Yankee Troller

It depends on time of year. In May/June when you're fishing surface breaks down to 30/40' they really like the bright gawdy colors. I typically like the Dreamweaver Super Slim size this time of year as well. Colors for this time of year are Chilly Willy, Mixed Veggies, Martel, Get-R-Dun, Rodfather, Watermelon, NBK, and Green Jeans. July/August when you're fishing thermoclines 40-80' down the same things Salmon are eating the Steelhead will chew. We're also typically running regular and mag sized spoons. Colors for this time of year are 42nd, Martel, NBK, Rodfather, Frog, Moon Cricket, Sea Sick Waddler, and Green Jeans,

Right now the guys in Rochester are heading out to the 27-30N lines and getting 20-40 chews a trip. Temp out there is a little more stable, and currents are generally not as bad.

In my opinion, it's when I'm not fishing that inside 80-200' water. When you're fishing 400-600'. The distance to get there varies by port.

I'd call Lowrance and ask if the Airmar P66 is compatible with your unit. If so, go that route.

Finally getting caught up after running the Orleans County Open event this weekend. Boy did that sneak up on me! My apologies to everyone for that, but I would say it went off pretty well. We already have people offering to help with next year’s event. My hope is that we can get a little more money into the event with help from sponsors and local businesses. Anyway, our Spring tourney season has been lackluster and frustrating to say the least. Regardless, that all changed this weekend! I'm not a huge fan of Friday events because I'm more interested in eliminating water utilizing sonar instead of beating up on the fish. We never turn on any bites on those days, so putting a big box together can be tough. Friday’s event saw 33 teams competing, and we finished in the money with a 6th place finish. Better yet, we had a decent plan going into the event. Saturday (Day 1) we made a 8 mile run to the West and set up in 280' of water targeting mostly Salmon. Those bites seemed to come easy. We took Salmon on a 40' Cannon Downrigger pulling a DW Rodfather and as deep as an A-TOM-MIK 400' copper pulling A-TOM-MIK meat. We spent most of the day looking for a few Steelhead. At 1pm we had 5 Salmon and 1 Lake Trout in the box. The decision was made to run in and grab our three Lake Trout. We stopped in 150' of water pointed Southwest and by 120' we were boxed on Lake Trout. From there we pointed it North and trolled out. On the troll North we grabbed a Steelhead on a sliding cheater with a DW Mixed Veggies. Shortly after that we upgraded our smallest Salmon in the box. That last hour was good for 4 tournament fish! We ended the day in 3rd place, but we had the heaviest box of fish weighed in with 9 of our 10 tournament legal fish. Sunday (Day 2) we went back to the same water but stopped short in 250' because we marked a lot of bait in there running in from Day 1. We deployed a 100% Salmon spread to get that filled ASAP so we could concentrate on Steelhead. We had a major case of the dropsies. Our Salmon box could have been MEGA! Around 10am we were sitting on 4 Salmon. I was sick of looking at marks down 250' over 300' throughout the morning. I asked for a 20lb Shark and sent one of our Cannon Downriggers to 250' loaded with A-TOM-MIK meat. 5 minutes later and we were into a teenager on that rod. That gave us our 5 Salmon, so we picked rods and headed for Laker land. Took us a minute to find them as we trolled from 120' into 85' and then back out to 130', which is where we found them. Once we did, they came fast on Hammerhead Cowbells and Gambler Rigs like the day before. Once we boxed our 3 Lake Trout, we pointed it North. Once we got back out to our Salmon water, we hit our second Steelhead on that same DW Mixed Vegies SS. We had our 10 fish in the cooler, and it was time to upgrade. That 1pm power hour started again, and we made 4 Salmon upgrades with one being a low 20's Salmon. They all came from A-TOM-MIK meat! We knew going in our box was heavier than the previous day AND we had our tournament box filled for the day. We were pretty sure we had this event licked! We were one of the first teams to weigh in and indeed our box was bigger than the previous day. My excitement was raging given our record the last few events. Then came the Dublin' Up team captained by Carl Martin with a West End hammer, Roy Letcher, and they dropped the MEGA ULTRA box down on the scales. In the end, we settled for 2nd place in the event, 2nd place in the Calcutta, and won 2/3 brackets.

If you cant find anyone up there I have a guy at Krenzer Marine, in Sodus Point, who does them almost weekly.

Make sure Switchfire (in the sonar menu) is on MAX. Play with full, wide, and narrow CHIRP spectrum to see what gives you the best picture when trolling. I'd assume wide? Other than that leave contrast where it's at and increase/decrease sensitivity until you can pick up your downrigger balls. Be aware though that the transducer you are running isn't ideal, but it will work. CHIRP transducers have narrower cones than traditional sonar. You may lose your cannonballs from the screen if fishing light weights or fishing deep.

We run A-TOM-MIK flies, so those are the colors we'll recommend below. They can be found here at FishUSA. Big Fin & Glow Big Fin Bam Crinkle Green Hammer & Glow Hammer Pro Am & Pro Am Glow SS Stud & Glow Stud Mirage

It's interesting that a few miles down the lake in Jefferson and St. Lawrence county they have the best Smallmouth fishing in the country. They had some of the worst Cormorant flocks up there for years, and there are no shortage of Gobies there either. Even the enormous amount of tournament pressure hasn't hurt that place yet. I think your problem is more of a habitat issue that anything else. Might also be you can't drag lures on bottom like you used to due to the Gobies. That's why drop shotting has been so successful.

200lb Power Pro or American Fishing Wire downrigger braid

Both are great companies, and I agree with Brian on the Raymarine products. Most guys running Raymarine have had issues in the past. I will say the one thing that separates Garmin and SIMRAD is their customer service. Garmin is hands down the best in the business with customer service. SIMRAD, or NAVICO which is the parent company, is one of the worst and has been for years. Although, they have gotten better in the last year or two. Let me know what models you're looking for and I can get you a quote on them. As far as performance goes both are equally as good.

McCoy Mean Green is what we use.

Try running a 24" on each side rather than a 48" on one side.