Podcast: Exploring Steelhead Alley with Greg Senyo



For this week’s podcast, we have an interview with author, guide, fly designer, and master steelheader Greg Senyo, who grew up in the Steelhead Alley region along the southern tier of the Great Lakes and knows it intimately. If you are heading to Lake Erie this year, or to any of the Great Lakes tributaries, you’ll find some solid tips on how to have more fun.

In the Fly Box, we talk about “dry-fly nirvana,” where to go on a Rocky Mountain trout trip (I don’t give any recommendations and I say why I don’t), how to catch suckers and carp in a trout stream, tying flies with silk, keeping your pant legs down when wearing waders, why expensive sunglasses are worth it, tips on tying Glo Bugs, the benefits of micro jig hooks, and why dry flies sometime twist your tippet.

If you don’t see the “Play” button above, click here to listen.


Longtime Great Lakes guide Greg Senyo and his then biggest steelie ever, a 17-pounder.
Photo courtesy Greg Senyo

2 thoughts on “Podcast: Exploring Steelhead Alley with Greg Senyo”

  1. I have been fly fishing close to 20 years. At first on small trout streams in Wyoming and Utah. Where you throw a bare hook and you catch a fish. And later on bigger rivers such as the green river and my favorite Henery’s fork of the snake river in Idaho!

    I listen to your pod cast to and from work and I love to hear anything about fly fishing. Everything from tying on a leader and how long it should be. Take ten minutes to explain how. I also I joy finer more detailed and more technical points to the fly! It’s all great to hear!

    I’m writing this in response to a comment on the pod cast that there is no need to have long drawn out explanations on simple things. I also recall a caller from what sounded like a teenaged kid just learning the basics. The pod cast can mean many things to many different people and skipping over the basics could loose some people and excluding them would not be very fun! So my response to the up tight gentleman that said he did not like the drawn out way that you talk about tying on a leader is, take time off get out and fish more! Time to relax bud! The pod cast is entertainment and a way to still fish when I’m at work and a great teaching tool for beginners.

    I’m no guide and not a big teacher but I do have a handful of new be people that I show how to fly fish both men and women and I tell them all to listen to the pod cast! So keep up the good work so that we all from 10-99 novice and expert can enjoy and follow what is being talked about! Look forward to listening to your next pod cast while I’m catching 20 pound lake trout on flaming gorge with the fly!!!!

  2. Hello, I’ve been a podcast listener and fly fisher for 6 years. Keep up the great work and the long drawn out explanations of the basics so the beginners can learn and the “tight” experts can “move on to the next pool” and remember that beginners need the most time to learn and patience by their instructors. Looking forward to more black diamond expert podcasts.
    That was a great podcast about Steelhead Alley. I’m just 10 hours away in Virginia and it looks like a great place to catch my first steelhead and Greg Senyo sounds like a great guy to go fishing with. I also learned about the great subject of tube flies.
    I had a question about the topic of polarized glasses mentioned in the fly box section of the podcast. I do a fair amount of flats fishing and have loved the great optics of glass lenses but also love the lightness of plastic lenses. Anyway, it was opinioned that glass lenses are more scratch resistant than polycarbonate lenses. I have worn out several glass lenses by scratches and trying out to see how long the polycarbonate ones last. However, I wondered about the coatings. Will either types be ruined if the coatings are deeply scratched before the lens itself is scratched?
    Keep up the great work, you too Phil!
    Eric aka Kingfisher

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