chowder

Georged,what kind of leads are you running on the riggers,what spoons?

Did the S.end again yesterday, 12-3:00. Got a couple decent salmon off T-point on rainbow pattern Storm stix down 40 over 75-100. Cannot seem to get spoons to work? Managed to get a flasher/fly bite going by running the wire out 210 right over marks on the bottom@ 90' but they were all Lakers . What a gorgeous day on the water!

Mower, my Alumacraft 16' is winterized and put away but the Islander will go out any day it's too warm to bowhunt or a crew of two can make it happen. My 78 year old neighbor and helmsman is going to Arizona next week so I will be hamstrung without somebody who wants to fish. I almost went over to T-Falls to search, what size and make spoons are you using?

I could not get much going in the south end on Sunday. Set up @ 6:30AM in 150' right out of Meyers in heavy bait pods and big hooks, lost a flasher and fly on the wire dipsy to a vicious strike while dealing with a 20" Laker on a rigger rod(that's what happens when you leave the drag and the trip too tight!). After that the bait kind of petered out along the east shore, should not have left Meyers in retrospect! We trolled with a blank screen for a while changing depths looking for something, finally found bait and some fish at the drop off and we crossed back and forth in front of the buoys (tremendous weeds around them), getting only dinks. We did not work up towards the Yacht Club, maybe we should have? Trolled back up to Meyers and worked the gps icons that looked so promising earlier but the fish and bait were scarce now, tried the cove and back out across the gps icons at different depths, 2 dinks. Got desperate, cruised up past AES and got a couple Lakers on the wire. We tried down speeds from 1.7-2.4. I ran 1 wire dipsy with a couple different color schemes, 140-200' out ,depending on depth. The riggers I set at 50-60 and 40-30 w/ spoons. I also ran 8 or 6 colors out to the side with stix.Suggestions?

Stan, are these Lakers prespawn to spawn out there? You may need to slow down (1.8-2.4 @ the ball). Out here I have found Lakers to be very fond of the white smart fish flasher and green crinkle fly behind the wire dipsy(Mag.size black or clear). I use a long lead behind the dipsy to the flasher(8'+), this can make it difficult to net but it does work to trigger strikes. 180' of wire out gets you to 70'+- down. Another way you can also use that copper rig is to bump bottom with a spoon ( out here we use Sutton spoons) to trigger lakers that you can see on the sonar very closely associated with bottom structure even at great depths, but I have not used this technique during the pre to spawn period ( that is where these fish are out here).Where are you marking lakers in this lake? That will tell you which presentations will be good bets- in general lakers are more speed tolerant than other species but depth can be the key.Good luck and let us know how it goes.

Troutman, I should be on Cayuga on Sunday,try me on 68 and maybe we can compare notes, good luck- Chowder

O.K. I got it so far but I am confused about setting down speed to achieve proper action on the thumper. If I am feeling pretty good about a certain down speed range for the riggers and dipsy baits wouldn't I let out or reel in wire untill the thumper showed proper action?Also what is a good source for the large weights?

Where can I launch a Starcraft Islander on Otsego lake? I would be coming from the west on 80.

I am putting together a thumper rig for next year, I have the wire on the reel and twilli tip rod, not sure about what to terminate wire with,amount of weight, leader spacing, swivel, etc?

It sounds like the sharks are the way to go- thanks for the advice.

Hey you guys who are fishing the south end are you setting up at the drop off or going north a ways first,are you trolling up as far as Meyers,which side seems better?- Thanks

Nice job on the browns,bows and salmon! What down speed was working for you?

All the different presentations( downrigger,leadcore,wire,superbraid,etc) produce their own signature as they draw a bait thru the water. At different times,fish attitude, water temp, etc one of these presentations may appeal to the species you are targeting more than the others. Also for some people they may prefer one presentation over another because it suits them well so they do well with it.

I have a fish hawk 840 in my 16.5' Alumacraft, just put a depth raider in my new to me Starcraft Islander, the depth raider is by far a superior product.

I am going to get some heavier weights, been running 8#, and I am wondering what you guys think of these shark weights? They sure don't give these things away @ $70/ weight. are they really that much better than the ball w/ fin type units?

We launched from Meyers at about noon on Wens 9/24. It was the maiden voyage for our new to us 96 Starcraft Islander. Cruised up to AES and setup in 240FOW. Set riggers running in 56 deg water, and 190-210' out on the wire. the white smartfish/green atomic was the hot ticket for the lakers, 22"-31".We got the best lakers after crossing to the west side on the rise just south of Sheldrake point. I just could not get the rigger program to produce anything big, I think we got 5-6 but they were all 13-16" LLs,bows and browns. I did get one ok brown on 8 colors, pink alewife pattern spoon( this fish was almost certainly out of temp). There was a lot to get used to in the new boat and I probably should have switched spoon colors on the riggers more, and experimented with other temp ranges,water is mixing some and you have to move the balls up and down a lot if you want to fish temps. I do think I need more weight on the DR with the Depth Raider probe, it had a lot of blowback compared with the other side.I was also frustrated by not being able to get the sonar picture to look like it does in my alumacraft( same Lowrance unit only in the Islander the sonar and the GPS are in separate units)- but, part of the problem was probably due a weakening T-cline and changing bait patterns too. It was a really nice day on the water and the boat performed flawlessly even if the new owner did not.

You might want to start by reading something like "Great Lakes Salmon and Trout Fishing" by Dan Keating and Chip Porter, you can get it from Amazon. Though learning thru doing is great it can help to have a framework for understanding why things are done they way they are. Trolling is an awesome and exciting pursuit but you will get overwhelmed by how technical it can be if you don't get an overall picture to begin with.

We saw 2 boats working around Meyers, trolling in shallower water than I have seen since April, I could not tell if they were getting into fish or not. We stuck with the deep program, small LLs and browns on the riggers, bunch of lakers on the wire, nice day on the water!

Thanks for the excellent post! Speed fluctuations must have helped to trigger strikes from fish that are becoming less aggressive. We are planning to go over on Wens(9/24), but probably will not get there before 10 or 11. I will post our findings.Was the T.cline still holding pretty consistent or did you find down temps changing a lot?

Shawn and Bill, thanks for the tip, I can see now what you mean!- Andy

I use the mag size and I have not had that problem, I have found the release screw adjustment to be difficult to get right on one of mine. I think I am just going to pitch it out, had to reel in a laker with the trip arm still in one day, I then adjusted it a tiny bit looser and it tripped 2x just trying to get it to depth.

Cable steering, Mercruiser 3.0

FLX , I do not know where White Rock is, Where did you launch from and how far up or down on the E or W side of the lake is it? We hammered fish up by AES down 30-80 in 240-300FOW on friday 9/5, shallow riggers and deep on the wire dipsies- chatruese spinnys w/ glow hammer and whitecrush smart fish w/ glow white fly. Had spoons on DRs orange/brown and natural killer worked best. Are the browns and LLs actually starting to stage in the south end?

You can run wire behind the boat using a large weight, that is what a thumper rig is. Each of these different presentations (copper, wire dipsy, downrigger, lead core, etc) has a different signature or personality if you will as it moves through the water, copper and lead core sometimes catch fish simply because the bait is presented so far away from the boat and the rest of the lines, it isn't strictly about depth is what I am trying to say.

JAX, who did you buy the unit from? Anybody know the steering configuration for the merc I/O in the Starcraft Islander?