11/27 Huron trip

[slimshady]

We finished November with a bang today. 3 man limit of 5-6 pound fish
and released another 20. Husky Jerks outperformed bandits and P10’s. Anything orange was hot today. 55 back unassisted at 1.8.

I learned a few things this year. You don’t need a mono or fluro leader for trolling cranks, straight braid works just fine. We caught just as many if not more fish without the leader. I also didn’t realize you should only use a snaps for cranks, not swivel snaps. The swivel snap takes away from the action of the lure.

This is my 33rd year fishing Lake Erie and I am still learning. Thank you to everyone who shares their knowledge to make us all better fishermen and women.

Tight lines!

Jim

Thanks for the report and nice job on the fish. The main issue with running braid is that it doesn't work very well with most clips on in-line planer boards. It slides right through my off-shore clips. Not to mention that I like to grab the leader and just flip in anything under 4 lbs to keep it out of the net. If I did that with braid it would slice my hands up. It also doesn't provide the same shock absorbing characteristics that mono does. Now when I am casting or jigging, braid is the bomb. I also like it for running Dipseys. But not for trolling cranks, IMO.

As far as DDHJ's go vs Bandits, it all depends on the day. DDHJ's have a narrower bill, hence a tighter wobble. They land in between a Flicker Minnow and a Bandit. I took a grinder to some of my Bandits and made them narrower as well.

You can see the difference in the photo below. The standard one is on the left. I made some just a bit narrower, and then others even narrower yet. On Saturday, I caught fish on both, so it was hard to tell which worked better. But it does give me variations of wobble to play with along with the various patterns, etc.