Today I am going to cover two different strikes I experience on the small mountain trout streams.
Pop Strike
There were eight wild brook trout feeding on dry sulphur duns on the long pool before me. I didn’t expect to catch all either but I knew that by using my pop strike, I could do well. My pop strike goes like this. The trout comes up and takes a natural. I cast my dry sulphur two feet above him and he takes it. Setting the hook I felt the solid resistance as the barbless hook penetrates the trouts lip. Instantly release all of the pressure on the fly and it slides smoothly from his lip causing no disturbance. The trout hardly knows he’s been hooked and he does not scare the other trout in the pool. This gives me a good chance to catch more.
Line Hand and Slip Strikes
Frequently when fishing mountain trout streams one must be careful in setting the hook on the trouts strike. It is easy to break a fly rod by swinging the rod into an overhead tree limb. In close quarters, I always use a line hand strike and not strike with the rod.
Carrying this one step further is to use a slip strike in conjunction with the line hand strikes when I’m using 7X or 8X tippets when I’m fishing midges and small ants. Here I set the hook with the line held between my thumb and forefinger of my line hand. The instant I feel the resistance of the hook penetrating the trouts mouth I release the line. The trout is hooked and the leader is intact.
For more information on fishing small mountain streams in Virginia, see my book Trout Fishing in the Shenandoah National Park.