right of way

[mdryer]

When trolling the shore in spring with planer boards, if a boat is headed at you, who has the right of way? Thanks

[Legacy]

If your question is "do you have the right of way when trolling?" then the answer is no.

the pecking order of "right of way" is as follows

-overtaken vessel

-vessel not under command

-vessel restricted in ability to maneuver

-fishing vessel

-sailboat

-power driven

-seaplane

your boat operations fall under power driven not fishing. fishing is considered as commercial trawling, nets, etc. not trolling. so when you and another "power boat" meet neither of you has right of way over another.

[spoonfed-1]

Courtesy would dictate a 5 or 10 deg starboard turn by both boats would eliminate any problems. Unfortunatley courtesy is sometimes hard to come by.

Glen

[emtystringer]

the New York boat handling and navigation guide rules state two boats meeting head on they both keep to there right

[mdryer]

Thanks for the info. So both of us trolling head on, one must keep to his right and hopefully expect the same from the on coming vessel.

[emtystringer]

the way the rules are,the boat with the shore line to his right should have the right of way and the other boat is to turn to his right which is out and give the other the right of way mainly because he can't turn in and run a ground

[Legacy]

the best thing to do is to state your intentions. if you plan on going left or right make an obvious attempt in a way to signal your intentions to the other boat. most of the time boats will pass port side to port side when trolling close. not everyone has read the book on kindness or common sense.

[ray koziatek]

the bigger boat has the right of way unless you have a 50 cal operational on your bow.....as stated the sugested rule for open water is to bear to right ,but it ant set in stone ...the near shore and other fishing conditions or encounters ,are a no brainer to some and a challenge to others ,then there is the auto pilot guy ,its my lake guy,the bigger boat guy,the inconsederate guy , the plain ol stupid idiot who ant gotta clue,and the charter captian trying to put his clients on fish at all cost ......Each port has there fair share of each .And it dont take long for the word to get out among the gang who the Idiots are and who the good fishermen are. in each port . fishing the pro ams 1 year ive found every port has the labled guys .As legasy said a deffinate turn of the wheel to show your port or starboard should be all it takes for two boats to communicate .but i swear most will not have a clue as to what your doing and assume you want to play a game of chicken...just plan way ahead as two approaching boats are on each other amazingly fast for only doing 2.5 mph each .i always figure in the idiot or clueless driver facter when in or near the pac. i strongly recomend a standard boating course for all on the water and the Power boating squadron course is worth its weight in gold for any serious boater.

[chowder]

In my limited experience with pulling planers I have had much more problems with guys in small, new, boats casting or drifting or large luxury boats. Most of the problems we encountered were due to cluelessness- actually had one guy shout over"what are you using for bait under that huge bobber?" At least he saw it! No problems meeting another trolling vessel (yet).

[ray koziatek]

Chowder ,your post is a perfect example of the need for a boating course. I dont mean to be a smartash (for once) (just once)but you said youve had problems with" drifting or casting boats" ..these would fall in the vessel NOT under power which actually give that boat the """right of way""" and you are the"" giveway"" vessel so driving around a stationary boat or object would fall into easy to plan ahead situation . and if you can hear the people talking to you in my bald headed opinion you are too close specially with boards out ,I would bet a dollar after you passed the other baot was thinking or say ing about you ,you had the whole lake and you had to drive right next to them. If ya got room give every boat a wide birth as to not "lable" the trollers .......now tight pack fishing is another story with experenced drivers some times you gotta "thread the needle ""to get through a tight spot ,that is usually caused by one boat trying to wedge into a spot and NOT planning ahead or the NOCLUE guy wondering why everyone is showing him there closed fist with 1 finger extended....Please dont be offended for me using your post as a example,, ,,,I will fairly bash you on another post tho if you give me a chance

[cannon]

.....proceed Port To Port........

[ray koziatek]

http://powerboat.about.com/od/boatingna ... eSpeed.htm

arrrggggg!!!!cannon take the course.....were takling safty issues here

[FX]

There are good courses here for a beginner or as a refresher.

http://www.boatingbasicsonline.com/

Shawn

[mdryer]

Good info, thanks for the feedback. WOuld hate to ever be that guy or cause a mess, just wanted to confirm my thoughts

[Gill-T]

It helps to know the water and lake topography and understand what is going on in the big picture. Case in point, trolling the drop off the Niagara bar where you can go from 150' to 60' in 50 yards....you can't pinch people trolling shallower than you even though the shore is miles away because it is almost impossible to move all the rigger lines, dipsy lines etc. at once. I had an incident last year when a troller coming towards me decided it would be a good idea to try to go between my boat and the boat in front of me with a planer and long copper, and then had the nerve to shout obscenities at me. What is it with the fall ESLO bringing out the idiots at the bar! Sodus has lots of little points and reefs you can run up on.....the locals know these spots and will have a set trolling pattern. Best advise is to follow the flow of what the other boats are doing if you are unfamiliar with the water.

[LongLine]

As Ray said there's one in every port. Unfortunately even though you have a 50 cal, he may have an RPG. Boating courses are great as they'll make you aware of the "rules of the road", unfortunately your taking the course won't help that guy who's on a crash course for you.

I'd suggest rather than keying on the phrase "who has the right of way", that you always be alert and pursue the philosophy "How can I safely stay away from that ignorant @ss#0LL" before he causes some damage.

It's also beneficial to remember that most near shore trollers often scare the fish about 150 yards toward deeper water.

Tom B.

(LongLine)

[chowder]

Chowder ,your post is a perfect example of the need for a boating course. I dont mean to be a smartash (for once) (just once)but you said youve had problems with" drifting or casting boats" ..these would fall in the vessel NOT under power which actually give that boat the """right of way""" and you are the"" giveway"" vessel so driving around a stationary boat or object would fall into easy to plan ahead situation . and if you can hear the people talking to you in my bald headed opinion you are too close specially with boards out ,I would bet a dollar after you passed the other baot was thinking or say ing about you ,you had the whole lake and you had to drive right next to them. If ya got room give every boat a wide birth as to not "lable" the trollers .......now tight pack fishing is another story with experenced drivers some times you gotta "thread the needle ""to get through a tight spot ,that is usually caused by one boat trying to wedge into a spot and NOT planning ahead or the NOCLUE guy wondering why everyone is showing him there closed fist with 1 finger extended....Please dont be offended for me using your post as a example,, ,,,I will fairly bash you on another post tho if you give me a chance

Ray, don't worry about giving me sh-t, I'm a dairy farmer so sh-t doesn't bother me, but actually we were very careful to go way out and around any boats casting or drifting, ( I have spent too much time in my canoe and kayaks to have any thing but sympathy for small craft) the issues that came up revolved around around boats that we would give wide berth to firing up their motor, practically cutting thru our planners to pass us and then set up casting again 100 yds away right in our path. This happened twice, one guy did this 3 times in a row, the last time he did it I did not give him quite as wide a berth as I did the first time, and that is when the "bobber" comment came up, (I sanitized the original quote considerably for this board.) As a number of people have commented, "rudeness" like in the example above is a situation that calls for a calm, relaxed attitude, unfortunately on that day I had a hot headed buddy of mine( ex corrections officer) with me who eventually yelled over to the guy " you are the reason I don't carry a gun!" Needless to say the situation deteriorated from there. My take home lesson from that experience was to just avoid a stretch of water if there is more than one or two boats fishing in it (especially if they are bass boats w/ guy's drinking lot's of beer!)

[waterlogged]

I may be opening myself up for a bashing here but here goes anyway.

Pertaining to two vessels both under power ":

I was told your bow light (and that of other boats) should be viewed as it were a traffic light. If you can see the other guy's red light then you must "STOP or (to use a "bad phrase here") yield him the right of way. If you see his green light then you can "GO" ("have the right of way").

After reading the posts however this would only be true of one boat crossing in front of another, as if you were starboard to starboard then you would both have the "right of way".

The best thing I read here is about the boat with the limited maneuverability being allowed the right of way. If he is pinned against the shore and you are outside of him it only makes sense that you should move to allow him safe passage.

Clarke

[Erbyjoe]

As Ray said there's one in every port. Unfortunately even though you have a 50 cal, he may have an RPG. Boating courses are great as they'll make you aware of the "rules of the road", unfortunately your taking the course won't help that guy who's on a crash course for you.

I'd suggest rather than keying on the phrase "who has the right of way", that you always be alert and pursue the philosophy "How can I safely stay away from that ignorant @ss#0LL" before he causes some damage.

It's also beneficial to remember that most near shore trollers often scare the fish about 150 yards toward deeper water.

Tom B.

(LongLine)

Tom You get a gold star for your answer. So many times I thought I had the right away only to be forced somewhere I didn't want to go by bigger boats who could give a rats A** about me so I will do the same thing make a move so I don't have to deal with the idiots that think they own the water and you are just a twig they can run over As far as a Boating course. It is going to be mandatory some time in the future for any one who uses a boat to need a course certifit. When I was boarded on the Niagara river last spring by the Boys I gave them my certifit for the coast Guard coarse and they said that they only get a few people that have the coarse and they said the same thing that it's only a mater of time. I also learned alot of things I didn't know so it is a plus to take one

[jekyll]

With right-of-way, you can be right but, you can also be dead right. Taking the right-of-way when you have it can result in a pulpit in your pilot house if the other guy doesn't see you or care about the rules. Some guys use only the "Big Lake, Little Me" rule.

[capt ace]

Legacy's listing of who has the right of way is correct. There is also another rule that states that you must take evasive maneuver to avoid collision. There are also horn signals that are to be used to when overtaking or passing vessels to state your intentions and horn signals to answer that you got it. I havn't seen to many boat operaters, if any employ this rule of navigation.

[daker1979]

the bigger boat has the right of way unless you have a 50 cal operational on your bow.....as stated the sugested rule for open water is to bear to right ,but it ant set in stone ...the near shore and other fishing conditions or encounters ,are a no brainer to some and a challenge to others ,then there is the auto pilot guy ,its my lake guy,the bigger boat guy,the inconsederate guy , the plain ol stupid idiot who ant gotta clue,and the charter captian trying to put his clients on fish at all cost ......Each port has there fair share of each .And it dont take long for the word to get out among the gang who the Idiots are and who the good fishermen are. in each port . fishing the pro ams 1 year ive found every port has the labled guys .As legasy said a deffinate turn of the wheel to show your port or starboard should be all it takes for two boats to communicate .but i swear most will not have a clue as to what your doing and assume you want to play a game of chicken...just plan way ahead as two approaching boats are on each other amazingly fast for only doing 2.5 mph each .i always figure in the idiot or clueless driver facter when in or near the pac. i strongly recomend a standard boating course for all on the water and the Power boating squadron course is worth its weight in gold for any serious boater.

Well said, Ray and I must agree to operate a boat it should be licensed as there are far too many out there that do not have a clue.....

[Edd]

I believe, and I haven't seen it mentioned yet, if there is ANY chance the other vessel doesn't understand your intentions, you should hail them on the VHF. Before anyone chastises me.....I do realize that not everyone has a $99 VHF radio. Just thought I'd offer a West Coast solution.

Edd

[Legacy]

I believe, and I haven't seen it mentioned yet, if there is ANY chance the other vessel doesn't understand your intentions, you should hail them on the VHF. Before anyone chastises me.....I do realize that not everyone has a $99 VHF radio. Just thought I'd offer a West Coast solution.

Edd

I love those conversations on the radio!

[ray koziatek]

ah yes the warm frindly chit chat ..good day mate i belive your on the course i want >>>kssst ...by george your right let me give you a little more room>>>>ksst ...cherrio and a tip of the hat to ya.>>> ksst ..righto and best of luck.