I am planing on going to the expo. It will be my first time. Have you been to the seminars are they any good?
They do some of the seminars right out in the open. Some are in the ball room. I would focus on the ones doing stream fishing techniques. What works in a boat won’t work for us.
I’m trying to get a small stream/creek tournament going for this summer. It will have similar rules to the “Uncut Angling 39 Hours” series. I posted about it on the Fishing Nerds FB page and got a lot of nice feedback. Basically it’s a 1-day tournament, where you and 1 other person (your team) try to catch as many different species of game fish over 12" as possible. You’ll have to do some traveling and planning to make it work. It should be interesting. To get an idea of what it’s about watch these videos:
The Team Shimano guys are guides right over the border. You’ll see them fishing in ArtPark all the time.
I just joined fishing nerds. Looks cool. Sanders fishing forum was always decent. But that’s gone. Rumors were it was going to be running again, but that was years ago and nothing.
Just got back from the show. It was much bigger with 10x as many seminars going on in each of the conference rooms. Almost all of the seminars are free. I went to one hosted by Danny Colville of Colville Outfitters. The seminar was about centerpin fishing, setups, technique, and casting. Was about an hour and a half long. They have lots of cool stuff for kids or the wifey too.
Hey we were in the same seminar. I went really not knowing what to expect but the seminars are definitely worth the the trip out. I was not planing on taking too long there today so i only stayed for one, but next year I will attend a few more.
I was in the same one also. The book said nothing about center pinning for that seminar. I thought I was in the wrong room for a second. But I want to get a centerpin this year. He was very informative. Later on he got into jigs, egg curing…etc. Was well worth it in my opinion.
Yeah, it was suppose to be about “steelhead fishing the Erie tribs”. Oh well, I have a pin and I was doing things wrong with it. His tips on casting were invaluable, even though he had zero room to cast. I’ll never just use my pin, whenever I bring it, I always bring a spinning reel too. I recognized a few guys in there from seeing them shore fishing. Danny Colville is considered one of the best.
Side note: Do you guys know how much profit you could make by building a centerpin reel? You need access to a CNC machine, and a few basic CAD files. There are only 5 parts to a reel, and they typically sell for $450+. The materials to build one are a small chunk of aluminum.
I’m curious how much he sells his for. I imagine you can make a nice profit. His shop is 5 minutes from my house. I’m going to check it out one day.
His shop is awesome if you fish tribs for steelhead. He has everything you could need or want. I am pretty sure his reels are in the $500-$600 range depending on the model.
As for how much it would cost to make one, it depends on on volume of reels in a production run, and anodize color variation, since most shops have a lot charge for anodize. Based on the volume and colors danny offers I doubt he is making a ton of money on his reels.
I’m pretty sure they are $450-$500. They do sell some entry level reels, but even they are $200.
So I just realized I asked a lot of questions but never really contributed to this thread very much-lol So anyway, this was my go to jig when float fishing this year. White tends to be the favorite color for Erie tribs. But this landed me more fish than white. I really never had a bad day when using this color.
I have to work the whole weekend and missed the Expo. What length rod are u guys using for float fishing? So far I like the 10’6" rod medium-light fast action. Current using spinning gears for this year. After a while, i might get a 13’6 center pin. I kinda like the Raven rods, but not sure what reel to get. My go to jig colors is black/red, black/chartreuse. Caught most of the steelheads on those color combos.
My centerpin rod is a 13’6" Temple Fork Outfitters rod. It was $139, it’s a 2-piece. For my spinning setup I use a 6’ medium-fast St Croix 1-piece. I will probably be buying a 6’6" medium carbon fiber rod in the spring from Lehigh Fishing. I like the accuracy of a shorter spinning rod and I like the power of a medium-fast action. The only drawback with a 6’ rod is casting distance.
I was thinking of using my 10’ medium-medium/heavy rods only for catfish and carp in the spring. Then buying an Okuma ultra light 8’ rod for steelhead. Im not sure if that will be adequate enough.
I landed a nice steelhead on a 5 foot ultralight. I lost an even bigger one though. The drawback is that if you hook into a slob, you won’t be able to power the fish away from any rocks or barriers.
This is my next rod for steelhead. It’s somewhat expensive but after winning the ultralight and seeing the power that it had, i’m certain a bigger version will be unbeatable:
http://lehighfishing.com/?page_id=210
I posted this a few pages back, but in case you missed it:
this fish was almost half as long as the rod:
Here’s a bigger one I lost. There’s simply no way to power the fish in with ultralight gear, you have to take the fish to exhaustion, which isn’t good for the fish:
After that weekend, I never fish the creeks without a net, lol. I could have landed that fish for sure with a net.
That’s a good looking fish! I also found a 10’ light action rod for steelhead. That ones peaking my interest. I want to get a rubber net also. Nothing more annoying than trying to get your hook out of a standard net when the hook pierces it.
Rubber really hurts the fish though, especially a steelhead. My net has that wax coating to protect the fish. A rubber net will scrape all of the protective slime off of a fish when you land it. It sucks when a treble gets tangled, but it’s never a really big deal. The guy that builds the Lehigh rods can do all sorts of custom stuff if you ask. It’s one of those few small companies that makes a stellar product for not a lot of money. If you ever price a top-end G loomis or St Croix spinning rod, you’ll end up spending a lot more.
I’ve never heard of that before. I’ve seen quite a few people use them over the years. Some manufactures even advertise the soft rubber is gentle on the fish. I’ll have to check out Lehigh.
Anyone go out this weekend? Water was in decent shape. I got nothing. From what I gathered it was slow all around talking to people.
I went Saturday around 6:30AM and most places was taken. Spendt 3 hours float drift and casting spoons without any luck. No one was catching anything. I went this morning at 7AM ended the day with only 1 small steelhead. The guy nect to me using center pin got one. Dont see anyone else catching anything. Light sprinkle here and there.