Problem with striking

[Hitch-22]

I probably have close to 20 hours in the game now mostly on ledger fishing, have caught my first monster and another couple around 400lb out of maybe 300 fish.

However when I try float fishing or spinning I am having one big issue and that is knowing how the strike mechanic works. I have tried pulling back on the controller as soon as the bite comes in or leaving it a few seconds and on both 90% of the time I loose the fish. I get most joy just leaving it and then I loose the fish maybe 60% of the time.

I would like to try and understand how the game handles this to see what I might be doing wrong if anyone can help ?