Three float fishing tips that finally got me hooking salmon

When I started float fishing for salmon I was doing everything roughly right and still getting nothing. Three adjustments changed that, and none of them cost money.

Most beginner float fishing advice is about gear. Mine wasn't the problem. I had a decent rod, the right float, and roe that should have worked. What was wrong was the drift itself — where it started, how deep it ran, and what the fish saw first.

Here are the three things that changed it, in the order they mattered.

1. Start the drift further upstream than the fish

The mistake I was making was dropping my float more or less on top of where I thought the fish were. That gives the setup no time to do anything. The float lands, the bait is still up near the surface, and by the time it has sunk to fish level the drift is already past the holding water.

Start well above the target. You want the float to land, settle upright, and the bait to sink to depth before the rig reaches the pocket you actually care about. On a small creek that might be three or four metres upstream. In heavier water it's further.

The second half of this is the drift path. Pick a starting position where the current will carry the float through the holding water naturally, without you steering it. If you have to mend hard halfway through to keep it in the seam, you're standing in the wrong place. Move, and start again. Reading where the current will take your float is the same skill as reading where fish hold — it's the same water, looked at from the other direction.

2. Use a longer leader than you think you need

This is the one that surprised me most. I was setting my leader to what I guessed the depth was, and consistently running too shallow.

Salmon in a river sit low. They're not coming up for a bait drifting a foot over their heads, especially in cold or clear water. If your bait isn't occasionally ticking bottom, it's probably above the fish for the whole drift.

Set the leader slightly longer than your read of the depth, and adjust from there. You want the occasional touch of bottom — that's your confirmation you're in the zone. Constant dragging means you've gone too far and you'll snag or drift unnaturally; nothing at all usually means too short. When you move to a new pool, reset it. The depth that worked in the last run rarely carries over.

3. Hold the float back so the bait leads

Left alone, a float travels at surface speed while the bait underneath it drags behind in slower water near the bottom. The fish sees the leader, and sometimes the float, before it sees the bait.

Holding back fixes that. Apply light tension so the float slows slightly against the current. The bait swings forward and downstream ahead of it, and now the fish sees the bait first, moving at a believable speed, with nothing in front of it.

It's a small amount of tension — you're slowing the float, not stopping it. Done right the float still travels, just a touch slower than the foam and bubbles beside it. That's the visual cue I use: if my float is keeping pace with the surface debris, I'm not holding back enough.

A useful side effect is bite detection. With slight tension already in the line, the float dips more decisively and your hookset has less slack to take up.

Salmon float fishing — three tips, two fish, and one that would not stop jumping

• 0:00 Intro & the three tips
• 1:07 Fish #1 — broke off
• 3:12 Fish #2 — landed
• 6:29 The jumping fish

What it looks like when it works

In the video above, the first fish took after a drift that started well above the pocket and ran deep — and broke off. The second one, same approach, stayed on. That's a normal ratio on salmon, and it's worth saying out loud: hooking them and landing them are separate problems. Getting the drift right solves the first one.