justtracytrolling

Did you look up north in town? The fish are around and active out of temp.

I do the same thing with other lures and spoons for certain situations. I use whatever I'm already trolling so the speed works. The spoon harnesses are really my favorite, but just about any lure will work if the lure works for you already. Gulp pinched crawlers on the rear treble, but not the rudder hook of the treble, gives you scent and your bait a little wounded kick. The delivery method is actually important because some lures are reaction baits, ie flatfish, some are designed for a feeding bite, ie small spoons floating rapalas and a few baits are both, ie flicker minnows. To deliver a reaction bite I like braid and a jet diver, dipsies, 3 way rigs, clip weights, or a rigger and a short setback. For a feeding lure I want a steady smooth delivery like mono or lead core and very long set backs. The precision trolling app even has recipes for reaction lead core trolling where you use a 15' thin braid leader instead of a 50+' flouro/mono leader. Ideally whatever you put your harness on to delivery them is something you normally run so getting the harness dialed in is easier because you KNOW how to troll the lure and you know it works.

Well they are biting from shore... maybe someone forgot to tell the rainbows it's too warm. Some real nice bows caught Tuesday evening.

I was trying lightly for a tiger to show you something I was sure you hadn't seen, but I definitely didn't want 4 tigers! lol. Couldn't get in there today to hunt a big girl due to a bass tournament chopper a ton of weeds and wind covered the area with mats. Did manage an exceptional 24" 8lber

I think you will get a walleye tomorrow on your rigger setup and a tiger with one of those plugs on the 5 color or the 6 color. Wish you had a map or imaging , but you can guage the troll keeping an eye on me as we are both looking for tigers and an eyes just make sure you stay a long way back if you get behind me...some of these fish I have to slow way down for extended periods of time as I get doubles and triples and you will drag gear, have a fire drill or run me over.

I know how to test it. I hear nothing but opinion and "ideas" everyday and I trust my process and until someone else can come close to my results here I only trust my process. I completely understand why you use the braid. I've used the braid before more than once, but It has never shown any immediate positive results, and I can't just run something with customers. I have to get past feasibility at a minimum for it to even get tested with customers. Constantly taking the braid off for customers is too much work. I have to at least catch a fish on it somewhat regularly on my own time first. It's actually quite simple to draw a definite conclusion, but you just need data. No matter what I will have to keep testing for the different water clarities because the light penetration goes from near 100% like Ontario in spring to dark 24/7 in summer with the algae bloom and slowly back to near 100% by winter. I would bet the steel helps during the bloom if I was the guessing type. Unlike recreational anglers I do 70-80 hours a week lines in....I will get feel for it as time goes on assuming I catch a fish tomorrow otherwise it's off till next summer minimum. Today, the braid rigger was down all by itself and never took a shot for hours while I was catching on the boards. As soon as I dropped a second rigger which I kept way above and way behind the braid rigger the braid rigger got bites. Then went back to just the braid and bites stopped. Added the steel with the identical setup and both took shots. Easily could be coincidence or an anomaly. It's up to the fish to decide not me... they will...and then I will have my answer. If anybody was catching like I am they wouldn't change anything, but they would never catch like that here without constantly evolving. My rigger program is already setup to catch the mature bigger fish. There is no quantity of better fish in the lake to catch than I'm catching now, but now I can only get those fish regularly with 1 and only 1 rigger in the water. Solo once a week I out fish the other 6 days when it comes to quality and quantity If I could put 2 in and get both going or even 3 I'd have something ridiculous. That 1 rigger averages 7-8 lb walleye and pulled almost all the 9-11 lb walleye I've caught all season on it....Over a dozen. So it has to produce tomorrow or it's done for now.

Rigger never budged till I put a second rigger down without braid. Test continues tomorrow

The deep tiger feed bite was ridiculous today. I had chowdaire out with me and wanted to show him how to target the bigger walleye specifically, and I had to move offshore dead center of the lake and abandone the bigger walleye to try to stop catching tigers and still got 1 more. We ended up with 4 over 36 and 1 for sure over 40. I handlined all four to the door and released them all without a net with no issues same as I've been doing all summer. I've definitely caught more tigers over 36" trolling deep this season than ever including when I ran a reaction program every day. Ended up getting into 1 good walleye at 8lbs, and the rest were average fish.

Im using my trolling motor to get on and off the dock. The pond has a few stumps and I don't even put my motor in the water and use my trolling motor all the way across when I'm solo. The other marina has more water but it has stumps too. I know what I can and can't do because it was lower yet in 2016 by almost a foot. Be careful...pm me when you are coming and I'll point you in the right direction for your tiger. They have been hot trolling deep since the water was still over 80. I've caught more over 40 this year than any other by far, and most of them on lead core and copper.

A lot of guys don't run riggers on eyes and I can't imagine not. Short cores with long leaders off a rigger has produced 8 of my 10 biggest eyes this year and they take no work to keep clean and running. I have noticed if I put 2 or 3 riggers down I don't get the big fish I do when I put 1 so I know the cable hum etc has a negative effect. I put braid on my center rigger for tomorrow. If it gets hot I'll do the others on the water or perhaps in the morning early.

Have you tried the riggers with braid on walleye? I've been meaning to throw some on mine to test it. I run core off em so I only need 25' of braid on each rigger to test it....might try it tomorrow

No it was stupid last night for sure! Lol

Small walleye spoons like the scorpions run very well from 1.8-2.2. You can catch a little slower or faster, but I want em at 2 ideally. 2 is also a great speed for flicker minnows, and shads, husky jerks, and honestly most hard baits. you can run crawlers mixed in at the same speed off spoon harnesses, gambler rigs, or hatchet blades on regular harnesses. A proper spread covers the bases, works together, and should tell you what they want. A clip weight 3-5' down from an inline board will tow lots of weeds. The heavier the weight the more it will tow. Fish shaped weights catch em best and I use a couple quick connect clips to hang em down to so I can tow a whole mat especially with my big boards.

The 2.5- 3mph reaction bite is very dependable there in the middle of the day when they don't wanna bite. Even works for structure fish if you can get near em. Great tip for anywhere when it's tough. Everyone has this preconceived notion walleye want it slow, but that's simply not true. I don't do it here as much these days because it's tough to land big fish when you hook em at speed especially on braid. No prob with that on Oneida though! There are some lures with lots of action at lower speeds that allow you to fish a feeding bite and or reaction bite at the same time. I do it here every day. Vibration is definitely a big key and usually I prefer a tight action that doesn't wander so you get bit if they feed also.

You can certainly catch eyes other ways than trolling, but I save that for night mostly. Although I brought a spin rod and casted before morning trips and after evening trips when I was solo several times this summer/fall and caught em both ways in the same trip. Even caught a couple on keitechs offshore in the morning when fish were pushing up bait. Had a walleye blow up boat side yesterday morning trolling and couldn't do anything about it because i had nothing rigged even if I cranked a line in...graph showed a bunch more with it and I trolled by way under em...Ive caught em casting in the middle of the lake before tho...did it one morning with a tdd11 waiting for a tow with Johnny walleye and Kevin (lyke2fish) broke down after casting all night.