DOWN RIGGER TROLLING QUESTION.......

[finnlander]

i.m new to salmon fishing, this spring will be the first time i have used riggers, so i have lots of things to learn. one thing i.m really concerned about is how far from the cannon ball do you place your flasher or spin doctor and how far back from them do you put your fly, spoon etc. i now there are alot of different answers and opinions but just generally speaking i need a place to start. also what would determine if you use a flasher or spin doctor fly spoon or cut bait. thanks guys in advance. by the way this is a great site.

[vetting]

Typically spoons are run without a flasher.  If you are going to run flasher/fly, a good number to start with is 28" from the end of the flasher to the tip of the fly.  User 40lb test berkley big game - its a bit stiffer to give more action to the fly.  Distance back from the ball is usually around 20 feet.  You dont want to go too much further than that because if your running a fasher of each rigger, they will tangle if you arent heading straight with the underwater currents. 

[King Slammin]

Most of the time we run our flashers and flies on our deep wire dipseys and spoons on the riggers. That way the flashers draw the fish into our spread from both sides. If u have a center rigger, that would be a great place to run a deep flasher or meat rig, sushi fly, etc. NO MATTER WHAT we always have a flasher fly in the spread. Some days the fish wont touch a flasher fly but will hammer the spoons, but i will still leave a couple of the flashers out as they could be the attractor. Leads range from 8' - 20' but definitely no more unless u have a huge beam.

[finnlander]

Typically spoons are run without a flasher.  If you are going to run flasher/fly, a good number to start with is 28" from the end of the flasher to the tip of the fly.  User 40lb test berkley big game - its a bit stiffer to give more action to the fly.  Distance back from the ball is usually around 20 feet.  You dont want to go too much further than that because if your running a fasher of each rigger, they will tangle if you arent heading straight with the underwater currents. 

thanks for your reply and what you say makes sense. i h ave a couple spin doctors how are they different from flashers? and what can you run behind them. i was told hardly anyone uses flashers anymore. if spoons are run without a flasher what do you run in front of them to attract the fish?

[finnlander]

Most of the time we run our flashers and flies on our deep wire dipseys and spoons on the riggers. That way the flashers draw the fish into our spread from both sides. If u have a center rigger, that would be a great place to run a deep flasher or meat rig, sushi fly, etc. NO MATTER WHAT we always have a flasher fly in the spread. Some days the fish wont touch a flasher fly but will hammer the spoons, but i will still leave a couple of the flashers out as they could be the attractor. Leads range from 8' - 20' but definitely no more unless u have a huge beam.

 thanks this does help. i will only be running 2 riggers 1 on each side of the boat and the beam is close to 8 ft. i do not have any dipseys and want to learn to use the riggers first.  what would be a good setup with my 2 riggers. thanks 

[Has Been]

If I were you and I was new to this I would keep it as simple as possible. Depending on where you are fishing, east or west end, your program & where/what you will be fishing for could be different. Ice out to say mid may on from Olcott east will be close to shore5-20'  for brownn salmon mix . Planer boards w/ sticks is my main way to fish this depth . once out past say 10 ' - 25 I Iike to put sticks off my riggers 50 -150 ' behind ball 10' off bottom( straight rapalas or  jtd rebels). Great way to fish if there is a good chop.

 

 The Bar to say olcott  or maybe the Oak    for say  May 1  on mostly a deep water summer time approach 40' & deeper.  .  for you I would put spoons on riggers  at first & maybe flasher on dipseys.  One each off riggers & two dipsy will keep you busy  if the fish are biting.10 - 40back  for spoons/ 25' for flashers on riggers. Stack 2 rods on one rigger when you get good.

 

 learn to work the lines you have in the water before getting to crazy.

Edited March 17, 2013 by Has Been

[Sk8man]

Looking at the name of the poster I'm wondering whether the specific Lake O stuff is important to him....might be from Finland

[Kuba]

[finnlander]

Looking at the name of the poster I'm wondering whether the specific Lake O stuff is important to him....might be from Finland

finnish by name only i live near fenlon falls ont.

[LongLine]

I'd suggest starting with a flasher -fly combo about 10-15 ft back on only one rigg'r.  Fly back about 22" from flasher.     Cut bait can be a little tricky and definitely frustrating if not done with a proper roll to it.  Spoons can be run with flashers but with much longer leads - in the 3+ ft range. 

 

Tom B.

(LongLine)

[Captain Carl Bish]

if spoons are run without a flasher what do you run in front of them to attract the fish?

Use all of your lines to attract the fish.....we call it our trolling spread or "program", think three dimensionally -- what does the fish see as you invade their niche?

[Sk8man]

Looks like I took the bait You got me!

[Tim Bromund]

the spoon has it's own action that attracts the fish, no need for anything in front of it. Flies need an attractor in front because they have no action on their own.

Edited March 18, 2013 by Tim Bromund

[finnlander]

the spoon has it's own action that attracts the fish, no need for anything in front of it. Flies need an attractor in front because they have no action on their own.

thank you................. should have figured it out daaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa......

[Kuba]

And for the past year i was using spoons with flashers............ nice

So no flashers at all???? With spoons? Just with flies?

Edited March 20, 2013 by Kuba

[Justin B]

Some of my best days in the spring last year (April) wad with a flasher 6ft lead and a glow spoon and the rest of the spread was either all clean spoons or a mix of flasher flys

I never thought flasher and spoons would be productive but I had 15+ fish days for a week doing it and boats around me wernt hooking up nearly as much as I was.

Everything works in lake o of u apply it properly and run it long enough

I like to try somthing new or tweak somthing that has worked every time I go out

Cheers guys

JB

[Kuba]

Check out "show me what worked for you" thread on this site by me. It shows what spoon and SD I used. It realky worked wonders. I could guarantee fish with it any time of day.

[Kuba]

of course I used both of them at the same time silly me

[Sk8man]

I know the "purists" out there will disagree with me but if you experiment you can run just about anything with anything if you do your homework and keep track of the data and make changes as necessary. There is no "miracle" setup... sometimes its just the fact that it is something different being presented. Sometimes things work great for a short time and then....nothingI  I was told by a bunch of fishermen friends that lake trout would never hit the little peanut behind a set of flashers back in the late seventies too....or that they wouldn't hit flies behind a dodger on the Finger Lakes (only the Great Lakes salmon) yet both produced some of my best fish back then. It's still a matter of finding active, hungry or aggressive fish and giving them something to think about in terms of either a "vulnerable" or "provocative" target prey. Sometimes its that "oddball" setup that sorts you out from the other contestants in derbies too. MY motto: "Keep experimenting...that's what its all about anyway"

Edited March 20, 2013 by Sk8man

[Tim Bromund]

I didn't say you couldn't/shouldn't put a spoon behind and flasher or that it wouldn't work, just that it isn't necessary because the spoon provides it's own action. 

 

I know that plenty of guys do run spoons behind flashers with success, but clean run spoons have been catching tons and tons of trout and salmon on the lake for decades before anyone ever heard of a flasher.

 

Tim

[Kuba]

Definitely I will be trying spoons by themselves this year.

Do you guys think it was just a coincidence that I was only catching rainbows last year? Were the salmons scared away by my xtra flashy setup?

I hit a lot of trout but not a single salmon.

[Justin B]

Fair enough Tim I hear where your coming from, I was kinda going along the lines of what sk8mam said that when I had my flasher spoon running in a big pack of boats that was probly running mostly clean spoons I stood out so maybe I got more bites a lot of times that's my favorite time to experiment is on a lot of boat traffic, because I wanna run somthing different than the 15 other boats around me

JB

[Justin B]

How long of a lead were you runnin behind flasher?

I found any less than 6 ft from the flasher wasn't very good for kings, I think it was more about the flash of the flasher than the roll of the spoon at 6 ft back the spoon only had a slight extra roll similar to a meat rig

[DJ 17]

Kuba,

If you were only catching steelhead, my guess would be that you weren't in cold enough water. "MOST" of the time the kings prefer much colder water than the steelies. IMHO try the colder water, below the thermocline.

[Sk8man]

Hey Tim I hope you didn't think I was referring to your comment ....I fully agree with what you said.