Downrigging?

[Full Curl]

When 'rigging for lakers, how much line do you let out before your clip? Would you shorten/ lengthen that for different lure styles? (Baitholder/ spoon)

[incept]

Well, it all depends on a few things. In a brief crash course nut shell here are a few things to think about. I am sure others will add a few more things as well. Kinda a rule of thumb in leader length involves depth and water clarity. The deeper you go the shorter the leader needed due to distance away from boat, conversely the shallower or closer to the boat the longer you need to go. Same for dirty water, if you are using a weight covered in reflectice tape as an attractor a shorter leader is required, vise versa for clear water. As for length dependant on lures, you'll get a feel for that one, what kind of action the lure has, keep in mind of what the lure does at rest, is it a floater or sinker, how close to the bottom are you, bottom type and are there lots of snags to deal with, etc.... I personally generally however never run leaders shorter than about 15 feet. 2 other things to consider, if you run a black box or positive ion control you want a shorter leader (around 15-25') or you are negating the effects of the ion control. If you are running in and out of bays and points keep the leader as short as possible, that way you can hopefully avoid hangups when cutting corners. Best of luck, feel free to ask anything else... Tight lines..

[gdbccb]

Kind of a related question:

I've always been curious about the best method to set the hook while downrigger fishing with a clip. I'll try to describe the situation without using a diagram.

Depending on the weight of the downrigger ball you're using and the trolling speed, the downrigger setup creates almost a 90 degree angle between you and the lure, i.e. the fishing line is attached via the clip to the downrigger ball, which drops almost straight down below the boat, then the leader length of fishing line trails straight back from the clip/downrigger ball.

Let's say your downrigger ball is dropped to 60 feet deep and your leader length is 20 feet. That's 80 feet of fishing line, bent at almost a 90 degree angle at the clip/downrigger ball. If I remember my grade 10 math correctly, the length of the "hypotenuse" of a triangle with 60 feet and 20 feet sides is about 63 feet. This means that when a fish bites the lure/bait and you grab the rod and pull the line free from the clip, you are creating almost 17 feet of "slack" into the line (80 feet of line is out, but the lure/bait is only 63 feet "as the crow flies" from the rod tip). Although the rod bend in a downrigger setup takes up a certain amount of it, I would think there'd still be a fair bit of slack after the rod "unbends" when you free the clip and slack is obviously not a good thing when it comes to trying to set a hook.

Clearly, it is possible to overcome this slack, otherwise you'd never catch a fish downrigger fishing, but what is the best method? Do you free the clip, then wait a second or two for the trolling speed to take up the slack, then jerk the rod? Do you reel in to take up the slack, then jerk the rod? Do nothing and wait for a further bite before jerking the rod? I'd really like to improve my "batting average" the next time I'm downrigger fishing :)

[Mike_W]

Kind of a related question:

I've always been curious about the best method to set the hook while downrigger fishing with a clip. I'll try to describe the situation without using a diagram.

Depending on the weight of the downrigger ball you're using and the trolling speed, the downrigger setup creates almost a 90 degree angle between you and the lure, i.e. the fishing line is attached via the clip to the downrigger ball, which drops almost straight down below the boat, then the leader length of fishing line trails straight back from the clip/downrigger ball.

Let's say your downrigger ball is dropped to 60 feet deep and your leader length is 20 feet. That's 80 feet of fishing line, bent at almost a 90 degree angle at the clip/downrigger ball. If I remember my grade 10 math correctly, the length of the "hypotenuse" of a triangle with 60 feet and 20 feet sides is about 63 feet. This means that when a fish bites the lure/bait and you grab the rod and pull the line free from the clip, you are creating almost 17 feet of "slack" into the line (80 feet of line is out, but the lure/bait is only 63 feet "as the crow flies" from the rod tip). Although the rod bend in a downrigger setup takes up a certain amount of it, I would think there'd still be a fair bit of slack after the rod "unbends" when you free the clip and slack is obviously not a good thing when it comes to trying to set a hook.

Clearly, it is possible to overcome this slack, otherwise you'd never catch a fish downrigger fishing, but what is the best method? Do you free the clip, then wait a second or two for the trolling speed to take up the slack, then jerk the rod? Do you reel in to take up the slack, then jerk the rod? Do nothing and wait for a further bite before jerking the rod? I'd really like to improve my "batting average" the next time I'm downrigger fishing :)

First of all there is no need to set the hook if there is a fish "bobbing" the line and the downrigger clip is still attached to your line all you need to do is free the downrigger clip with a quick pop on the rod ....the fish is already hooked up and another "hook-set" would only pull the hook from or make the hook hole larger causing the hook to slip out easier.
Once the line is freed from the downrigger clip either by you popping it off with a quick jerk or by a hard fish strike simply pull back and reel .......water isnt like air the line is under tension when in the water and when the clip releases it doesnt create a massive slack line.

Good Luck
Mike

[Mike_W]

When 'rigging for lakers, how much line do you let out before your clip? Would you shorten/ lengthen that for different lure styles? (Baitholder/ spoon)

I would run your flasher about 25 ft behind your clip .....leader length depends on the bait but somewhere between 4 and 7 feet for your bait behind the flasher.

Good luck
Mike

[Sundancefisher]

I would run a dummy flasher about 10 feet up from the ball and have the clip for your line at 5 feet. I would lengthen the leader if the surface is wavy but stay shorter if not. Most times for lakers if you are needing a down rigger...they are too deep to spook so distance from boat is irrelavent. I would say 6 feet to 12 feet is fine. Bounce/drag the ball briefly on the bottom from time to time for additional attraction if there is minimal chance of getting stuck.

IMHO

[Deer Hunter]

Clearly, it is possible to overcome this slack, otherwise you'd never catch a fish downrigger fishing, but what is the best method? Do you free the clip, then wait a second or two for the trolling speed to take up the slack, then jerk the rod? Do you reel in to take up the slack, then jerk the rod? Do nothing and wait for a further bite before jerking the rod? I'd really like to improve my "batting average" the next time I'm downrigger fishing :)

I like to use long mooching rod/reel combo's on the downrigger whenever possible. They take alot more flex and set the hook/take up slack as soon as the fish pulls off the clip. I start reeling as soon as the fish is hitting the lure, either to pull it out of the clip or to pull the fish in. I have never had alot of problems with setting a hook off of a downrigger.

[Full Curl]

Thanks guys! One more for you. What weight of cannon ball would be sufficient for a slow troll down to 80 - 100'?

[jjstar]

I have been fishing 50-100 down with around 12 feet of line from ball to hook. I use a 7.5 pound ball and a 10 pound ball both work good in my experience. The difference is maybe 5 degrees of angle when trolling at 2.5 mph for lakers at 100 feet. If you are trolling faster then a small weight will suffice. If you are fishing Cold Lake PM me I think I have the system down I stole some spring salmon techs. and seems to work pretty good