Posts: 8
| Hey guys. I am a novice when it comes trolling. I live in WV and I need you trollers to lend a little advice to me on fall trolling if you don't mind in lakes. Our lakes vary in size but on the small end from a couple hundred acres to close to 1,000. The forage base in our lakes is bass, crappie, cats, and shad. I had some decent success in early summer until the water temps got too hot and I quit until the water dropped back down to safely release them. I had 3 hook ups and 1 chunk low 40's boated since I started trolling again in late August until now. I have been running the same line length (30-50') with the same lures. I have been running 10" jointed believers with 30-40' of line out. 5"tuff shads with 30-40' of line out. A swim n raider as my tail gunner with 70-90' of line. 8" Jakes anywhere from 25'-40'. 207 cranes with 30' of line. I run the lures anywhere from 2.5mph to 4 mph. I try to occasionally bounce the lures off the bottom where I can without getting hung up too much in the timber that was once flooded. I run 5 rods, 2 11'ers as my front rods, a 8'er and 7'er as my middle and a 6'6 as my tail gunner. The water here has cooled down in the mid to high 60's and the bait fish are moving deeper in the water column 12' to 25'. The weeds are dying off now and fall is here. Thanks to all for any information. |
Posts: 433
Location: Cedarburg, Wisconsin | So basically you are fishing shallow, which is OK if you have clear water. As the temps drop the fish will too so you will probably need to increase your line out distances to 80 to 120 feet to get some running depth on your lures. Id go with solid, not jointed, lures with wide wobbling action, like Believers, Swim Whizzes, and similar lures. I find the fast wiggling lures aren't worth much as the temps drop. 10" Jakes/Grandmas work OK too along with Slammer 10" shads. 3mph is a good speed running deeper when the water cools off. I'd key on sharp breaks into the deepest water available, like river/creek channels, or secondary breaklines. Keep the shad in sight with your electronics while you fish these spots and you will probably do good. At least that's what I'd do if I was on your water. |
