Gill-T

The lense is all foggy because of the all the huffin' and puffin' realing in that fish Tim. Nice job on the king.

I use fireline #30 lb and DON'T have a problem. Not sure if it is the shape or wax coating, but I get less fleas on my braid than my wire. The difference being if I do get fleas, the roller tip on my wire rod cuts the fleas off nicely as I reel in, where as I have to use the "slap" technique to shake them off the braid.

Thanks for the report. I will be fishing off the catt. Friday and Sat.. Just hail Gill-T Hooker on 68 and I can tell you what is happening east of you.

I am a firm believer in the view of the spread has a lot to do with your success. Like Capt. Vince says " everything matters", for example the flashers/flies on the divers may be pulling fish away from the higher copper lines. How far back and how deep the dipsys and copper is running in relation to each other and the downrigs lines matters! I once saw some really cool underwater footage on In-Fisherman tv, where a diver was filming from a position deep under the water looking up at trolling rigs passing by. What I got from the footage was fish first see the downrig lures and orient themselves with the boat and start swimming in the direction the boat is traveling. Even fish deeper than the downrig lines, they slowly tracked them at a distance. These fish that are too far away to make a move on the downrig lines are the ones that you are targeting with the junk lines brining up the rear. It is important to know the whole picture. Ideally, you would want divers at AND below downrig lines. Copper, has been disputed about the actual depth it runs on a straight line troll, but from what the group that put out the "precision depth trolling guide" book dispute the 20' down for each 100' of copper......feeling the copper has a dimished return over length so by the time you get to 400', there is not much difference in depth achieved compared to 500' and 600'. In other words we are fishing higher with copper than we thought. Not a big deal, because fish come from "out of temp" all the time. But sometimes they are only biting in their preffered temps.......deeper than your copper is running. Maybe, in the middle of your troll you hit a band of higher cool water and now the copper starts hiting again. It is probably best to let the fish determine what they want.

No reason why you can't use only dipsys. I have every sized planing devise out there, including the deep six and double-deep six. If I were to devise a six rod spread for you involving no riggers. It would be a slide diver or leadcore or copper on the outside lines with the leadcore or copper needing in-line planer boards or big boards w/planer mast....to take those lines out WIDE and out of the way. You don't need boards for the slide divers. Middle lines would be size #1 dipsy with braid or wire set on a 3-3.5 setting. Inside dipsys would be a size #1 dipsy with braid or wire set on a .5 or 1 setting. You can't run two deep sixes out the back without tangles. The other option is a six rod all in-line planer leadcore or copper set up. You set the longer lines to the outside, working shorter on the inside lines.

Go to at LEAST 30# lb line to keep fleas off. You can always place lighter line as a leader material.

Wow, great shooting!!! Isn't there some of the most beautiful slate green water off Niagara county right now? What I can't understand is where the hell is the bait? You would think all those fish are feeding on something.

As long as you are not wearing double-crush glow crocs, your feet will be safe.

Rick, I experienced similar blank fish graphs off Wilson this weekend. Had the girls with me Sun. and Mon. .....which meant we started trolling at 9:00 am , and the of course they wanted to jump into the water first before setting lines. So each morning before we set down, I am staring at a blank screen on the graph. No bait, no hooks. The girls and I are swimming out in 200' FOW (68 degrees refreshing) and I keep looking at the graph while we are stationary, and I can't believe the amount of hooks appearing under the stationary boat! The thermocline shows up perfectly as well. What I learned before sending down any Temp probes or downrigger lines was an accurate depiction of where the fish were holding and the thermocline temp break. So we are done swimming and I anxiously set line to where the fish are showing, and as soon as we start trolling.......the graph goes blank again? Stop the boat to swim again (hey it was hot), and hooks everywhere! What I learned from this experience is just because nothing is showing on the graph doesn't mean there aren't any fish around. Next time I am scratching my head to figure out where the fish are, I think I am just going to go for a swim. The best theory I can come up with regarding this irregularity is there was a north current rolling cold water in all night, and a SW wind blowing it back out so the fish were on the move.....too fast to show on the graph.

Tim, I am going to get you a meat-packers' tampon for your engine hood. . Finally got some browns eh?

Some ahole had the bright idea to steal my expensive Racor fuel/water separator and swap it with their used dented cheapo Thank god it fit, could have been disasterous with a gas leak!!!!! Boat is slipped in Wilson, and the filter was swapped during the spring ESLO. Who ever you are, I am sure you had water in the gas issues and did not know what else to do, but you really pulled a bonehead move!!!!! If you have a consious please bring my filter back so I can punch you in the head.

How are your rods loaded? If you have the rods in the holders towards the middle of the transom, you are pulling the weights towards each other. Sounds like you are in a cross current, however. Figure out what direction creates the most blow back and try to troll straight into the current with the cables straight back.

I catch a lot of pike locally on rattletraps. In Canada, spoons.

Because the lake is stocked, the DEC has to allow access. There is a canoe launch on the east side, otherwise, you need to get a homeowner to give you a key to the launch on the west side launch. Beware of unmarked stumps if you bring your power rig.

You want easy Tigers.....Lime lake in Machias. Bucktails are all you need.

Erie guys, what is your take on hook placement with nightcrawlers. Do I run two cheaters or one and let the end of the worm dance? I have seen worm harnesses with three hooks and end hook is placed at the tip of the nightcrawler to catch those nipping fish.....but that has to kill the action?

Sunday morning off the Catt was dead also. Flat glass calm water and full moon is NOT condusive for a good walleye bite. Good news is there is a crap load of stuff on the graph, bait/perch etc. You walleye guys need to give me some good spread ideas. Sunday I was running a 2 color core and 115' copper off the boards, a downrig on the bottom and a 40 jet down the shoot. I was not happy with the copper......seems not to undulate like the core. Should I pull the copper and go with a 6-7 color? Maybe sprinkle in some dipsys? Seemed after the full moon feed, fish were all up above 25' in the morning.

Could you have a problem with your carb?

Keep up the good work. However, I have heard the returns in the fall up north have been horrific. I am wondering if the atlantics are spawning elsewhere, waiting until they achieved larger size, or maybe the piss warm/low water fall flows have had an effect? For the millions of fish stocked, only to have a few fish return in the fall tells me you guys are missing something that is happening in the lifecycle of Lake O fish. Maybe now that those fish you stocked years ago have reached a size to make a serious run in the fall. Here to hoping PS: Can you tweak the fertilization/egg development date to push back the lifecycle of the atlantics so they don't run in September when streams are too warm?

Yes, but except you might be better off with a big jon mini disk as opposed to a heavy pulling dipsy as the high line.

A couple tips if you don't have a probe. Temps at depth can be generally figured by the temp transects page on the NOAA site. If you want to guess which way to troll, figure out by looking at the cable blow back at different directions to figure out down current direction and then troll into the current. You are more likely to catch fish with a spoon that is moving too fast instead of a dead one that is moving too slow. Usually the cables will start whinning when you start to troll into the current.

John, with that rough non-slip surface you created on the floors of your boat, you have to be carefull how much you really love your new "redhead"......might cause some unwanted abrasions and imbedded fiberglass shards

Try this one to start. Bottom rigger set on 100' with a flasher/fly set-up and a SHORT lead approx. 8' off the ball. Then stack a spoon approx. 8' above with a longer lead...say 20-50' back. Second rigger do the same with the rigger at 80' w/flasher/fly and stacked spoon above. The idea is the flasher/fly sucks them in and if they get there late the spoon will be right there bringing up the rear. Expect to get tangles when a fish hits the bottom line and just deal with it......hey you caught a fish! If you want to get crazy you can add a free-slider to the top line, giving you 6 lures in the water. You can avoid tangles if you have your rods set in holders at different angles to each other so when a fish hits the bottom line, the slack is pulled away from the stacked rod. However, a big fish will go where it wants, so tangles are often unavoidable with stackers. Two deep lines with extra rods torqued down mean more blow back, so before your trip consider the #15 lb torpedo weights sold by A-Tom-Mik. PS GET SOME DIPSIES!!!!!!!

This time of year.....step one, determine the proper depth based on water temps and where the bait is showing on the graph. The bigs will be actively feeding in/around bait during the prime feeding times at first light, last light, in the 50 degree band of water that usually coincides with where the bait is showing. Other than those prime feeding times, target the bigs in the 40 degree band of water which depending on which end of the lake you fish (east end= warmer water, west end=colder) will start around 80' down in the summer. Fishing that deep (80-130'++) usually involves flasher/flies or flasher/meat for big fish. I am talking in generalities here. Each area of the lake is different. In shore big Kings are usually DEEP near the bottom. As you head deeper out into the middle of the lake, cold water is not as far down, so you will be fishing higher.

Congrats on the great steelhead!