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Posts: 32886
Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin | Talk to me about fishing trees, stumps, and logs for Muskies. Keith and I are hitting some new water this year, and I'm always looking for some new tricks.
I use weedless creature quite a bit, and also bump spinnerbaits off the wood. Any other techniques work for you in the serious timber? |
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Posts: 484
Location: St. Louis, MO., Marco Is., FL, Nestor Falls, ON | I really like a high bouyancy bait like a Crane twitched around the timber. Something about a slowly worked twitch bait that turns them on when fishing wood. My second go to is a 10" Fin-S-Minnow weightless and point tucked in. Work it like a twitch bait and let it drop. |
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Posts: 134
| Spinnerbaits are the best and I'm sure you know to fish parallel with as many logs or tree trunks as possible. I also use a floating deep diver crankbait; fish it SLOW so when you bump something you can stop and let it rise and not get hung up. When you bump some wood, stop, let it clear it but be ready, that's when I get most of my action.
I never tried the weedless jig thing, that sounds good, I'm going to try it.
Good Luck'
Joe Wishin |
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| Crane 207, 9 inch Holoform Grandma, 5 or 7 inch Big Game, or 10 inch Holoform Jake twitched in the timber are deadly and I already have several muskies this year doing just that |
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Location: Des Moines IA | Jointed Believers run through wood extremely well ..... |
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Posts: 906
Location: Warroad, Mn | I've had good luck with crank baits that run nose down and tail up, with big lips or noses. Twitch Grandma's or Jake's and let them rise and stop. Slowly straight reel
jionted Believers. Bounch all off whatever you can get the lure through.
Get a good lure retieverer.
I fish wood all winter and this seems to work.
Doug Johnson |
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| Giant Sluggos rigged weedless work great on the stump/wood infested flowages I fish I prefer A slow erratic presentation like sink twitch twitch twitch pause and so on. The fish gennerally take it on the pause or when I start the twitches after the pause. I like to fish it with a liitle slack in the line and watch for the line to jump or run the surface I like to let them take it a little similar to Texas rigs for Bassin. I really reef the hookset super super hard, also use white line on the rig I fish it with seems easier to notice line jumps. I took 7 fish this way last year along with some real fatty bucket mouths. good luck. |
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Posts: 2112
Location: The Sportsman, home, or out on the water | whatever you throw in timber, youd best have my two favorite Frabil products:
The lure retreiver and the net! |
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Posts: 2089
| One of my all time favorites for fishin' wood / standing timber is an unweighted Suick. Enough buoyancy to pop in and around the wood without snagging. Ironically, also a great bait/technique for weeds . Steve |
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| Worrall,
One of the most effective methods of catching muskies out of the wood, early season, is a timber jig and a redtailed chub. When you feel the hit, give to the count of 3, and lay the wood to them....they will be caught in the mouth 99.7% of the time. I've caught lots and lots of muskies using this method! And a few big ones too!
As Jonesi pointed out, the UN-weighted Suick can be very successful. I bend the tail up quite a bit and try to get a shallow dive, and side to side slide!
Let me know how you do!!
Donnie  
Edited by Donnie3737 5/11/2007 7:44 AM
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Posts: 389
Location: Presque Isle Wisconsin | I Love fluttering a slow falling spinnerbait down in front of the wood.Ill also throw in a vote for the unweighted suicks,Cranes,and little Ernies.Last yearwe had quite a bit of success using the shallow dawg in front of the wood also because of the slow fall.Shack Atttack will be coming out with a very slow drop rate plastic also this year.The prototypes Ive seen will make this an awesome bait in front of wood.
Bumping the wood can be a very good thing- AT TIMES-especially when a good wind is blowing into the wood.When its calm it seems to spook the fish rather than cause a strike (Its all about those details-isnt it? )
I dont leave a wooded shorline area before trying baits at different depths,speeds and angles including,as mentioned above parallel casting.
Wood is especially important on Lakes that lack weed cover and there are many of those in my area.Im not above doing a little midnight enhancement on certain lakes if I think the shorlines need it.Also any fresh trees that the have fallen into the water can quickly turn into a goldmine in a very short period of time (sometimes those trees need assistance -ahem!)
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Posts: 827
Location: Minneapolis,Minnesota | A blade tailed creature....like others have said, fish it vertically to timber as much as possible. |
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| I would like to put a completely different spin on this. While all the tactics that have been mentioned will work I do something completely different.
The common thread here seems to be fish a lure that won't get hung up. I fish the wood a LOT and if you aren't getting hung up you aren't catching fish! Neutral or weighted lures work great in the wood. My best wood lure is a 6 inch weighted Reef Hawg, followed by a jointed baby Depth Raider.
You want your lure to have some hang time in the timber and like someone else said, the Frabill lure retriever will get a workout! |
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Posts: 208
Location: Northern Wisc. | rigging creatures and jigs do you rig them weedless? |
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Posts: 364
Location: Kentucky | Steve,
The new DeLong 11" Witch worked better than expected for me on Cave Run this year in the stump fields. Slow, erratic, and even when it bumped the timber it would bounce off or shake loose most of the time. Slack line and slow snaps sort of like a Squirko make it dance... and I've used the other DeLong eels and such and hated how hard they are to work. |
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Posts: 1270
Location: Stevens Point, Wi. | Howie, Here I thought I was just hearing extra large northwoods mosquitoes when I was out night fishing. Now I know you were just out helping the beavers. |
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Posts: 239
Location: Madison, WI | I don’t fish a lot of wood and typically it’s up north much later in the season. Give me a Pacemaker, Chopper, Topraider, etc and I’ll be good to go in the wood. Look for current if available.
Spinnerbaits, jerk baits, weedless jigs, so many great options!
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Posts: 1906
Location: Oconto Falls, WI | I prefer the route Oneida mentioned, hangtime in the wood. I have found that lures that will hang there around wood are better for the lakes I fish. One of the keys, especially early in the year on very clear lakes, is fishing fallen timber. Timber can draw more heat, and I find a lot of fish around it early on. Any bait you can jerk around, and then let sit without it popping up like a bobber is what I use. I am not trying to bang wood as I feel that scares fish in clear water as Howie mentioned. I'd rather let my bait suspend near/over the wood and let the fish come out. |
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Posts: 1462
Location: Davenport, IA | In clear water, I like to work a glider in the wood. I can see all the stumps and use the rod to work the lure around them all (not all gliders will do it) Now...If I could get a 10" frog I'd really be set. |
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Posts: 317
| I bounce an SS Shad off wood. The shallow dive, high boyancy really eflect wood well. A sleeper wood bait is the Suzy Sucker. It doesn't look like it would be good, but I have thrown it in the nastiest tangles on Kinkade and Petenwell, and it came through everytime. Just work it slow and be patient enough to crawl it over snags. Another great timber bait is a Red October tube with the single hook. |
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Posts: 3867
| I've spent many hours fishing deep (20'-30') water so timbered that you can't get around in a boat bigger than a light 14'er. I even put a Minn Kota Maxxum 55# on the transome just so I move faster to retrieve hook-ups on the wood. Couple thoughts to add when fishing heavy timber......
* getting hung up is avoidable downtime
* floating baits minimize downtime
* sinking baits maximize downtime
* the more wind, the more downtime
* fish quiet and throw shorter casts
* don't waste time fishing deep in water with tons of standing timber; what are the odds of a hooked big fish not getting hung up way down there?
* throw smaller/faster bucktails to the shallows when early morning sight fishing; cover shoreline as quiet and fast as you can
* when the big spiders are close to the waterline on the timber, fish are holding deeper
* when the big spiders are well above the waterline on the timber, fish are holding toward the surface
* after a while, you don't spook when your boat rides up and gets stuck on subsurface deadheads (put the motor in reverse and rock the boat until she slides back off)
* better know how to get back to the landing when it gets dark, but bring a good compass anyway
When I mention "spiders", I'm talking about those heavy-body big guys that can straddle a coffee cup, like 6" across; they live on the tree trunks that rise high above the waterline. When you bump a tree and one falls in the boat, you can hear its feet scratch the metal as it tries to scramble up the aluminum. Those guys scare the hell out of me.
Oh, baits: unweighted suick; 7.5 Grandma; Topraider; Buchertail 700 bucktail; Hirsch's Original Ghosttail bucktail; and a small Mepps Muskie Killer bucktail. |
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