Rate my drift rig presentation

[SandFinish69]

Hello, first time posting on here but I have been lurking in the shadows for a while. This will be my first year targeting salmon/steelhead. I'll be bank fishing the mckenzie, willamette and row river. I ordered a rod and reel from fishUSA (9' okuma celilo with shimano SLX casting reel) while I'm waiting for it to arrive I started tyeing leaders to practice. I have a couple questions and I just want to know if my rig presentation looks good for drift/float fishing steelhead. I'll be using 3/16 pencil led and black surgical tubing for weight.

Should I go to a bigger hook? The photo is size 4 octopus hook with off set eye. Since I'm just learning to drift I don't want to scare any smaller fish off. I'll be happy to land any fish.


The hook doesn't sit "in-line" with the leader, it has almost a 45° angle to it. Is this normal? I used a snell knot and ran a yarn ball through the bait loop. (I need more practice with egg loop knot that's why I'm using a snell)


I don't have any tooth picks but I plan to pin the corky about a 1/8" above the hook eye. Is that a good distance or should I go more?


Yarn and corky color combos for summer steelhead? I got a few diffrent corky patterns at bi mart I'll be trying but what are your favorite combos?


This rig is composed of 12# seaguar redlabel leader, size 4 gamakatsu octopus hook, size 14 corky, atlas glow yarn with atlas magic thread and a mad river fish pill on the shank.

Any advice and constructive criticism would be greatly appreciated. Thank for taking a look!

 

[troutdude]

I'm not a drifter, but it looks good to me. Although the Mac is a crystal clear stream. So when fishing for summer run fish...a much smaller OFFering would likely be best. A larger OFFering will spook wary steelies.

 

[Fishonshawn84]

Yeah, in low clear water go less yarn. I use a size 4 hook most of the time but even go down to a 6 sometimes. I take my yarn and peel it into halves or even thirds. Here's an example of a typical low flow, clear water, hot afternoon, set up i use. I also usually dip it in some anise scent.

Don't worry about your hook sitting 45° when your line is hanging. Thats normal with a bait loop knot. I just re-read and saw you used a snell knot. That's OK but learn to tie a bait loop.
As for your lead. Everyone is different, but ive done it all. Hollow core pinched on tag of leader, hollow core lead pinched on tag of main line, hollow core pinched on a literal scrap piece of line I just tied on my swivel just for the weight, I've used slinkies, I've done the solid core with surgical tubing.
What I've landed on as the best for me is solid core 3/16th lead with a hole punched in it, attached to a snap swivel, with my leader tied on there on the same end as the weight, and my main line tied to the other end of the swivel.
With hollow core pinched on i would often lose my weight if snagged. With slinkies it's hard to feel the bottom without putting to much weight on...its just to dull of a feeling. With the surgical tubing I was losing waaaay to much lead. With my current setup I do break off sometimes but often it's solid enough I can get it all back. Plus I can feel the bottom great. Your milage may vary and you may like something else. But ive done every set up for at least 1 year, most more. Some people also switch it from what i do and have the lead on the side of the main line and leader on the other...not sure if it makes a difference or not but this is what I do and it works for me.

Don't worry about pegging your corkie. As soon as your stuff hits bottom your presentation will swing below your weight and your corkie will slide right to your yarn instantly. No need for pegging it above your hook like a bead.
My absolute go to is a peach colored corkie with light peach yarn. But I switch it up a lot. I'll go metallic blue/red corkie and red yarn, dark purple corkie with black/purple yarn, light brown white corkie with black yarn does very well. I knew a guy who only used peach and green. In the mornings I like the lighter colors, pinks and peaches. In the afternoon when the sun is out that's when I switch between metallics and dark colors. Just go small. I also don't bother with florocarbon line. I just use 8lb maxima ultra green mono most of the summer. If the water is a little up I'll go up to 10lb just because I can.
Here's some of my pre tied stuff.

Good luck.

 

[troutdude]

@Fishonshawn84 Good looking out and great info!