Beginner Steelhead Tips?

If you ever make it to eureka and Wana fish the mad river give me a shout

Wow, thanks for all the feedback guys.

I crawled around the SLR over the weekend just for the hell of it but didn't get a single bite. Took some of the advice here and didn't bring my fly rod. Drifted a rubber worm under a bobber along a few stretches for nothing.

Definitely interested in a guide trip, just gotta work the timing and finances out a bit. Also happy to meet up with anyone who's going out for 'em.

That kayak trip looks pretty rad as well...

If you ever make it to eureka and Wana fish the mad river give me a shout

Nice fish Doug! Congratulations!

My kayak fishing experience is non existent, but I have caught a steelhead or two on a fly rod. If you go somewhere with the real potential for big fish, equip yourself for big fish. I’ve never really had the “leader shy steelhead” experience that you’ll often hear of and as a big believer in releasing fish as fast as possible, I always go on the heavy side. A 9-10’ 7 wt is the ideal steelhead stick in my opinion, enough power for sinking lines while swinging streamers and nimble enough to roll over bobber rigs all day. Also there was a study done a number of years ago that showed a very high mortality rate for released steelhead, the cause was them bashing their heads against the ground when being landed in shallow water, good to keep the goal of netting or tailing them in at least knee deep water if safe to do so (from a kayak this wouldn’t be an issue but be mindful of their heads flopping against the boat itself).