Why streamers? It’s really a simple question to answer. It’s because I like absolute violence unleashed at the end of my fly line. The take when swinging a big articulated fly is just that, and few other freshwater fly fishing pursuits can come close to replicating it. That smashing hit can literally rip the rod right out of your hand, the electric pulse thumping through the rod as a steelhead thrashes to the surface, shaking its head back and forth, diving back down and then going airborne. A muskie might come close, but just yesterday I watched a 50 inch muskie on YouTube, using a one, one thousand one count, netted in just 8 seconds. That will never happen with a 30 inch steelhead, even if hooked using heavy fly fishing tackle. Large and smallmouth bass hooked on topwater may be thrilling, but you're never going to chase a bass down the river for 50 yards. Pike, yes the take can be violent and big ones can put your heart in your throat, but stamina is not one of their strong attributes. I think many of us evolve as steelheaders, and after you’ve done it for a while and have caught a bunch of them, it sometimes becomes more important, or maybe just more exciting, how you catch them, than how many you caught. Creating my own articulated streamer patterns and swinging them with a two hander on big water has become my favorite way to catch them, thanks to the influence of friends like Jack Hanrahan and Steve Brugger. Over the last decade or so, many of my largest steelhead of the entire season have been caught while swinging big stuff.
