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catfish_cantley |
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| Tiger |
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| catfish_cantley |
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| Magruter |
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Posts: 1316 Location: Madison, WI | |||
| EsoxRookie |
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Posts: 107 Location: milwaukee | |||
| Pointerpride102 |
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Posts: 16632 Location: The desert | Hey Catfish, I do 95 percent of my fishing from shore and to be honest I wouldnt really want it any other way, I think its much more exciting getting hooked up when standing in the water with them. Getting followers to eat can be tricky when fishing from the shore, but it can be done. My first question to you would be what type of water body are you fishing? A river with good current, like below a dam? In normal, slower moving stretch of river? Lake? How to entice a strike, for me at least, depends a lot on what type of water I'm fishing. Do you fish from the bank or do you have waders that get you out and into the water? I would highly recommend getting a pair of waders if you dont have them. In the fast moving stuff, where I spend most of my time, my best approach has been to cast way up in the fast current, and work the bait back down to me. If I can I like to get the bait to come in up stream of me so I can see if a fish is on it, and if it is I can go into my "figure octagon" or something of the like. When the bait comes in upstream of your body, you can keep it out in front of you and watch it the whole way, and with practice can get it to do some pretty crazy things in the current. As you bring it down stream in front of you start angling the bait to come toward you and make it look like it is heading perpendicular to the current and back towards the bank. I'd say 90 percent of my strikes from follows have come when I do this. Once you have the bait sideways in the current keep it moving towards shore until you run out of room due to a short distance of line out, the snap the bait back to turn downstream again and out towards the middle of the river. I have attached the worlds worst paint diagram trying to represent what I am talking about, but please excuse my poor artistic abilities. Once you get the hang of how your bait moves in the current you can modify your retrieve to get the bait to dance the way you would like it to. One rule of thumb I have, however, is I try my hardest not to move the bait upstream or into the current. A little movement into the face of the current isnt always bad, but I only do it sparingly, like when I can hang a bait into the current and run it into a current break and actually get the bait to hover in the slack water/back current created by the break. But I will never cast down stream and retrieve up stream. This seems to me to be the most unnatural way something would move if being chased by a predator. They would be most likely to run towards shore and down current, at least in my mind. As for slower moving sections of river and lakes, you are a little bit more free in what you can do to try and entice a strike. If you are standing in the water try and get on a rock or something to get you elevated in the water a bit....this makes for an easier figure 8 or oval. If something chases in these situations the best thing to do is give the bait one heck of a direction change. Make the L turn hard and fast, then go into a figure 8 or oval or something that keeps the bait moving and is easy for you to repeat a few times. I hope this wasnt ridiculously confusing and helps you get some ideas of things to try. Feel free to shoot me a PM if you have any questions. Good luck! Attachments ----------------  riverdiagram.bmp (255KB - 84 downloads) | ||
| mikie |
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Location: Athens, Ohio | |||
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