50 ROD 6- CREEL 



CHAPTER XIII. 

 HINTS ON SPINNING FOR STEELHEADS 



SCIENTIFIC spinning, however much it may be despised by fly 

 fishermen, is a most excellent form of sport, particularly so 



for winter or early spring steelhead fishing. To cast a minnow 

 or prawn with accuracy requires just as much dexterity as it does 

 to cast an ordinary w r et fly. Almost anybody, with a Malloch 

 reel can, with a little practice, get a Devon minnow out some 

 twenty yards or so, even if he has no idea where it is going to 

 land in the water, and then reel it in again, either fast or slow, 

 quite regardless of the current and depth of the water. But this 

 is not spinning, though an odd fish may be hooked once in a 

 while and even landed by such methods, though the chances of 

 either are very remote. 



To be able to spin properly requires a vast amount of prac- 

 tice and as perfect an equipment as for fly fishing: the rod, 

 reel and line must all be suitable or you will never succeed in 

 doing really good work. 



The Rod. Most fishermen make the very bad mistake of 

 using too small a rod, many even using single handed steel ones 

 not more than five feet long. With such an implement you can 

 neither work your minnow properly or play a fish if you hook 

 one. It must be remembered that steelheads are very powerful 

 even for their size, which is often up to fifteen pounds, and 

 occasionally as high as twenty pounds, and if you hook a fresh 

 run fish of half that weight on one of these toys with a cheap 

 reel only holding about forty yards of line, you must expect some- 

 thing to smash within the first thirty seconds. 



A few years ago when small rods were almost entirely used, 

 very few steelheads were landed and some very amusing inci- 

 dents used to happen, one of which is worth relating and it will 

 at any rate give the beginner a good idea of some things he 

 should not do. 



I was watching a man fishing with just such an outfit in a 

 piece of water where an occasional fish lay pretty close into 

 shore. He was using an enormous ''Si wash spoon " fitted with 

 double hooks to match it in size, and as the water was quite 

 clear and a bright sky overhead, his chances did not look good, 

 especially as his first three attempts at casts were failures. His 

 fourth attempt was more successful and the spoon crashed into 

 the water some ten or fifteen yards out. The unexpected of 



