Chironomids with Sink Lines

[raffensg64]

Gents, are your legs tired from all that kicking around in your pontoon or tube? Or do you just wanna settle down, do some serious fishing, and catch some fish? Try this the next time you see a good chironomid hatch.....

Using at least a type III sink line (I use a IV or VI), shorten your leader to 5-6 feet. Drop your anchor in water ranging from 20-30 feet. Get a "guestimate" of the water depth. A fish/depth finder is handy for this, if not get a rough depth from your anchor rope (I'm in the anchor rope mode since my fish/depth finder crashed!). Match your line length (leader included) to your estimated depth and make your cast. Allow line to sink until it is vertical. Begin a slow retrieve, an inch or so at a time, and vary things up with an occasional "pop" or "jig". If a fish takes, you will definitely feel it...there is zero slack. If the fish are feeding aggressively, your rod tip will be violently taken into the water. If not, the take may be slow and subtle, as though a slight bit of weight or pressure is being applied. Other takes will fall in the middle, slow but constant with your rod tip being pulled down. Either way you will know it.

My partners and I agree that when this is working NOTHING will produce more fish. Some folks have claimed to me that they lack the patience for this style of fishing. When it is rocking you'll be onto a fish every five minutes or so and patience is not necessary. And there are, of course, times it does not work....it is hatch dependent. But recently we learned that in the absence of a hatch a blood worm pattern will work just great! These are super for "dangling" while you're munching on something...just make sure you secure your rod! And while at Amber a few weeks ago, I dropped a stillwater nymph vertical and absolutely clobbered them with that same, glacially slow retrieve. Go figure....

Give it a try sometime. If it doesn't work, try and try again until it does and you gain confidence in it. In time, you will learn the areas of your favorite lakes where it works the best. And here's an incentive; you will say "good-bye" to the shallow water dinks and "hello" to the bruisers that hug the bottom in deep water. For example, most West Medical regulars are not aware of, or have never seen a brown trout from that lake. But they are there, and we nail a couple every outing, along with a lot of BIG rainbows, right off the bottom.

Good luck, and your legs will say "thank you".

Anyone else have any experience with this technique?

[Marc Martyn]

Great Post=d>
I did do that up in the Okanagon (sp?) area at Blue Lake for the Lahontons. Worked great.

[jmay]

I've had great success doing the same thing off the basalt cliff of Bager and Williams doing the same thing with a brassie

[Stonedfish]

There used to be a guy who fished Dry Falls who did the same thing. He's use a type 7 full sink line. Cast it out and would sometimes wait 10 minutes before he'd start to strip in. When he did strip, he would put his rod completely in the water, pointing straight towards the bottom. Only his reel, handle and about a half foot of the rod were above water. He'd twitch the fly in super slow and just killed the fish. I swear one day I saw he catch at least 50 bows doing this. I spoke with him at the launch one day. He said all he ever used for doing his was chironomids or hares ears.
Brian

[wolverine]

If the objective is fishing vertically in deep water why not just use 15 - 20 feet of T-14 attached to a mono running line? It would sink like a rock, much faster than using a sinking line.

[dbk]

If the objective is fishing vertically in deep water why not just use 15 - 20 feet of T-14 attached to a mono running line? It would sink like a rock, much faster than using a sinking line.

That system would definitely work, but if you use a type VI or VII full sink line, it does not take long for your fly to reach the desired depth so I doubt there is that much more of an advantage (in respect to the sink rate) to using the mono running line and the t-14 shooting head, though that system would (I assume) have a faster sink rate. Either one would work just fine.