Sk8man

The fact that they hold up to the tanker lakers Brian catches should be all the proof someone would need

The Anglers Pal rod holders are fine for light rods such as toplining and walleye fishing but you could lose a dipsey rod and reel very quickly using them for that. You need heavy duty metal rod holders with a solid base (usually reinforced from the underside of the gunwale). Most folks use rod holders from Burts, Big Jon or Cisco for this purpose as they are made to withstand the constant strain exerted on them as well as the instantaneous whacking by a big king. I would think the Diawa 47LC would be considered "marginal" and should have the drags replaced with carbon fiber washers at the very least if used (Tuna Tom is reasonable) but they would also probably be best used on say the Finger Lakes where there aren't big kings . I think capacity wise the Magda Pro 30 might also be marginal for the 1,000 ft of wire required. I have used the 45DX with wire on the Fingers OK but for Lake O use I have the Diawa 57's because they have a 20 lb carbon fiber drag....again related to the king salmon concerns. Both the reels you mention might be used during the early Spring for browns however.

The one essential thing as far as the rods go is to have a twilli tip on them or a roller tip to reduce the friction and cutting of the wire on tip and guides.The twillis are only a few bucks and they have adapters for different rod diameters. If you go with a roller tip make sure the side plates on it are steel and not aluminum or they too can cut through.

X2 and less expensive

bill - The answer is yes to each setting.....it is a question how much though depending on the speed, currents, which side ofthe boat while turning etc.

Linda - You are an inspiration to all of us Good luck in your quest

Over the years I've used Dipseys of various sizes and just about every type of line possible and by far the best seems to be the stranded wire. Mono stretches and some of it greatly when pulling dipseys. At one time I used only the smaller dipseys on downrigger rods with mono in shallow and still do that in the early Spring or late Fall and they run well close to the bottom in shallow water and are easily controlled just by the speed of the boat when set right. I set them by lowering them to the bottom and then cranking them up a foot or two and I play with the outward settings (1-3) as well. I run light weight flutter spoons when doing this to avoid hanging up on bottom. For most purposes throughout the season dipseys are best run from wire because it gives the best compromise between achieving depth and warding off the fleas with no stretch so not allowing slack. The wire seems to shed fleas best while braid on the other hand seems to accrue them like a magnet. Although I have the full range of dipseys on the boat I prefer the 124 mm Walker now Dreamweaver Deep Divers on 30 lb test 7 strand wire over all others after many years of experimenting., The reason for this is that they achieve the greatest depth and ratio (sometimes approaching 1 1/2 to 1 depending on setting and speed) and are quite predictable in the way they run. One of the critical things for the dipseys is before you use them they need to be set right as far as tension on the release or you will be very frustrated by false releases with a whole lot of wire out. This is another reason I prefer the heavier divers on wire becasuse once the tension is set right ( I set it so that it feels a little difficult to release by hand) they release properly even when way out unlike say mono and a smaller lighter weight on the dipsey where the stretch prevents proper release. If running multiple dipseys on a side I usually run the one closest to the boat on a 1 setting as it is one a shorter roller rod while the second one is set to 2 1/2 or three. This avoids tangling with the riggers set at a 45 degree angle at the back. If not running the riggers (and usually sliders on them) I run the closest at 0 to get it good and deep and close to the predicted dive curve. A main concern with dipseys in general and especially running multiples is sharp turns and underwater current. It can be a real problem when fishing solo in a chop without an autopilot I use the old school method of constantly monitoring the angle of the wires as well as GPS speed to estimate how things are running as I don't currently have a Fishawk X4D. I am constantly making adjustments in each of the wires up and down to try to entice strikes. I also "work" all my lines (e.g. riggers and boards) while out there and frequently change attractors and flies (types and colors). One of the biggest mistakes I've seen folks make out there and especially with larger fish like salmon is to pump the rod while lowering it extremely to gain on the line and this allows slack from the attractor to the fly and off they go. Any slack in the line is always your enemy in maintaining a constant connection with the fish no matter what the setup. Just keeping a constant steady pressure while letting them take line as necessary is the best recipe for success in getting the fish into the net. i also keep the total length of the dipsey setup within 6 inches of the length of the rod I'm using so I can net the fish without hand lining them as I often fish solo. Safety lines for your rods can also be a good idea especially when fishing on other folks boats with "questionable" rod holders. Last of all always double check the direction of the dipsey setting because if set the wrong way you'll have an instant mess

I think you pretty much summed up what seems to happen....there is a length that generates the ation that the fish want and it pretty much coordinates with what the dipsey manufacturers recommend....probably not "accidental" . I also notice it with the flies that I tie myself the longer ones lose theirsction at the usual trolling speeds and if too short they whip too much and the fish have a hard time grabbing them. I noticed that a few years ago when some of the guys posted videos of the fish trying to grab flies whipping sideways so I started making mine a little bigger and heavier so that the general action of the flasher stays pretty much the same but the fly slows its sideways movement a little allowing the fish to grab it a little easier. It reduced the "dropped" situation a lot.

I missed that post....nice going Billy....thinking out of the box too That would be a spectacular fish no matter where it is caught.

Recently I've had some folks asking me the same thing...."What's up with Seneca?" My reply is that after spending nearly my whole life fishing it I have yet to do real well on trout and salmon fishing Seneca during the month of August. In years past I switched over to fishing perch but even that has been off there for some time now. Of course there has always been the king salmon addiction wispering in my ear by Lake O around now too. The trout and salmon and more so the lakers may be there in Seneca but they are inhabiting ddifferent places and depths than usual and more spread out right now apparently. Much as June seems to be a month of "transition" for Lake O August seems to serve this function for Seneca. A few years ago Cayuga seemed pretty "dead" and plagued by lampreys but this year it has been action packed for nearly all species although lakers continue to be a mainstay of the action and they are hard to avoid when fishing for silvers. Once the water temps begin to plummet on Seneca the fleas will greatly reduce and then vanish mid to late Fall but the lake often turns over in late August or early September too depending on weather. Hopefully things will improve for the trout and salmon fishing around mid Fall although for me it is then a conflict with the perch game on multiple lakes Once again, what a great place to live.....

Three of us fished the eclipse from 7AM til about 8 PM aboard the Admiral Byrd boat out of Hughes Marina on Lake O. It was a VERY slow day all the way around. We managed a total of 6 kings with two at about 16 llbs as the biggest. They were kept but the smaller 4 were released. Three came on flasher/fly combos on my home made white or green google eyed flies, one of the larger fish came on a spoon ythat was a wild multicolored generic magnum spoon and the other smalls also on spoons on riggers at about 90 over the 3 hundreds. It was all in all a VERY slow rigger bite compared with last time out. We ventured out to about 600 ft then came back in as we stopped marking fish out deep. I'm not sure whether it was eclipse related but we marked most of the fish we saw during the afternoon way down deep at 200 -350 ft down in the water column and a few at about 100 ft. down suspended but they would not hit anything we tried. Neither of us has ever seen so many suspended that deep before (with nothing around them e.g. bait). Bob even ran a downrigger at 220 ft over whatever to see if he could get something to hit just to satisfy our curiosity but to no avail. We also had a few hit and runs on the wires intermittently but gone before we could even grab the rods. Although we tried a multitude of depths with the wires (250-400 out) the fish that hit were at 275 set on 1 or 300 set at 3.Riggers only fired at 90 and 100 on spoonsnothing would hit shallower or deeper set. The heat was nearly unbearable in the afternoon and the flies took their toll on my (once again) ill-prepared companions who were wearing shorts. They might be fast on the learning curve for fishing but not on fly avoidance The undercurrents were VERY strong and created a couple irritating problems with line positioning (nice way of saying tangles). Although the GPS reading was about 2.2 to 2.4 it seemed as though we were going much faster when looking at the angle of the lines probably relating to the strong currents.

I can understand Sammy and Theresa might waant to be hiding their faces after that pic of Nick's perch but I 've adjusted the pic

If anyone would like a couple of free sets of the hammerheads and Spin N Glows they are located on bottom in 180 ft out in the hole