jekyll

TH Snubbers are shock absorbers you attach to the back of the dipsy to absorb the shock of salvage hits. The absorber prevents the line from breaking. Attach leader after the snubber to your bait, lure or flasher. Here is a link for Luhr Jensen snubbers: http://www.cabelas.com/prod-1/0003422111782a.shtml Here is a link for Opti-Tackle snubbers: http://www.optitackle.com/terminaltackle.shtml

I did a few with albright knots but that sucker is very difficult with super braid, especially on the water. Braid is very slippery so you need to double the braid to get a solid grip. My last attempt to do the albright on the water with braid took about 30 minutes and more than a few attempts so I just connected the Big Game with a small Sampo swivel. It works great and is far easier to tie. I had a good teacher with the Professor but, I can only tie braid in albrights sitting at my bench.

May be something to that. I started using dodgers once the browns hit the 30 foot mark. I didn't try them shallower. Still on stick baits and straight spoons until that point. The 4/0 dodger is not much larger than a spoon so it might not spook them in shallow during early spring. I'll find out this season. I took a few nice browns on flies behind Spin Dr. and Pro Trolls while chasing salmon in 90-250 FOW but that was later in the season.

Yes. Chowder, I'd like to get out with you in your new ride once the browns start hitting in the spring.

Andy: The dodgers are Lure Jensen but they list them as 4/0. They are 3-15/16 by 1-3/8. Something is up with the Lure Jensen web site-it's not working for me today. Cabelas lists them as size 040. Look closely at the pictures of the silver and copper/silver in the following link and you will see the LJ mark of 4/0. http://www.cabelas.com/cabelas/en/templ ... ISO-8859-1 I have some 4 inch fined Pro Troll flashers but they didn't seem to work as well as the LJ dodgers.

There is no substitute for wattage! Dual Freq is worth ever penny.

Andy: First, are you setting up slide diver rigs for the Finger Lakes or the Big O? I think 14# line is too light on the Big Lake for a diver. The diver and the lures will put significant stress on the line which means that a good brown or anything of good size could easily clean you off on the initial strike. I've lost spoons on 12# flourocarbon behind slide divers. All the tension in the set up doesn't allow much margin for the hit. I suggest you run 25 or 30# through the slide diver and then leader down at the back side. Don't be surprise to find salmon or big lakers in shallow when you are in close picking around for browns. I lost more than a few spoons last spring from salvage hits when looking for browns though they might have been from Sheephead. My slide divers are set up with 30# Fireline, one in smoke and one in dark green. I haven't noticed any different between the two in catch rates. I think the lure and location expleains any differences better than line color. I use 20-30 yards of 30# Big Game through the diver and then 6-8 feet of flourocarbon leader after the diver to the lure (12-15# for browns and 25-30# for salmon). Not sure which copper back spoons you mean but it's likely 1 of 2 which I favor: Stinger Glow Goby Copper and Stinger NBK copper cup. Not many places carry the coper cup NBK but Fat Nancy's always has them. The Copper Cup Glow Goby can be found in many places. Fat Nancy's and Jon's Little Salmon Tackle have them. Also, the glow back Stinger Glow Goby worked very well last year as did the NK-28 Glow Frog. I'll cheat the Gobies on one rigger and cheat the NBK and Glow Frog on the other side. The center rigger this year will be for sea trials of different spoons. I had good luck on the NK-28 Sea Sick Wadler and the Stinger Penguin off slide divers. I didn't break out the wire dipsies when targeting browns in close. I had good success with 4/0 dodgers 30-36 inches in front of spoons off the riggers. Best colors were copper/silver and solid silver. I intend to experiment with additional dodger colors this coming season. You know where you can get rid of excess meat sticks

Yup, I rig the braid with 20-30 yards of mono leader. The final leader is 10-12 pound flourocarbon. This can be a deadly rig in late spring once the fish move into the 30 foot + depths. Use the Lite Bite versus the old model slide diver. Some of those browns can be on the wee side and the Lite Bite will release. The Professor showed me how to employ the slide diver on browns and now, like the Monkeys used to sing, "I'm a believer". Be careful when trying for those bottom hugging browns. The older slide divers can be trickey when close to the bottom. They can be cut off when they bump bottom even once. This is due to their design where the main line enters at the front. This section faces the rocks when trolled so the line gets cut between the rocks and diver. I lost 2 full rigs within 30 minutes one day. The Lite Bites are slightly different and will better survive bottom bounces. Also, slide divers have different dive charachteristics than dipsies. I can get much deeper with same size slide divers but, I have the larger wieght and a ring on mine. Keep them away from the boat, 35 to 50 feet in front of your lure and off the bottom and you'll catch fish. Did you get your buck yet?

I'd buy that for a dollar!

What makes you think he'll be too busy to sign a bill the congress sends him? It doesn't take a lot of work and time on his part to review and sign. There will be plenty of gun grabbers in congress to work up the legislation and get it to his desk. The real problem is that there is no check and balance fom the liberal House and Senate.

From VA to PA yesterday. VA: 2.03 Southern MD: 2.18 Northern MD: 1.89 PA: 2.20

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.

Mike: You might consider running a 30# super braid (Power Pro, Fire Line etc.) until you get experience with dipsies. Wire is great but it takes care and precautions or else you can easily lose tackel and fish. Super braid is very forgiving and dives as deep as wire. It has no stretch and fights like wire. Mono stretches a lot which limits it for use on a deep diver. Shallow divers ar OK but if you have a lot of line out, you might not be able to trip dipsies for retrieves due to the stretch.

6113: HMM-165, HMH-462, HMT-204, FAWPRA Atsugi. 6002: MALS-39, HMLA-267, VMO-4, HMLA-775, MAG-42, NAVAIR.

Ray: Frog mech splains a lot about you. I got nervous every time I crewed a Frog. Something about intermeshing rotors. I was a 6113 and "Chitter" crew chief from 76 to 86 then a 6002 AMO till retirement in 98. But hey, every Marine is an infantry man first so I guess in theory I was an 0302

Tom: Where in PA? What channel do you monitor? I monitor 78 and 9, Mexico Bay.

Baytech: When I ran a smaller boat, I always has a plan B in case of blow-off days. This kept me from tempting fate. My plan B was to tow the boat to Seneca and troll for lakers. Always had great laker action. My last time on Seneca resulted in 17 lakers in 3 hours.

Dave: I thought about my response and it might have been a bit deficient. My response was geared for the staging period we are in now. Not to be confused with early and mid summer. Since you are heading out this weekend, I assumed you wanted info for that. I don't motor out to 575 fow in the summer and then zigzag within 20 feet of the target depth Also, not everyone has a relationship with a charter captain or 2 and can't call them up for the latest info. Use the forums for that instead. I try to post info as do a handful of others. I don't do it to brag but to provide info for the guys that don't get to the Lake often. I call my charter friends and get info about current locations, depths and presentations. I then filter it through the forums after I've used it. I don't post data in advance such as "hey, my charter friends say to target xx fow this coming weekend". To do so would terminate my relationship and the flow of information. Instead, I put the data to use, mixed with my own experiences and decisions, and report the success or failure thereof. Brian: 600 feet of Cu during staging? You must like steamed zebra mussels. Last time I checked, 1/4 mile was 1320 feet. Must be some reel to hold that much copper

Best way for a beginer is to head out and and join the pack. The pack is usually, though not always, close to fish. Stay on the periphery and try a bit shallower and a bit deeper. My process is a bit different. I call several charter friends the day before and discuss where the fish have been for the week. I look at temperature and wind trends along with recent rain then I make a decision on where I'll start my search. At this time of year, I pick the water I want and cruise out till I'm about 20 feet shallower of my target. I reduce speed so I can see fish clearly and I start heading deeper looking for marks. I drop the bag and start setting lines after I see 2 or 3 arches or bait. I make my first troll run towards deeper water past my target to check the picture. After all this, I have enough information to select a final target depth. I'll stay within 20 feet of the target depth in slow but large zig zags. I try to avoid the temptation to chase the radio calls. I find this method puts me on fish and usually away from the pack. A final method which everyone uses at some point is to shadow a charter boat. I don't say this to create more traffic and congestion for the charters because you and everyone eventually figures it out. What many don't figure out is that the charters can get really boxed in by folks shadowing them. Give them some room so they can turn and do their thing. Don't travel beside them because they need to have room to turn. Best way is to stay WELL behnd them. You can stay 1/4 mile back and get plenty of knowledge on their depth and speed without becoming a nuisance or a hazard. Respect them and they will respect you.

Paddles are flashers - Spin Doctors or Pro Troll e-chips etc. Yes, glow hammer is an A-Tom-Mik fly. I use the tournement rigs. When fish get a solid hit on those, they "buy" the hooks for life. It either ends quickly in the cooler or later after they do a break-n-take but, either way, they own the hooks for life.

There is a crap load of hungry fish in the East end of the Lake. We welcomed good fishing weather on Saturday and most of Sunday. We did 18 for 32 for the weekend with the hook up ratio improving on Sunday. We managed our 3-man limit on Saturday but only took a 3-man limit on Sunday with 4 on board. I'll say it again, loosen the drag guys. Thom practiced for a week: righty tighty, lefty loosey. He's making headway but still needs some practice Saturday, Fireplug and Danno from the site joined me. Fireplug had fished with me for browns but he didn't get a fish that time. This time he got even. I think he realized that once the other guys limit, he gets more action if he adds numbers to the denominator, not the numerator. Fishing is a crew thing so we had fun trolling while he worked on getting his last fish in the boat after several break offs. We went 9 for 18 in the end with 2 cohos, a steelhead and 6 kings. Danno managed a hat trick: 1 king, 1 coho and 1 steelhead. His steelhead was a bit different, its back was light blue and its sides were tinted with orange. I haven't seen one colored like this before. Danno and Fireplug turned one double. Here's Danno's steelhead. The colors don't show clearly in the photo: Fireplug with one of his kings: The day's catch (borrowed Trout One's board): We located the fish in 100 fow. Nothing deeper and a few shallower. We stayed out of the pack for the most part. The pack seemed to be targeting 80 FOW where the fish had been for several days before the wind messed with the temps. We were quite happy with miles of boat-free water and plenty of fish. We fished from the South Dunes to Sandy Pond. Sunday found fellow site members Amazing Action and PJ Weber and his son with me. PJ had posted looking for a ride and I answered up with 2 seats. We went 9 for 14 with 3 sets of doubles. PJ and his son Darren managed to do 2 sets of doubles. It was a pleasure watching father and son with their doubles. We took 1 coho and 8 kings. The fish had moved in shallower than they had been on Saturday. We stayed pretty much on fish all day in 75 to 85 FOW. We stayed North of the pack from the North Dunes to Sandy Pond. Amazing Action and I ended the day on a double. It was my turn at bat when a dipsy fired. As I reached for the rod, the adjacent rigger fired and I got to chose my ride. I realized I was a bit tired after 2 full days so I opted for the DR and let Amazing Action have the dipsy. Wise choice because the DR was well-stuck but Thom lost the dipsy fish (a king). PJ and Darren with 1 of thier doubles: Amazing Action (Thom Crance) and me working our dusk doubles: Thom is a licensed drift boat guide. He is wearing his drift boat night time running lights - the day glow shirt! He says it works well, it is bright in the picture. We hit fish with speeds of 1.6 through 2.4 with 2.0 being the most consistent. We kept the balls and dipsies within 10 feet of the muck because of the temps. The temp break was low. 68 degrees at 50 and 50 degrees at 75. Sunday was an exception. I set the probe rigger first and stopped at 50 feet to get a stabilized temp reading. As soon as I turned towards the next rigger the crew started shouting fish on. Total fishing time: 5 seconds and our 1st king was on. I love it when a plan comes together. My center rigger didn't fire all weekend. I ran fixed cheaters on both corner riggers ala mupp, but none on the center. I tried chips, spinnies, J-plugs, spoons and meat twinkies. Ran it high, ran it low and in between. In frustration, I made 3 changes at once (mistake, now I don't know what fixed it) I changed to a chartreuse mountain dew spin dr with a crazy **** fly, I set it back 60 feet and dropped the ball into the mud then raised it 2 feet. It then fired within 10 minutes and took 2 fish in the last hour. Stats are as follows (with 1 I forgot to document): Riggers: 20 Wire dipsies: 10 Braid Slide diver: 2 Copper: 0 Wire thumper: 0 Spin Dr.s: 12 Pro-troll finned chips: 19 Chartreuse paddles: 15 White Paddles: 12 Black/blue hologram/glow white chip: 1 11 inch chrome/chrome chip: 3 Glow Hammer: 13 (I really love this pattern) Glow white: 10 Glow Little Boy Blue: 3 (this was on the 11 inch paddle) Crazy ****: 2 Mirage fly: 2 The white wasn't as dominant at dusk and dawn. Our first 5 fish came on chartreuse paddles and glow hammers on Saturday beginning at 0630. Sunday we started an hour later at 0730 due to wind; the first 4 fish came on white. The last rig to fire was the 11 inch chrome/chrome chip w/ glow LBB after dusk.

Heh, did you guys start the PA Phishin Possy without me?

Are you asking about stream fishing the runs? If so, I use 30# Floro Clear on ABU Garcia Ambassadeur 6000 series reels matched to a 8 to 9.5 foot rod. I like a heavier line for a number of reasons: 1. Get the fish in quickly in crowded streams 2. Land fish quickly without using them up. They survive release better 3. Bust free of line stuck to the bottom 4. Break off fewer fish, leaving fewer orphaned hooks swimming around 5. Lose less main line by sacrificing the leader. I carry different size flourocarbon leader to suit the water conditions: 12, 15, 20 and 30.

Not as good as I had hoped. Didn't get a Derby fish. Went 5 for about 15 over 3 days. Hits came on Spin doctors and echips about equally. White on white violence in the dawn and dusk and green on chartruse violence in mid day dominated. The favorite flies were ultra white glow, packer fly, mirage fly and glo hammer (all A-tom-Mik Tournement flies). 3 hits on dipsies, all wire, no slide diver. The rest were on the riggers except for 1 on the thumper. Saturday, I had amazing action and breaktime aboard. I started with a smaller king on a dipsy shot then they both straitened hooks on larger kings. Amazing action straitened the thumper's hooks and then breaktime showed us how to straiten a hook on a downrigger. Loosen the drag guys...... I took 3 guys on Sunday from the forum: Chowder, adirondackice and his step son Kent Vedder. Adirondacice wanted to get a king for Kent. Lukily, I managed to get them each a salmon and we had a great day. We had 1 double with which we batted 500. The double started with 13 year old Kent tieing into his first slamon. He nailed a nice 22 # off the nuke plant and used all of 30 minutes to get it in. Kent wasn't sure which of them would prevail. Here's a picture of Kent wondering if he would win: Kent won in the end and throughout the day, he opened the fish box so many times to look at his salmon, all the ice melted. Here's Kent and adirondackice: Adirondackice, followed Kent a short time later with an 18 # king. We wrapped up the morning with a nice 5-6 # coho for chowder. Nice guys all, and like I said, we had a good time. I fished with broad horizons and his friend Pete on Monday. Regretably, we managed only 2 dipsy hits niether of which stuck. I managed to take 1 king Monday evening by myself runing a 1-rigger and 1 dipsy spread. There is something to be said for "less is more". I fished about 1 half the time between the highrocks and the nuke plant and the remaining time north of the big river. I took more hits at the plant but the boats were thicker there. Most hits were between 70 and 80 fow and down 60 to 75 feet. Dipsies fired at 150 and 250 on #2.

It's OBE now but, tickets must be purchased before 7am of the day fishing (check the rules). Bob and his cuz were ready and legal.