When I am fly fishing for most species available to us here in New Brunswick Canada I don’t usually strip the fly in all the way to the boat but when I am fly fishing for chain pickerel I do. Why?

Well chain pickerel, just like pike, love to follow your presentation all the way back to the boat where they explode on it, so I try to keep the fly in the water until the last possible second before I re-cast my fly.

Then there’s that big V-shaped wake the follows the pickerel as it’s headed for the fly. I have a hard time controlling myself when I see the wake and a lot of times I pull the fly right out of their grasp.

Favourite Fly To Use For Pickerel

I use a lot of flies when I am fishing most species but when it comes to chain pickerel it’s almost always a mouse or rat. They just can’t pass up on a big meal.

The first few times, early season, when the water temperature is still below 54F I don’t have much luck with the top water flies but as soon as that temperature goes up past that magic 54F/7C they will start to move a bit and go for those top water flies.

It’s great fun from that point all the way through to the fall when the water temperature drops below that 54F again. But heck it makes for a great time fishing from my float tube.

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I have so many great fishing memories but when Jamie and I were fishing chain pickerel this past weekend I was reminded of a fly fishing trip with Fishing buddy Kerry. We were out in our float tubes for a day of fly fishing pickerel in the weeds, which is always exciting.

Pickerel are great fun on a spinning rod but fishing pickerel on the fly will give you an entirely new experience, one that will keep you coming back with your fly rod. At the best of times having a chain pickerel on my fly rod is exciting but being deep in the weeds and hooking one of these toothy critters on the fly is a challenge. What an adventure.

Kerry was really good at creating a tippet that was pretty weedless because he was continually out performing me.  I eventually asked him what he was doing to keep from getting caught up in the weeds. That’s when he showed me how he had used epoxy to cover all knots, including the steel leader he used.

As soon as I got home I sat down and prepared a few setups for our next trip out, which was at least once a week, if not more. Now I was able to keep those weeds off my line and the catches increased dramatically. So sad that he chose to get married and move away rather than stay here fishing with me.

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