Free Sliders

[Huntin' Trout]

How long should a free slider be? Mine are ~ 7' - 8' long and I haven't had any luck so far.

[Shade]

Usually the length of your pole. Try to run the same spoons or same colors (run mag spoon on the cheater)

Shade

[crumcake1223]

ours are about 6' fishing with a 8 1/2' rod and have prity good luck. shade is right normaly the same spoon above is a real safe bet if not the same color patern is almost a must

[Rich D]

Not saying you are wrong with the color selection, but if you are running your rigger down 100 plus feet, you could be targeting 2 diff species, ie salmon down deep, and steelies or bts up high. Since a free slider runs roughly half way, that could 2 differant areas of the water column. Don't be afraid to run some steelie or bt colors on your sliders, oranges, pinks, reds etc. If you are doing fixed sliders, ex MUPP rig, then yes deff same pattern. Good Luck.

Capt. Rich

[Gotta Bite]

I tend to agree with Rich. I usually run brighter colored spoons on my cheaters and have had excellent success with browns and especially steelhead. I usually stretch my arms open an use the as my leader length and that has been working

for me. During the Atomik challenge we stopped running the cheaters because we kept

hooking steelhead and it was preventing us from

getting into the kings. It was a good problem to have but cheaters will put fish in the box. Hammer

spoon and DW Buffalo Bill being 2 of my favorite spoons for steelhead and brown trout.

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[EarlyRiser]

I seem to always get the cheater tangled around the lower line when I run one. Is this just par for the course or is there some trick to avoiding it?

[Rich D]

ER,

That will happen on the retrieve, it should not be the case while running in the release. I have also gone to shorter leads, 2'-3', and found no change in the number of releases on the slider. Also make sure you run a bead at the swivel to stop the slider from getting to the lower lure. I run a floro leader to my bottom spoon, approx 6-7' long, swivel, then bead on the main line.

Capt. Rich

[PeterSaban]

Do you load up on the rod or run the rig with a little more slack to create a bit of a bow? Thanks

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[Rich D]

Depending how deep your main rig is, if it is fairly shallow then you wil need to leave a little bow in the line. But if you are deep, say 80' plus then you should be ok with no extra bow in the rod. Good Luck.

Capt. Rich

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