EarlyRiser

My buddy called me this afternoon to see if I wanted to give it a shot once the rain slowed or stopped and I could not resist. We launched from Myers at about 4:30pm and trolled until dark. We went 3/4, landing three good fish, including a personal record rainbow. We caught a 7lb laker, a 3lb smallmouth, and a 23" 5 1/2 lb rainbow, pictured below. Unfortunately, I did not enter the tournament this weekend, after striking out big time at the two I did enter earlier this summer. Oh, well... Good luck to all of you fishing tomorrow.

Thanks, Bob. I've had success some early mornings, but never in the evening. I had only tried jigging in the evening a couple times before, so I figured that was too small a sample size to conclude that evenings aren't great for jigging. Maybe that is the case, though... I guess I will stick to trolling when I get out in the evening. Kyle

Well, a friend and I have been talking about doing more jigging, so this evening after work a group of four of us went out after work to give it a try for a few hours. The good news -- we did not get rained on; we found some fish;and we had some fun. The bad news -- we only managed 1 fish total in the three hours we fished (a healthy 24" laker). The fish were there, but the waves made it tough to maintain good bottom contact and even when we were able to dangle our jigs in front of their noses, they did not want to bite. We tried white tubes, white paddle-tails, silver jigging spoon, chartreuse and white paddle tails, white shakers, silverish tubes, bucktail jigs, etc... We marked a pretty steady supply of fish on bottom in 80-95 fow just north of AES and then we marked bait and some suspended fish out in front of AES. Surface temps were about 75 degrees.

I seem to always get the cheater tangled around the lower line when I run one. Is this just par for the course or is there some trick to avoiding it?

Nice work. I guess that type of pattern takes some time to figure out...

I use one on Cayuga and it is definitely fine there. Never tried it on a king...

I don't know if others are also experiencing it or not, but my productivity on Cayuga has been steadily declining over the last few weeks. 7/21: Saturday we started at 6am and trolled East side, West side, and down the middle between Myers and AES with fairly steady action, but not a whole lot to show for it when we wrapped-up around 3pm. We went 10/14 with 4 lakers 16-24" and a whole bunch of dink salmon 6-16". We tried riggers, divers, spoons, spinners, etc.. in colors from silver/blue to white/green to blue/green to purple and covered everything from 35' down to about 70'. We fished from 80' fow out to 380 fow and varied our speeds from 2.2 mph up to about 2.8 mph. In the end, we had the most action on our 10 color and our 8 color in the middle of the lake traveling between 2.5 and 2.8 mph, but it was definitely nothing like the size and quality of fish we had been doing back in June. The action was better than nothing, but I don't know what the deal was with all the small fish. The 24" laker was the only fish over 19". 7/23 Evening: Headed out for a few hours after work on Monday. We trolled from Myers diagonally toward Tgk and then back and forth a bit near Tgk and then back to Myers. Fished from 6pm until about 9:30pm and went 1/1 with a tiny rainbow on the 8 color leadcore and a white/green/silver spoon. It was a nice evening to be on the water, but the fishing was absolutely pathetic. There was bait up high (20-30') out over deep water, but we did not seem to find fish under it. There were some deep marks (65-90') near Tgk, but they would not go for our setup. We tried green dot/green fly spinnies, purple spoons deep, bright colors on the leadcore, glow spoons when the light faded, lots of different speeds, but to no avail. The wind had broken up all the weed mats from the weekend, so while there did not seem to be a lot of weeds, every time we checked a line it had at least a few weeds on it. I'm sure that didn't help our cause. Good news is that there were very few fleas on either trip. This is about the time that the fishing got really tough for me last year. Does it just get tough for everyone on Cayuga at this time, or have the fish just been negative recently with all the hot weather/high pressure, or is there a different approach that I should be shifting to at this time of year? Thoughts? Ideas? Advice?

Awesome. Thanks! I am going to order some while I still can. I've spooled up with some 50lb Trilene Big Game, and that keeps the fleas away really well, but that stuff is really thick for tying knots and has a lot of memory.

Does the 20lb flea flicker work even when the fleas are horrible, or do people recommend 30lb ff?

My boat is shallow like that and just about the same length. There is rarely a day on Cayuga when I would not go out, but I would not really go out on Lake Ontario unless I was staying close to shore and knew the weather was going to be calm/stable.

You've got the idea. You adjust the tension with the white end and you wrap and clip your line into the black end -- that section pulls forward to allow your line to snap in under the head of that end. The fish pulls the head of the black end out, releasing your line. It works pretty well, but I've stopped using the one I have in favor of a Chamberlain release.

Sweet. Thanks for sharing!

I considered it and decided against it thinking that the lines would get tangled too easily.

Also had rough luck today, so we didn't even weigh anything (did contribute to the cup, though). I think we learned a few things and it was nice to watch the weigh-in. Congrats to Billy V and crew. Thank you to those who organized and assisted. A bad day fishing really isn't a bad day at all!

Still available. This really can add some flexibility to your setup! You can PM me or email [email protected]

Aha! We experienced that same current last night near AES. The rigger lines crossed and I couldn't figure out why... The weeds were AWFUL last night on both sides and in the middle.

I have one used Big Jon Downrigger butterfly plate for sale. This plate mounts onto the 4"x4" base and extends back and out so that you can mount two rod holders at the rear corners of the rigger. It's rigid, unpainted aluminum and very sturdy. It is the same as the one in this link, but it is silver instead of black: http://ep.yimg.com/ca/I/yhst-1642133721 ... _222922707 (rod holders are not included) This is a great way to add some more rod holders to your spread without drilling additional holes in your boat! I use adapted versions of these with my Walker Downriggers on Gimbal mounts so that I can easily install or remove the riggers and rod holders as one unit. It makes it really convenient. $15 Pickup available in Ithaca or up at Myers Pt. I can also ship it at your cost.

Thanks for sharing.

There are a few on EBay that end later today. I have a few Walkers, so I monitor parts..

I've had good luck with a small SPRO swivel or a double uni knot.

With the lakers, I like to squeeze the belly a little bit behind the gills to get the air out and then send them deep like a torpedo (as you've described). It works almost every time. I am curious to try the sleeper hold, though. Brings back fond WWF memories. Ray, do you have to come up with a cool wrestling nickname to use when trying this move? If so, I need to start thinking about mine...

Count me in. I'll be out there at first light

Lots of helpful tips. Many thanks to you all!

Interesting. Had not thought of it from those angles. Thanks.

I'm hoping for some advice here. We lost a few nice fish (likely a couple big lakers and one very strong salmon or brown) this weekend on two of my hottest lures (a 4" purple spoon and a purple fly). Now I know that losing fish is normal, but the trouble is that my most active lures are also the only lures we lose fish on and they are just about the only ones I have with single hooks instead of treble hooks. I'm thinking of changing these up to some good strong treble hooks or maybe adding a trailing treble? Have any of you made this move, and if so, what size and brand do you recommend? Thanks. Kyle