma Aventa if you're looking for a decent reel for cheap.