Anyone use stick baits

[jmyers8]

Does anyone use walleye stick baits for trolling through spring and summer for kings. I have a whole box full of bandits and reef runners and thought it may be good to put behind a downrigger. Seems like most just use spoons and flys or meat rigs but not much talk about stick baits besides early brown trout fishing.

 

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[Mike M]

We will start our early spring salmon fishing running a lot of straight running sticks like renowskis and bombers. This is when surface temperatures are 40-45 degrees. Typically we’re in less then 50 fow. Longer leads on riggers,3 to 5 colors off boards, slide divers on # 3 with 25-40 ft leads. Smelt are around early spring ,sticks look like smelt. As water warms and kings move out to 60-120 fow we’ll switch to spoons and flasher-flys. Usually we start spring king fishing in Wellend canal area or even further west Canadian water. We haven’t been able to go into Canadian water for almost a year. Hopefully this spring we can.


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[jmyers8]

Do summer stick baits usually not work say may through august?

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[tuffishooker]

Stick baits did nothing for us after the boat ramps finally opened last year !

[jmyers8]

Interesting in erie we use them all through the year and catch steelhead on them I was hoping they would still produce

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[tuffishooker]

Lake Erie is a TOTALY different fishery than Lake Ontario !

[Zinger11]

47 minutes ago, tuffishooker said:

Lake Erie is a TOTALY different fishery than Lake Ontario !

Are you saying that techniques used in Lake Erie would NEVER work at Lake Ontario

[guffins fisherman]

I don't know of a single charter captain in Henderson that targets kings with sticks in the summer. If they do, they keep it real quiet. Not likely, but possible. I think a stickbait would be absolutely destroyed after a couple fish at the most. Worse yet, a plastic stickbait may just snap in half, have the ring anchors pull out or the terminal anchor pull out. I suppose a stick would work, but the traditional gear just seems to be better.

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[jmyers8]

Thanks for the info its interesting. Guess I can leave that box at home

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[mr 580]

IMO the best answer is that other lure choices work better on Lake Ontario than stickbaits - especially when water warms and you are fishing faster and deeper than on Lake Erie.  Sticks will take fish especially steelhead high, but most days spoons and flasher flies will take more fish especially kings.

[Legacy]

 

19 hours ago, jmyers8 said:

 

Does anyone use walleye stick baits for trolling through spring and summer for kings. I have a whole box full of bandits and reef runners and thought it may be good to put behind a downrigger. Seems like most just use spoons and flys or meat rigs but not much talk about stick baits besides early brown trout fishing.

 

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Sticks work great for Kings and they put the first Kings in the boat for us every year. Typically they are a incidental catch for us as we target Browns in shallow water in Spring. However as we slide into slightly deeper water spoons become a better choice of baits and once we fish deeper in the water column flashers become the top choice. Sticks also work late in the season when Kings are staging and we use them along side of plugs. 

[CK3080]

We boated a pile of kings last may off the bar with bayrats xld’s on 5color stealthcore. Deployed it on a whim and it was on fire. Will be running it again this year. And the sticks held up great.


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[jmyers8]

We were plannin on fishing the bar around mid may so guess it could be a viable option. In erie we run shallow lipped baits off of dipsys and shallow and deep baits off of bandits guess it could be worth a shot

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[Sean Youngblood]

18 hours ago, Mike M said:

We will start our early spring salmon fishing running a lot of straight running sticks like renowskis and bombers

Renowskis are the cheapest quality lure I have ever used. Yes they are ok for Walleye But I have had more than one have the tail section broken off by big Walleyes. Last batch I bought I was lucky if 1 out of 4 didn't fill up with water right out of the package. I would like to see what a big King would do to one.

[Cpshelb17]

I will almost always have deep diving sticks/cranks on my outside boards, they will often pick up a few cohos for me. Last year’s favorite was a large chrome colored hot n tot. Bomber long a in northern lights color was great in early season as well

[Mike M]

Agree on poor quality of Renowskis last few years. I pretty much stopped buying them. I have some that are over 20 years old that are still catching fish. We get rid of all 3 hooks on most sticks and upsize to a #2 mustad KVD triple grip on rear of the stick. Works for Eyes and spring Kings.


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[Yankee Troller]

Typically, Spring is when sticks work best for Salmon. Once they get out past that 40' range they seem to not be as productive. They can shine again when the stagers show back up in the skinny water. Generally in both of those times gawdy colors are best. Bay Rat Lures makes a LD and a LXD that work great and don't get busted up by the mighty King Salmon. You can find those sticks at FishUSA - Bay Rats

 

Pics for proof:

 

https://www.instagram.com/p/CHa1VgeAK-U/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

 

https://www.instagram.com/p/B_IF7vVgvsH/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

[lady luck]

Yep!

[Legacy]

[lady luck]

4 hours ago, Legacy said:

That’s a color I haven’t seen in a while😛

[jimski2]

Rapala J13's on side planers in the spring are my hottest lure for kings before the sun comes up high.

[redfisher]

I use YALEYE sticks for a couple of weeks in the spring ,remove the factory hooks and put a #2 owner on the back and these baits really hold up to spring kings.

https://www.yaleyefish.ca/site/shop-online/category/me

[tuffishooker]

What year did you get out in the spring redfisher ? Our ramps were closed !

[redfisher]

Now I can't tell you that TFH  see you this spring......

[HB2]

About 12 years back there was a ton of ice  cold water on west end  LOC . 

 

We fished Johnson's creek and had some lest say OK water out to 30 ft then clear cold black . 

 

We spent the days we fished from 10 to 30 ft . Our setup was J 13 and 5 1/2" jointed raps and rebels 75 to 125 ft back on both big boards and riggers set 10 ft off bottom. We did well on some nice kings.  One morning I remember we boated 6  . We got 2 or 3 each day as I remember . 

 

Up until the NK / Pirates came on scene , all we used were sticks untill the Thermocline set up . 

 

It's a good way to fish .