Can't buy a hit.

[Lund20]

I need help! I have tried everything I know. I had good luck with the browns early, but after that nothing but a scrub Coho. I have fished from shore to 9 miles out, from 10-120FOW. I have used every lure that all you guys say is good. I have a good setup with Big Jon downriggers and a LCX 25CX graph. I thing I put the lures right in front of the fish. On Sat, I saw several large fish actually run from the rigger balls.

WHAT AM I DOING WRONG?

I have a 20 ft Aluminum Boat, Could It be some sort of electrical charge that I am putting into the water?

Any suggestions are welcome except the one that I am a just unlucky.

I am fishing out from Hedges to Pultneyville.

Regards

Dave Hyde

Hyde N Seek

[ray koziatek]

could be electrical next time unplug the battery charger when you leave home :? do a black box search there web will give ya several things to try ,,i still get the feeling im missing the big secret but manage to get a couple fish in ........ :shock: speed, temp,lure color,water temp ,,browns are pretty forgiving plus your around other boats to adjust your speedon the other hand long lines would eliminate any electrical issues of your boat. sent? banannas?great sound system?or you just plane su##$%%when it comes to fishing(hope your not on a suiside watch)im shure if you get the above ,speed ,temp,color, speed and speed,youll do just fine the east current and wind gots the fish messed up,june is usually the slowest month (trasition period) the last 2 weeks 1:00 in the afternoom is when the best fishing has started ive had a short window in the morning but the big boys have been holding off till alittle later for me .your welcome to jump abord anytime i go out i usually give a 20 min notice before i leave..

[W.W.IV.]

Ray,do you think he had one of those dasturdly banannas on board?Hey L20 how long have you been fishing the lake, if your new at it you may just have to pay your dues and it will all come together. Good luck.

[Guest ReelDiel]

i'm gonna guess you need a speed and temp probe. You have a great fishfinder but heres probaly whats happening if you are seeing fish and no hits 1. your fishing below them or 2. your speed is to slow/fast

sometimes a ff can be a little deceptive. if you see an arc at say 80' and that fish is on the outside of your cone he may only be say 70' down. The ff just sends a pulse down and up and interpets the depth of the return. So if you have your riggers at 80 and the fish maybe at70 or a little higher you may be below them and they wont normally strike down. If you have a speed temp probe it will help find the temp breaks and give you an accurate lue speed with all those crazy currents. hopefully my late nihght babblings help a little.

[Fishstix]

Truth is most of the time they dont hit.I fished part of the water you are talking about this weekend the area between ginna and pville and those fish 20 ft and down would not wiggle a rod.All board and high rigger action.My advise would be [after this weekend anyway] shorten you leads run smaller snap swivels , I also switched up to 30lb test line this weekend.

My buddies picked up a slob laker off the top in that 67 degree water Sunday. I did a couple last weekend. My best advise is run stuff you know catches fish at the moment the best spoon in that area for me has been 42 second spoon or yellow and white optimisers.I have not had much of a fly bite.

Im not getting down on speed and temp units. Ive got one. I just catch most of my fish out of temp.I would say he probably has a speed problem.

Hedges to Pville is probably a all day troll.Pick a point of land and work the water off it. Stay in one area. In all directions shallow and deep.I used to troll in a straight line I dont anymore . I aim for 2.1 SOG.Also look for that mossey green stuff floating in the water . Try and fish around it and not in it. Look for humps and bumps on the bottom. If your marking a lot of bait piles ,pick another line unless its first thing in the morning.Keep changing direction. Get away from the packs of boats. Look for swallows swopping on the water. I could go on and on.

[Goudy156]

Dave, i fish out of Bearcreek a lot and to tell you the truth we don't fish much out of there in June. The fishing is not very consistent. i did notice you said you could see them 'swim away' i wold say that is good you can see them that well. someone told me a few years back that fish (trout salmon) look up or can see up better than down. i would suggest try running your riggers a 2-5' higher if that seems to be the case. One other suggestion would be to keep it simple our standard spread is 2 riggers with fixed cheaters and two wire dipsey's. so if i wanted to fish without down temp i would focus on were the mark on the screen are lets say 40'. then one rigger at 55' cheater at 45', other rigger at 40' cheater at 30'. Wire and dipsey's on 2.5 setting ~3:1 maybe start one at 90' out and another at 130' out. some thing we have been doing more is swapping rigger depths rather than change out. if one at 55' and other at 40' just bring one up and one down. I think if most people watch there screens them they would see fish 'run' from there ball, we see is sometimes. the best way to judge speed is to stick a pole it water with spoon or flasher fly rig on it. you'll know when it looks right.

[Skunk'd Too]

Lund:

I got back into the Lake Ontario fishing last year. I spent a whole year with nothing. Just look at the name! I followed eveyone's advice, but still couldn't hook up. The best advice I got was " ... you gotta spend time on the water...". The next thing I did was book a charter this past spring. I paid close attention, even though the fishing was tough, it paid off. The next time we went out, I finally bagged a real nice coho.

Everybody on this message board was a lot of help. Stay tuned to it!

[chinook]

S.T,- the first thing that I would suggest, is that you approach this sport with a degree of confidence, that I feel that you are now lacking, due to your last post. Having said that, when you obtain this, you are more apt to play closer and more attention to the details that will put fish in the boat. Such as some have mentioned, speed which is where I would suggest myself. A starting point would be app. 2.5 GPS if no down speed is available. This is open for tweaking up or down under the current conditions that you fish on a particular day. Next, if you have a way point that has a degree of targets, approach that from various angles until a rod fires, then duplicate. Next-set back off your rigger balls, depending on the depth you're fishing, vary these until again a rod fires. Say if you fish 20 feet off the ball, and then a diver rod fires, that tells that the targets are aggressive and that you may need to shorten your leads off the ball to get the rods to fire more consistent. However, say if you are fishing a core rod and then it fires, the targets are skittish and further set backs off your riggers are needed to get them to go. Fish with a slider or pinned cheaters to get extra lines in the water. A few spoons that you want in your arsenal among others, N.B.K's- Frogs including glow, melons, melatto's, purple thunder( both silver and gold cup)- 42 second spoons, Billy's Habanero's- are just some to start with. There are plenty of others, but these will get you started. As Ray mentioned, scents. I had a friend who had similar problems for he sometimes had trouble getting his rods to fire. He then started using Smelly Jelly in Anchovy( rubbed on his hands) before he fished trying to mask any offensive scents that he may emit. Also, what pound test line are you using? Go with 15-20 pound with spoons and heavier once you start using attractors. Also, make sure you are using a quality bearing swivel to provide maximum action to the spoon itself. Rigger ball colors, I personally like black. I run these on all of mine. What colors are you currently running? As I mentioned in an earlier post don't crowd your spread with having 3 riggers within 10 feet of each other. If you have a rod that fires say at 60 down and your next rod up from that is at 48, lower it down to 60 to see if you can get it to fire as well. So in closing, confidence-know that you are going to boat fish on a particular outing. Pay attention to details. If an outside rod fires on a turn, you need to bump your speed up. If an inside rod fires on a turn you were trolling to fast and need to slow down. Vary leads off your riggers and see what rods start to go. Be it a diver,core or rigger rods. Run spoons that are compatible be it - N.K.s' -Streaks-Dreamweavers etc. Put an attractor in the mix to pull fish into your spread. Off a diver, rigger or both. I know I missed out on some other details, but this may provide something you may have overlooked. Lastly, keep the faith. There are plenty of good fishermen that fish our waters that are willing to help out. Best of luck this season, and always remember- a bad day's of fishing is still better than a good day at work:)

[rail bird]

This is my 4th season with my own boat on lake O and at one point I had the same feeling as you have now. Lot's of people around me catching fish but I would come home with nothing. I thought the same thing It must be my boat. The good new is it was not the boat it was some little things I was doing wrong that stopped me from catching fish.

You did not mention what your normal set up is but I run a 2 rigger boat with 1 or 2 dipsys and sometimes a lead core. I have had good luck running with just 2 or 4 rods so don't feel intimidated by the 8 rod spreads that the big boats put out. A few of the things I have worked on that have helped are as follows.

1) Make sure what you put under water is running correctly. When you put your first spoon in the water drop your rigger in the water a few feet. Watch your spoon. Is it flashing and does it have a good wobble? If not speed up or slow down the boat untill it looks like it is running the way you want it. Different spoons run better at different speeds so if it takes 3.5mph to make an NK 28 flash right then run at that speed. Currents can play games with your spread so it is better to run at a speed that works for what you have down. Repeat the steps with your other rigger keeping in mind it might be better to run the same types of spoons so they all should act the same way at the same speeds. In my opinion it is better to have one lure out running correctly than to have 5 lures out with one running incorrectly. One spoon spinning in a circle can chase the fish away. The same goes flashers and flys on dipseys let the out a little bit and watch them The flashers should have a slow steady rotation.

2) When trolling keep the cables running behind the boat. Currents can swing your spread to the left or right so find a direction that keeps yor cannon balls running directly behind the boat. If you take a hit make sure you notice what direction you are running. Some days even 10 deg variation in heading can stop the fish from hitting.

3) I am a big fan of free sliders and almost always run them if I have spoons on the riggers. 6 feet of mono with a snap at each end is all I use. Watch the lures as they slide down the line to see if they are running right. If they look bad you might have to speed up or not run them.

4) Don't be afraid to run close to shore in the summer. The 40 to 60 fow range can be really good if there are schools of bait in the area. Most boats go out deeper in search of big kings but the area where the thermocline intersects with the bottom can be a good place to search. I will say that if the screen is blank in shallow do not bother fishing in that area but if you see them try it.

5) Watch your rod tips. I like it when they bounce a little bit like a sewing machine. If they go dead you may have some weeds or other junk on your lines. You have to clear the weeds so check the rigs if you think they look dead.

I think thats most of the important stuff. Trust me if you keep trying you will find the set ups that work for you.

Good Luck

[Lund20]

Guys,

Thank you all for sharing your wisdom. I know I have to pay my dues.

I will try everything you all have suggested.

From everything you have suggested, the first thing is lure speed. The second is depth, and the third is the lure it self.

WTF is a banana? The real thing, a fruit? If you tell me that bananas repel fish, I'll never eat one again.

Thanks guys,

Dave Hyde

Hyde N Seek

[GAMBLER]

bananas are bad luck. Do not let anyone on your boat with bananas in their lunch. I don't let anyone in my boat that has anything with banana in it. If you ate a banana before the trip, it must be out of your system before boarding!

[TrophySeeker]

The banana thing is a really old superstition. If you are not superstitios you can ignore. But - I am not very superstitious and I don't take out bananas. But - I also don't eat bananas much at home either.

It's June - the lull during between spring fishing and the lake truly setting up for summer/fall fishing. Don't beat yourself up - it is a tough month.

You have gotten great responses from other very good fishermen.