Techniques for Fishing Sculpins

[MD_Gene]

I think I know how sculpins swim. They lay on the bottom and go up a foot or so then sink back to the bottom. But I have questions:
1) Do they have a propensity to get caught in fast current get washed down and become fish food like that?
2) Are they dependent on the current by and large for movement?

I ask as I was fishing the fast water on he GP above Falls Rd today. I wasn't sure how to fish them in the fast deep water. At the end of the drift, do I retrieve them like any streamer, or is that a waste of time?

I did manage one last week on a sculpin but I was able to fish it in a seam across the current.
Any help is appreciated.

 

[tulenkot]

I don't specifically know the answer to your questions, but, stripping them at the end like a streamer is not a waste of time. I have caught many fish stripping them back.

 

[BelAirSteve]

Gene,

How did the GP fish? I noticed they have had a release going for the last few days.

 

[MD_Gene]

Yes, they cranked up the flow from 30cfs to over 100. I tried fishing my sculpin patterns in the fast deep water to no avail. Not wanting to be skunked, I switched to my GP go to fly (pink SJW) and got one on the second cast.
There were a few fish rising too. I have been doing well, at least very entertained with Tricos from 1100 to about 1300 a couple of times a week over the last few.

 

[crs2006]

I usually tie them weightless (zonker tail, cross cut rabbit body, wool head) and fish them on a fast sinking line with a short mono leader and a fluoro tippet. Upstream aerial mend or reach cast to get it down fast, swing, let them dangle, a few strips upstream, let them dangle again, then recast. More often than not something will chase it down on the swing and smack it right at the end as it turns into the current. I think that this makes them look like they are fleeing something, and the browns just get plain reckless chasing them. I've had fish grab them just hovering in the current down stream of me when I'm not even really fishing it.

 

[Fishidiot]

Don't overlook dead drift. Here in the Cumberland Valley where sculpins are extremely dense in the spring creeks and provide a very large component of a trout's diet, there are constantly dead or dying sculpins in the drift and fish will keep an eye out for these easy meals.