Hello all, I'm a newbe to this board but have followed it for years. I would like to say you all give excellent advice on tips and techniques for different way's to fish for steelhead. I had a quick question requarding calculating the weight of fish. I picked up a nice brat on saterday morning which was 31" long 9" wide and 7" thick. What formula do you use to calculate the weight of this fish? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

There's a better formula out there, but for steelhead, I always assume that a normal 30 inch fish (not snakey) is about 10 lbs, and add a lb for every inch after that.

Howdy Fishon..

Welcome to the board!

I use a calculator off of a guide's site. All you need is length and girth (measured just in front of the dorsal) and you can get a fairly accurate weight.

I have made comparisons of the weights from the calculator to my digital postal scale (accurate to within 1/10 oz.) and found it to be pretty darn close....within 1/4 lb. in most cases.

http://www.johns-guide-service.com/Fishing.html

The calculator is about half-way down the page.

Mike B

Bob has a calculator on this site already!

http://www.piscatorialpursuits.com/resourcecenter/weightcalculator.htm

The weight of the fish is directly proportional to how good of a fishing buddy you have that can attest to it. Since you're a complete stranger to me, it appears that the fish in question was about 11 lbs. Now if one of my buds caught that very same fish, I could say with all confidence that it was 14 lbs.

Remember, fishermen have a reputation to keep up. If you want to look for the dead nuts low number, take up golf. Wait, golfers subscribe to the buddy system also.

Never mind.

For steelhead under 30 inches, length minus 20 inches gives you a pretty good approximation of the fishes weight in pounds. For larger fish, 0.0013 x (length) x (girth)^2 is a little closer. All fish are unique, however, so without weighing them their true weight remains a mystery.