hawkeye625

It's my 2nd year fishing lake ontario and can see it's going to be a life long obsession. It takes me about 5 hours to get to the lake and I fish Erie as well so I'm looking for a trailerable boat. My open bow 19 footer is on the small side and limits me to 1 to 3 foot waves, even that is BUMPY.

From what I've seen many like the Starcraft Islander. I've also seen a fair amount of Sylvan offshores and a couple of Crestliner Sabres at the lake. I'm looking for pros and cons of each or just what you guys think in general of these boats or any others of the same type.

How do these boats handle larger waves? And where is a good place to find one reasonable. Seems like the Sabres cost a bit more, any reason? I know they have the welded Hull, but are there other reasons?

Thanks

Jeff

Put a new transducer on my 520c and took it to Erie yesterday. Works like a new unit. Tracked bottom up to 37MPH. I'll keep you updated.

Jeff

I've have a Lowrance 520C since 2008 and this year it started acting up. Sometimes it'll show the bottom at 250' and then it'll lose bottom. It rarely shows fish anymore. Spoke to Lowrance support and they said it was the transducer going bad, no longer under warranty (1year). Had to buy a new transducer at $75.00 from cabelas (sales rep said that was a common issue with those units).

I'll let you know if that solved the problem (hasn't been in water since replaced). IMO a $500-$600 2 year old unit should be problem free or at least repaired by the company. My unit has always been used on Erie or Ontario and the transducer never contacted anything it shouldn't have.

I love the unit, but if a company doesn't stand behind their product my next purchase will be another brand.

We went back in 2002 and the fishing was great. Booked our charter online and it ended up being a 1/2 day party boat out of Homer. Make sure when you book that the charter is the type your looking for. The party boat wasn't our thing but it was still a good time. A smaller charter might have given us the opportunity for some other species. As for the silvers, they are loads of fun on a fly rod or spinners but if your going to fish from land on an even year (2010) your going to have a rough time getting your bait through all of the pinks. They run really thick on the even years and we caught a ton of them mostly in Soldotna on the Kenai.

If you enjoy trout fishing I would suggest a float trip on the upper Kenai River for rainbows. I believe coopers landing is the area we booked our trip with troutfitters. Excellent day trip with huge numbers of rainbows (catch and release) and even a couple of silvers. If memory serves me right August was prime time for silvers. Pixey spoons in pink and green where the best producers for silvers for us. Pegging trout beads was the ticket for rainbows, just match the size of bead to the eggs in the stream when you're there. If you want a trip away from the crowds go into Talkeetna (north of Anchorage) and book a guided trip or drop off to clear creek. Just watch out for the bears.

Make sure to budget another $300 or $400 to vacuum pack and airmail fish back, it gets expensive!

Good luck and enjoy your trip.

Came back up for the day Sunday 11th. Got a late start (left dock a 10:30). Ran a black green dot spinny w/green hammer fly on a dipsy 3 set back 150-180. Spoons on the riggers 60-80 down with cheaters and other dipsy on 3 set back 160-225. 20 or so hits 14 boated including 2 kings 20.2 and 20.14 (our best to date). 2 reel screamers on the black green dot spinny, both shook the hook. Our best fishing was in 200-330 fow.

When things slowed down we took off the spinny cause the spoons were hot. No more hits until we put another spinny out (white). They didn't want the white spinny, but it seemed to bring them into the spread. Would've never thought to try it without the excellent advice I picked up off this thread.

I have to say the addiction has started. 9 hours on the road for 8 hours of fishing? Must be crazy! Thanks again guys. Hope to be back the last weekend of July for a couple of days.

Jeff

I just wanted to thank everyone for helping out a fellow fisherman. We went out of Olcott this weekend and had a blast. Landed 74 and had many more hits/misses. Majority of fish were footballs! Spinnys were hot for us early in the AM and spoons picked up with the sun. The dreamweaver dolphin was our hot spoon, accounting for roughly 1/4 of our fish. 6 or so kings in the 17-20lb range, many coho's and steelhead 8-13 lb range, 2 atlantics (1 16lbs) and 2 browns. 90 to 330 fow 45 to 90 feet down. All the rods had their moments, but the dolphin spoon 20 ft off the ball 50-65 ft down was the hot ticket for us.

We also had 4 or 5 screamers that got the best of us. 2 break offs and 2 shook the hook, and 1 poor net job , but all took 100 to 200 feet of line on the 1st run. Great stuff.

We also limited out on fleas! If you were there, you know what I mean. What a mess those things are. Lines out more than 20 minutes were covered and jamming up the eyes of the rod when reeling up. Switched out the power pro to 30lb big game, but didn't seem to help much, I think they're even harder to remove from mono.

All in all it was the best trip we ever had. Kept a couple for the table, left most for another day. Look forward to the next trip.

Thanks again guys, this site is great!

The adapter worked like a charm. Just had to cut the linkage arm from the tiller handle and put the piece on (shrink wrap on 1 end a metal tubing on the other).

Used the control king on Erie yesterday (love it).

Thanks for the info guys, looks like I was running dipsys too shallow (150-180ft back) and wasn't running a spinny off the dipsys (thought it would drag too much and trip the diver). Usually fish the bar area or Olcott (only there once, but will be back in July).

I haven't had trouble with the dipsy program tangling, just when trying to run the planner boards. The boards seem to want to track towards my boat and are not pulling like I expected them to. Eventually, I'll probably use the in line boards and get rid of the mast (just seems like a lot less to deal with). To keep things simple I'll stick with dipsys and riggers for now.

Thanks again for the posts, I'm going to Olcott sometime in July and will have alot more confidence in my spread heading into the trip. Think I'll run 1 dipsy with a white spinny and fly, one with a mt dew spinny and green fly, and spoons off the riggers with sliders to start with. If nothing happens I'll mix it up to a spinny on 1 rigger and move a spoon to one of the divers.

Feels kinda good to have a game plan. Can't wait to put it into action!

Mounted it the same as in the picture with the directions. They are a little confusing though. Spoke with the guy from control king and he's sending me an adapter used with the model with controls. From what he said my linkage doesn't have enough play in it to allow the servo to work properly. The adapter should give the play needed. I guess its just a piece of shrink tube that fits tight on 1 side and loose on the other, allowing the servo to work while the tiller handle isn't being used.

Thanks for the post Tripleduece, I'll let you know if the adapter works.

Pretty new to lake O trolling and still trying to put a king in the net. Have riggers, dipsys and boards but new to rigging and using the boards (first 2 times with boards ended up in a mess!). Think I'm going to stick with riggers and dipsys.

We usually fish 6 rods (2 on the riggers and 4 dipsys on 2 and 3.5 sets). New to spinnys also. We've been running one on each rigger 15 foot apart in the column back 20. Stinger spoons on the dipsys with 6ft leads. Usually pick up a couple steelhead and coho, but no mature kings.

Do most of you run more than 1 spin doctor and fly in your spread or is that too much action under the surface, or do you run them off dipsys to spread them out? Seems like when we run only 1 spinny we pick up more fish but still no matures.

I've been reading alot of great posts on this site and trying to put together a game plan for my next trip up (4.5 hours from home). Thanks in advance.

Jeff

I just bought a new tohatsu 9.8 tiller and added a control king yesterday. The control king seems to function o.k., but it will only move the throttle linkage about 1/3 of the way (to setting 4). It seems the linkage is too tight for the little electric motor to move. Is this normal or am I missing something? Even tried disconnecting the tiller handle control and linking control king direct to carb (it gained a little but not full throttle).

Any suggestions welcomed.

thanks guys, still looking.

Thanks for all of your input, makes me feel a little better about my decision.

I just want to get opinions on releasing under legal size fish that are sure to die. A gill hook for example. Over the weekend we caught a couple small fish that took the stinger hard and at least one of the hooks got into the gills on most of the fish actually tearing the gill on the way to the boat. Wasn't even sure what kind of fish they were and didn't want to keep them out of the water too long to increase any chance of survival they may have. The fish looked like coho, but had a small white mouth.

I was raised to eat anything I kill/or mortally wound and it goes against the rule book to keep a fish too small by regulation. Hate to get fined for keeping and illegal fish but by the same token I really hate to release a fish sure to die. Just wondering what you guys would do?

Looking for a four stroke kicker. Long shaft with electric start and controls.

Thanks for the suggestions, just ordered a 70lb pdv2 with ipilot, i'll let you know how it works out.

Guess we weren't the only ones to get invaded by the bugs out by the red can over the weekend. My question is have any of you guys found a solution to keeping them away? Anyone tried a therma cell? My friends use them for mosquitos during archery season, just wondered if they would work on those little pesky nats..didn't think to bring one to try. Only way we could get rid of them was to go 30mph!

Looking to upgrade my old motorguide 55 and looking for advice. I have a 19.5ft sea nymph deep v and just started fishing the lower Niagra and the bar last year. Seems like a good quality trolling motor is a must.

I like Minn Kota's autopilot and ipilot features but wondered if anybody has experience with them. Also wondered what you guys think about trolling out in deep water with the ipilot with cruise control. Seems like a good concept but not sure how long batteries would last. Also wondered if a 55lb thrust is strong enough for my boat.

Don't really want to spend $1000 on a trolling motor, but if it can double as a kicker on the big water I might be able to justify the expense.

I've never used planer boards and thought they were used mainly for shallower water but have seen boats with them out in deeper water. Do you run deeper diving plugs like tail dancers on them or are shallow rapalas, etc for fish running up high, or are they mainly charters running them to get 8 or more rods in the water avoiding tangles? I have boards, but usually only have 1 or 2 guys in the boat with me and didn't know if it was worth the trouble in deeper water to run them or not.

Thanks for the reply, can't wait to get up there!

Jeff

Fished the Bar for the 1st time last May and think I might be hooked for life. Looking to come up in late April not targeting any specific species just to fish. It seems like browns will be close to shore and salmon a little deeper but is there a happy medium where a newcomer could catch multiple species? Have all the gear, but have never used boards and don't want to be into alot of boat traffic when putting them out for the 1st time. Reels are all spooled with 30lb power pro, will an 8ft lead of mono work o.k. or should I overspool with 100 ft or so of mono? Thanks for all the information. This site is awesome.

p.m. sent

A couple of you guys suggest catching your own bait (minnows). What type of net can/do you use and is it legal for shiners? I'm new to fishing the river and had to drive to gander mountain for minnows last year, would much rather buy a net and catch my own. Seemed to be alot of emeralds close to the launch.

Thanks for all your help.

Jeff

Thanks for all the input guys. I think I'll wait to see what sales come up before spring and go from there.

Hello, I'm new to lake Ontario last year and hooked for life. We fished twice on lake Ontario, once in the spring near the Niagra Bar and out of Olcott in the fall. In talking with some folks at the docks it seems a probe is a must on this lake. Just wondering what you guys use and what you would suggest. I have 2 cannon unitrols and 2 mag 10's. I really don't know much about probes and don't want to get too complicated.

I also had some trouble picking up fish on my sonar (lowrance 520) in deep water (200+ ft). Tried different settings on sensitivity but still didn't get any marks, but we were catching a few fish. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Jeff