jonboat

I have manual riggers... we'll only bring a rigger up if that's where the bite came from, and only if I'm not running a stacker. If it's a dipsey fish or one off a stacked rigger, the riggers stay down and we'll work around them to net the fish. For spring browns, I run everything off the big boards (the riggers stay home). With everything way off to the sides, no need to bring anything in.

I regularly do my salmon (and browns) up as "indian candy". It is a favorite snack in my house. Done right, it's not quite jerky dry, but a lot firmer than normal smoked salmon. What MuskyBob posted is very close to my recipe, which I'll share... Brine: 1 gal Water 1/2 cup canning/pickling/kosher salt (pick one, as long as its not iodized) 1 cup dark brown sugar halve or double depending on how much salmon you have to brine. Use a non-reactive container to brine. I use a canning pot (porcelin coated) for small batches or a cooler for large batch For the cooler, you have to keep some ice in it to keep at safe food temps, for the canning pot, it goes in the garage fridge. Pull the pin bones, then cut fillets into ~1 inch wide strips Brine for 24 hours Rinse and pat dry with paper towels Allow to air dry for 1-2 hours, until pelicle forms About midway through drying, start getting the smoker ready Smoke at "IDEAL" (I have the Brinkman bullet smoker too) for 3 hours with apple or cherry wood At 3 hours, baste with real maple syrup smoke for one more hour and done *variation: sprinkle with brown sugar before placing in the smoker Here's what I end up with:

I use drift socks, but dragging a 5 gallon bucket on the end of a rope will slow you down a bunch on the cheap. If it's not windy enough to drive you off the lake and you can slow your drift, you can probably continue to jig. You might want to take a page out of the walleye playbook, and you touched on it mentioning a sppon downwind. Use a jig (heavy, of course) and cast down-wind and let it sink. work it on the bottom until it's almost under you then reel up and repeat. This will keep your jig in a small area along the bottom, almos like stationary jigging.

Great stuff John - thanks!

Even with the small ones, I can get them through the guides, but they don't make it through my levelwind That's why I stopped using leaders longer than 9'-10' overall length.

Thanks guys! I'm thinking that yesterday would have been a good day to keep the copper in the boat... don't see too many boards track well in 4 footers

A quick question just out of curiosity... all of the posts and the photos/videos basically describe the same knot - a doubled line overhand knot that creates a loop. All of the posts have feeding the loop through the swivel, then the swivel through the loop before tying the overhand knot. I've used various loop knots to attach terminal tackle for years with monofilament line, always tying the loop knot (surgeons knot, perfection loop, or dropper loop) first, then running it through the tackle eye, then the tackle through the loop, creating the double half-hitch that actually holds the terminal tackle. So what I'm wondering is why can't the overhand knot be tied first? is it simply a preference thing, or does it really make a difference when working with wire as opposed to mono? I could see it becoming more of a factor if tying on something big that would require a huge loop, but swivels, with or without snaps, are small enough that loop size can be small to begin with. Is there something about wire that makes the order more important?

What is a church board? Is it just a brand of in-line planer, a big-board (like my OtterBoats), or something else. Just not a term I'm familiear with. But using a planer board to get it away from the rest of the spread makes sense. I've used inline planers with lead core before. Seems like a similar setup. Still wondering if people have problems with copper down the chute on calm(er) water. A 19' boat on 4+ foot rollers does a lot of bouncing and the speed fluctuates a bunch too. Copper is new for me. First time was Monday on an angry lake. I like the idea of letting it out on a light drag down through the prop wash while setting up the rest of my spread, but if it means spending all that time fixing tangles, I won't be trying that again.

no... I keep my leaders to 9-10 feet long so that I don't need to reel them past the tip and can still land a fish. I don't think I'd use barrel swivels for reeling in to my guides. I'd go with a high quality, smaller ball-bearing swivel instead. or go with a wind-on swivel like this http://www.basspro.com/Offshore-Angler-WindOn-Swivel/product/22764/

I use 3's for most everything to do with my trolling gear. Never had any problems. you want your swivels to be big enough that they can handle the kind of fish you are targeting.

Big consideration is length of your boat. That determines most of the minimum requirements. For the most part, the requirements are the same across NYS. Here's a brochure from the USCG: http://www.uscgboating.org/assets/1/workflow_staging/Publications/420.PDF and here is a "virtual safety inspection" you can answer questions and find out if you're in compliance. http://vdept.cgaux.org/vve/launch.htm

Maybe it was just because of the four foot rollers yesterday, but we were running meat rigs off the riggers down 80', had starboard dipsy out 180 and the port dipsy out 200, and a 300 copper down the chute. When we first set up, the rigger releases were too light, both popped on their own ase we were bouncing along (19' boat). I reeled one in, then started reeling the other in and brought in our copper with it After a half hour of untangling, finally put everything back in the water and a little while later noticed that the copper rod was pulling like a diver... found out that was because it was pulling the port side diver :( So the question here is this: How do you keep a 300 copper from getting hung up in the rest of your spread? Is this a normal problem, or was it more of a problen that comes along with rough water? I'm hoping the rough water is the culprit and the lesson learned is to not bother with copper when it's rough out.

Ditto on the south shore launch in Bridgeport area (DEC launch). More 'eyes from there and East than you'll find to the west. tight lines!

anything going on along the Seneca closer to home?

I fished in the inaugural Oneida Lake Team Walleye Trail tourney last year and had a blast. This year they are doing two dates, and will be a qualifier for the Cabala's NTC (not sure what it is, but sounds like it's a big national walleye deal). Both tourneys will run out of Oneida Shores Park (Onondaga County). There is camping available at the park for folks that will be travelling. Dates are June 9th and July 14th, with Rules meetings the evening before the tourney dates - last year they held the meetings at Gander Mountain. Lots of sponsors this year, some of which Lou members will recognize, including Pro-Troll, Michigan Stinger, ReefRunner, Off Shore, and Northland. They have prizes for total 5 fish weight, big fish and gave away a ton of door prizes, along with a nice cookout along with the weigh-ins. I'm not a tournament fisherman, in fact that was my first, but I felt welcome and had a great time even though I didn't win anything. If you like fishing for walleyes on Oneida lake and want a good excuse to spend an extra day on the water with the potential to bring home some cash or nice door prizes, heat over to http://www.oneidawalleyes.com and get a registration form. 53 boats/teams entered last year's tourney, let's keep this thing going strong and see how many we can get this year.

Oneida Lake Team Walleye Trail will be running two tourneys this year, and will be a Cabela's NTC Qualifier. OLTWT Dates: June 9th, 2013 and July 14, 2013. Tourney will be run out of Oneida Shores Park. Details, rules, registration forms, etc can be found at http://www.oneidawalleyes.com I'm in for th 6/9 date with my neighbor as my team mate. Hope to see some other LOU regulars there too! Fished it last year, and they did a great job putting on a classy tournament with 53 teams competing (I didn't place, but had a great time)

Quick answers.... I use ground and a shooter as well. For seasoning, I use a mish--mosh of stuff, but always use Tender-Quick per the directions instead of salt. For dehydrating, I have one of those round ones from BPS, it does the job in about 8-10 hours. I take all the jerky when it's done, put it on a cookie sheed and stick it in a pre-heated oven (300 deg) for 10 minutes to make sure there is no bacteria alive on it. Between this step and the tender-quick, the stuff will keep for a long time - but I don't know how long because every batch I make is gone within a week.

Brinkmann Smoke-n-Grill at home depot... $40 materials to modify it to work better... $10 Salt, Brown Sugar (for brine)... $5 Lump charcoal... $8 Applewood chips/chunks... $5 Ability to smoke all the salmon you can catch..... Priceless! I did a batch last week, and have another batch thawing in the fridge right now for this weekend!!!! YUM!

91 Octane without Ethanol at several "FastTrack" gas stations. I fill up at the one at Great Northern Mall area when heading to Oneida Lake