Unbrella Rig

[stan]

Has anyone tried a Unbrella rig for Kings, Laketrout or Bowns ?

Is it to heavy for church walley boards ?

Or is long line the best or downrigger?

[Fishtails]

Stan,

I tried an umbrella rig one time last spring In lake O, but It was mid day and the bite was off. I couldn't really judge their effectiveness on kings or browns. I'm making a promise to myself to devote a rod to one for the whole day or two next spring....when I know the bite Is on. I see absolutely no reason why they would not be as effective on Salmon as they are on Striped bass. Umbrella rigs look unbelievable in the water!! There is a fair amount of resistance upon retrieval, but not much more than a diver that Is tripped.

As far as using them, there would be to much drag for a church board. I'd compare them to a dipsey diver with a bit less drag and resistance. For striper's, the common way to deploy them Is clean off your wire rod.

I hope to get in a half day trolling the ocean tomorrow. I'll try to take a few more pictures of them in action for you.

[stan]

You say off the steel rod. Do you hook on a Dipsy first, then the unbrella ?

Or hook it up stright to the steel.

This sounds like something that would work in our lakes. Our bait fish swim in schools, some are vary large bait balls. On a number of our lakes the kokanee are the bait fish for the Mackinaw ( Laketrout ) and Browns.

It's starting to sound like time to brake out the credit card. I use Grand Slam Bucktails for Browns and Mackinaw ( Laketrout ) Or would you use someting drifferent ?

[Gill-T]

I have tried them. Pain in the arse! Netting is a nightmare. The extra drag kills the fight of the fish. If I was to use them again, I would hook them up to the downrigger ball, and place the release up the cable a little, then run a bait that dives a little......like a stickbait, kwickfish, willy spoon or hot'n' tot with about a 10' lead. That would put the bait even and trailing behing the "school" of attractors. The slower moving baits I described will also be needed because of the blow-back of the cable....you have to run slower.

[stan]

Would not the longer leaders, end up getting tangled up ?

We run sticlbaits out here 2.5 to 4 mph while ripping the shore lines for browns. Now the Mackinaw ( Laketrout ) 1.8 down deep to 2.5 on the surface . The stickbaits for Mackinaw ( Laketrout ) are the Cisco Kid by Suick Lure Co. they range from 7" to 9" I don't think there is a better made stickbait

[Fishtails]

I'd agree with Gill T that netting would be a challenge with a bigger king If the fish Is not tired out. Far as I'm concerned, It's like anything else that Is a little unorthodox. Most guys will think It's whack and to much trouble by It's sheer presence. Hey...stripers ain't no walk in the park to pull In, but my 9yr old brought one In on the Umbrella so It can't be that bad

Like Gill T said, some of the fight Is lost, so a brown may be very lame on the end. Same goes for a laker. I think a king would be up to the challenge I have thought to run it off the ball without hooks to pull fish Into the spread and then stack a rigger rod above it. You could put a whole school of bait under the boat doing that

Btw....No dipsey. Just clean off the wire! They'd be fine off the copper or leadcore also.

[stan]

Well, I just took out the old american express and bought two ( 2 ) ..I will run one off the wire and one ( 1 ) off the copper. What speed do you run them at...Will it hang up on the bottom ?

[Fishtails]

What type did you get Stan? Here are the one's we run. I'll be buying a few myself.

http://www.9erslures.com/

I'd start slow. We trolled them around 2.5 to 2.8 gps speed when we were hitting fish. With tide and current, that was as slow as I could go. I wouldn't be afraid to start even slower If you can....then bump up the speed till you find the magic number. They will definitly hang up on the bottom, so be careful. There Is good info on the tech. page of the above website.

If the guys out there think planer boards and dipsies are odd.....wait till ya pull that sucker out of the box Let us know how they do out there for you.

[REELJERKS]

Here's a crazy idea,

Run Familiar Bite of the Unbrella rig as the trailin bait.

What ya think?

Mark

[dieselhp]

One of the things you can do is take the hooks off of all of the baits except the traling one. that will help with the net. 99% of the fish are on the traler and sometimes we change that one with a spoon.

[stan]

I got mine at

http://www.stripertackle.net

[Fishtails]

Why not Mark?

Hey Rick, that's a good point. Salmon, Stripers, browns, lakers will all usually take that trailer bait....It's those blues that like to crash the herd!

[stan]

So Rod which is the better unit

[Fishtails]

Having just used them, I like the 9er's myself. I'm a rookie with the umbrella rigs (Diesel knows alot more about them) but the 9er's are awesome and probably one of the better on the market. The are pricey, but top quality! The ones you ordered might be good and the investment Isn't as painful. If they take fish, you can always upgrade!!

[jekyll]

I used one for years. I hung it over my son's crib as a mobile (without the hooks if course). Got to get them interested in fishing at a young age.

[on the lam]

I would consider running spoon blanks on the umbrella rigs and fix one to each of the corner riggers on the cable 5' above the ball with a 5' lead. then run spoons below and behind on all 3 or 4 riggers (whatever you run). i've done this using dodgers with good results, especially in spring and summer for kings. Just a thought......