Fishing For Sea Trout With Ian Moutter APGAI    

Sea Trout Fly Fishing Tackle

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Tackle

It is difficult to give general tackle information, as with most fishing situations, tackle is dependant on a host of different factors. The following is information that has proved to be very effective over many years, resulting in the capture of many fine sea trout on different types of rivers.

River Sea Trout Fishing

It is a mistake to believe that big sea trout only run in big rivers, there are many small stream that have large numbers of significantly sized sea trout running them and sometimes in large numbers. I fished a small stream for years that seldom had a width in excess of 5 yards wide and was often less than 3 yards wide. The runs of sea trout on this stream were impressive and included shoals where the average size would have exceeded 7lb. The Cornish Rivers Fowey and Camel cannot be considered large by any measure, but each have large runs of big fish, as does the East Lothian Tyne in Scotland, where fish in excess of 10lbs are often taken. So when fishing a small river you must take all the factors into account. When fishing a large river like the River Tweed the same applies.
On the whole I personally prefer to fish for sea trout at two levels in the water - either on the top using surface lures or as close to the bottom as possible

• Rods - 6 to 8 weight. 8ft to 10.5ft with a sound through action. Smaller rivers with dense undergrowth and lots of bankside vegetation warrant the use of smaller rods, however, always go for the longest practical rod, but not longer than 10.5ft.
• Lines - 6 wt to 8 wt. The weight of the line will depend a lot on the size of fly you are using and the density and weight of any sink tip used.
• Sink Tips - Regular sea trout fishers often design and make their own lines to suit particular situations, in fact a line can sometimes be designed for a specific pool. For those starting out in fly fishing for sea trout, a selection of different rates of sinking tips can be very useful. The less experienced caster should stick to 5 to 6 ft of tip. Experienced casters can use as long and as heavy as required.
• Leader - My first rule is "never use too light breaking strain leader". 8lbs breaking strain is my minimum and up to 15lbs breaking strain. This is really important
• Flies - Lighter flies on sinking lines are better than heavy flies on a floating line, they tend to fish better and you have more control over the depth the fly will fish. Saying that I love to fish a large Sunk Lure Tandem on a fast sinking line when the conditions allow (not for the inexperienced). Four other favourites - Serial Killer, Teal Blue & Silver, Medicine and Peter Ross. Over the last few years we have been trying out flies with little lights in them and they have proved very successful. For the surface, a selection of surface lures, not too small, a big wake seems to work best.

The above comments are not applicable for every situation, but are a good general guide.