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Posts: 255
| O.K. guys, I finally got a good fishfinder that I know how to work in manual mode. Now, I was able to find pods of baitfish down around 15-20 in 50 feet of water. I think I was trolling through them or around them. Not really sure. I was also seeing some arcs just below the pods. I am guessing those were muskies. I was trolling an 8 inch Jake and a jointed depthraider. I really want to get a big girl soon so I can have more confidence and do more of this type of fishing before I give up. Also, I never ever see other guys fishing suspended on this lake which normally sees alot of pressure on structure and weed beds. I have printed out info on this before but, I am looking for more before I leave again this Thursday. Any help would be great. Thanks, Tom |
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Posts: 21
| Hey man Open Water is the best. No bluegill fisherman, No topwater geeks.
The fish you find near schooling pelagic baitfish will be sizeable, and most times, have seen very few lures. I am a beleiver that some predator fish never go shallow if they can find plenty of feed deep. I believe that many of these open water fish are more succeptable to standard trolling presentations than shallow water fish that see every bucktail and jerkbait that goes by. Look for bait rising on your graph. In my experience this triggers a feeding response from those big arcs hanging below the school. Sometime these bait activity periods only last an hour, sometimes all day. Look for insect hatches in the mid-lake basin. Many times I have located active bait by a swarm of insects on the surface. Also look for gulls, skates, and herons milling around in a basin, or diving for bait. All these are ways that I have stumbled upon to find open water fish. Sometimes you have to run two or three different depths to find the right thing. I have fished over schooling smelt just of the bottom in 30 ft of water and the only presentation that worked was a rapala f18 black and silver. This lure only runs 7-10 ft down as trolled from my boat. Why did it have to be high? don't know. Crystal clear water, bluebird day. Didn't make sense, but it worked. I just got back from ten mile lake, mn. The tulibee's rise at dusk all summer there. Trolling from dusk to midnight over 90-160 feet of water, we caught northerns from 3-12 lbs all caught on deep diving raps, running about 25 ft. These pike were stuffed full of bait, to the point that their belly's were bulging. Find the baitfish, Loose schools tend to be un pressured, look for tight balls of bait. When you find them, you will find feeding predators near. I start by trolling deep, just above the big arcs. If this doesn't work, start going up, until you find some action.
Just a few thoughts from an open water fisherman
Not gospel, just guesses
Lonewolf |
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Posts: 255
| Thanks lonewolf. I will try starting out deeper just above the depths of the arcs and near the bottom off the baitfish. I was afraid to go too deep so I will try it. Anyone else? |
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Posts: 3240
Location: Racine, Wi | The best thing I can give ya is to stick with it. There are times when we might go a couple of hours without scoring a fish. If you see the bait there, and you know the fish are there, keep working it. Don't be afraid to change things up, but don't over do it either. If you go through the area a couple of times with no rips, move your baits around. Maybe go higher, or deeper depending on where you ran them the first time. Also, watch your speed. If you see a fish on the locator and she doesn't eat the first time, you may need to speed up a bit, or even slow down. Are you in Wisconsin, or another state? The nice thing about Wisco, is we can drag 3 lines a person, so it's easier to find the depth they are eating at. Also, make sure to do S turns going through the areas. This will cover more water, plus it will give your baits more action. ie The outside baits speed up and go deeper, the inside slow down, and can rise up. (depending on the bait your running). Make sure to keep note of which rod gets eaten. If they eat an outside rod on a turn, you may need to speed up, if it's the inside rod, you may need to slow down.
Basically, keep on changing until you find what they want, then ride out the fun till it changes again. Most importantly, keep up the confidence that you're going to get ripped.
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Posts: 2691
Location: Pewaukee, Wisconsin | Great info Joel.
One thing to add is that it helps to know the size of the baits fish your trolling. Keep the size close to what they are targeting.
Some lakes have stunted bait fish and others have larger bait. Matching the size helps. Colors can very with the weather and depth you fish.
I wish I had more time to explain in more detail. Got to go......... |
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| Anyone know the limit of lines per fisherman in Ontario in the summertime? I'm headed north on Saturday.
I'm going to be doing alot of trolling for big pike, so i'll be trying alot of methods.
Big plugs set deep in the down-easters vibrating till that clicker sounds off!
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| any tips on keeping lines from crossing/tangling during turns? |
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| speed up, and take wider turns. |
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Posts: 3240
Location: Racine, Wi | Lambeau, wider turns help for sure, but make sure to set your longest lines farthest away from your boat. Then decrease on the lenght as you get closer. My down rods are usually not too far from the back of the boat. Also, the lenght of rods you are using can help. For my board and down rods, I'm not too concerned, but the boat rods (rods in the middle of the set) I like them to be a foot and a half or so longer than the down rods. That helps keep good spacing between your baits. |
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Posts: 1316
Location: Madison, WI | Good guestions, great answers! If you're fishing 6 lines, in what situation do you start to clear lines? Anytime a fish is caught? Clear the whole side the fish is caught on? I've only been in boats where we've run 2 straight lines. So i'm not too sure what the routine is for running muliple lines per side. |
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Posts: 4
| Willis - 8/9/2006 1:30 PM
Anyone know the limit of lines per fisherman in Ontario in the summertime? I'm headed north on Saturday.
I'm going to be doing alot of trolling for big pike, so i'll be trying alot of methods.
Big plugs set deep in the down-easters vibrating till that clicker sounds off!
one line per fishermen |
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Posts: 3867
| Excellent tips, wolfie. |
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| Great info guys. This site is awesome. I am going to try it all. I am determined to get me a suspended. Tuffy1 your info is great. I will be in WI but, I only have 2 rod holders right now. Need to get a 3rd. Thanks for all your help. I will post a pic when I get back. Later, Tom |
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Edited by Sponge 8/23/2006 9:15 AM
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| I love trolling these kind of spots. I run lures about 25-45 ft back with weight 2-3-4 oz size to get the lure to run at the depth I find the bait fish. I like running joint lures like lokes, Slasher's, Depth Raders, Hogenater's. The new Slashers have ben my hot bait this summer. Matching the color to the color of the bait fish works best.
338 Muskie  |
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| Musky53 what kind of fish locator did you buy? I am looking for a new one.
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Posts: 2691
Location: Pewaukee, Wisconsin | One other tip I would like to share is to amke sure your baits run true. By this I mean the crank will run straight even at fast speeds. The faster the speed the more important the tuneing will be.
If a lure runs to the right when you troll with it, bend the eye of the lure (where you hook it to your leader) to the left a bit. Try it again and you will see it will change. This can be hard with some baits and very easy with others.
I will make sure every lure is tuned before it gets used in a multiple line set. One badly tuned lure will cause plenty of problems. Some lures will never run good and others will never have to be tuned.
One tip is to check all baits when you first use them. I just purchased 14 baits, all the same kind but different colors. 4 of the 14 worked great and the other 4 sucked. I use the best ones and leave the other 4 in my box. All lures are not perfect. Find the good ones and run the crap out of them.
I run 6 lines all the time. Four flat lines and two board lines. People I guide can't believe we don't get tangles but if you understand the space between the boat and lures and bring them in adn put them out the correct way it's easy.
I know I helped creat a monster with Joel..........He always runs 6 now.
Good running baits will make multiple line sets easy. Well until you get weeds or bottom debree on the baits, then they run crazy.
Back to work, break is over.................... |
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| I got a Lowrance LMS-339C DF iGPS this summer. After working out at bells it Great!! The lake maps are great. Putting way points on weed beds and trolling around them helps keep the lures up close to the weeds without getting snaged. Also marking pods of bait fish and trolling over them. I like useing 50 lb Burkey big game line and 80 to 100 lb leaders depending on the size lures I'm trolling. |
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Posts: 3240
Location: Racine, Wi | Good points on the tuning Mike. That will Definitely make a mess. If you know your baits are in tune though, and one looks like it's running to the side, It's a fish!!!! LOL (stupid walleye) I love running 6 lines, and if I had more rod holders I'd probably run more, just cause it's fun.  |
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Posts: 227
Location: New Brighton, MN | I would like to get into trolling boards, but is it really practical on a lake with diverse structure? (big extended shallow reefs in the middle of the lake, weedbeds, emergent vegitation) or is it too much of a hassle to try to run more than 2 straight lines? I think I would either get snagged trying to run close to the structure, or waste my time being too conservative in 25 ft of water. The late summer weed growth makes trolling tough on my patience. Any suggestions? |
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Posts: 3240
Location: Racine, Wi | We run up to 6 lines here on a couple of lakes that are tough to troll structure at times, but the way we would run it would to be put high baits off the boards so if you get too tight, they will stay over the weeds. (of course that doesn't always work) LOL I would think if there is an abundance of cover, I would stick with 2 lines placed where they need to be especially if theres alot of points and turns in the weedlines unless you know them like the back of your hand. There's nothing wrong with running only 2 lines and there are lots of guys that get plenty of fish trolling this way. I would go with what you're comfortable with. I think in MN you can only run one or 2 rods a person, so in that case, unless the fish are spooky, you wouldn't even need to run boards.
One other thing you can do is run some top water off the boards if you wanted to try that. Just run them when the floating weeds aren't too bad or you'll be constantly cleaning baits. |
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Posts: 227
Location: New Brighton, MN | Thanks Joel,
Minnesota is 1 line per, but I do most of my fishing in Polk County, WI. I was thinking if I have 2 guys in the boat, boards might be something to try out, but there are alot of floating weeds this time of year (arrrrrgh). When those weeds calm down, I might just try topwater or a shallow plug on a board as you mentioned. (I just love the thought of trolling a topraider) Any suggestions on a specific type/brand to start with? |
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Posts: 3240
Location: Racine, Wi | I personally use the Off Shore boards, then replace the front clip with the OR-18s as they hold the superbraids better and are easy to work with. I use the OR-16s for the back release. I know others use the Mr Walleye boards too with some success.
If you are fishing Deer or Bone Lakes, I know one of them (I don't remember which as I've never fished them, but was looking at a map because I was planning on fishing them) has a few sposts that look like they would be good to troll and would be okay with boards. The nice thing is you can cover the tops of the weeds, the breakline and the suspendos at the same time. Just adjust your baits and depths accordingly. The floating weeds to get in the way around here, but you just stay on top of them and clean your lines and you'll still score fish. |
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Posts: 5874
| I've run 9 a couple times. two boards per side. Not too tough to do, but you gotta be on your toes, and get the inside board in as soon as you get a hit on the outside board! I did it with my kids a few times.
I've run 4 boards per side when eye fishing! Easy with harnesses. A bit trickier with cranks! Impossible if the cranks are not tuned! |
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Trolling for Suspended around Baitfish