steelhead

[SteelEyes]

As Dr.Ed and TIN CAN stated, Conneaut will be your first place to start. We have been getting some mixed in with the walleyes trolling 8-15 miles out. As water temperature lowers and we get some good rains, the fall run steelhead will smell the 'home waters' and begin to stage and make their runs to the river. Snug Harbor, as suggested, should be called, they record a fishing report daily. Sometimes it's as early as september, but October and even November can be good months for staging at conneaut. We troll spoons 80- 100ft back, with no diving devices and are successful. This fall I may experiment with some shallow divers outside the harbor.
To expound on the previous statements, you can troll in and out of the harbor, and in the ship channel. If your boat is small (low) enough you can even troll up conneaut creek. You just have to be able to get under the rail bridge at the back of the ship channel. Generally you can boat fish the creek to just upstream of the Woodworth Road boat ramp. Just upstream of the boat ramp their is another rail bridge, there is 1 pool upstream of the rail bridge we troll and turn around in, upstream of that it gets real shallow. Saw a jet ski bottom out and get stuck there one day last year.
The below link has some good information on Ohio steelhead. Good point to remember is that conneaut creek gets stocked with both fall run (by PA) and winter/spring run (by OH) strains.
http://www.steelheadschool.com/new_page_11.htm
http://www.steelheadschool.com/fall_fishing.htm
Also, if you can get under the rail bridge at the creek mouth / ship channel, then you could launch your boat at the woodward rd boat ramp for free, rather than paying the $5 at conneaut harbor.

the lines on the attached harbor picture show the general area where we troll, the circle shows the low rail bridge at the river mouth. the river image has the circle for the rail bridge, another for the boat dock, and the line at the bottom shows how far upstream we troll.

[BAD KARMA]

that was an awsome report and i appricate it. i am going to try that out when the reports are good. been wanting to try to catch some steelheads for a while but walleye fishing has been so good its hard not to go get a cooler full. I have a 22 ft. center console with a t top. do you think i can make it under the bridge. i can make it under the last one in vermillon if you have ever been there. thanks again joe.

[SteelEyes]

No, you likely won't be able to get under the bridge due to the hardtop. Not sure the exact clearance, and am sure it varies with water level, but in our little 16' blue fin my head seems close to hitting while sitting. Can definately reach and touch the steel girders. Maybe 5 feet of clearance between top of water and bottom of bridge. I have a 21' starcraft fishmaster, and don't think I could get under the bridge with it, think the windshields would hit. But with a bigger boat you can troll out further from the harbor than what I drew as well.