Trolling with downriggers

[sherman51]

just for fun I went to canon's blowback chart and checked 100' of line out with 8, 10, and 12, weights, and the depth shown for the 8 and 10 was 100' down. the 12 was just a couple of feet deeper. but that's at 2 mph. Another example they gave was at 4 mph and the depth was only 80' down. but this is a far cry from losing 15' down 30'. just go to cannondownriggers.com and check out the blowback on the charts for yourself then you will have a better understanding of blowback. so I figure with the 10# dredge weights at 55' with a deep diving bandit my lure should be close to 60' deep at 3 mph. works for me. I figure at 2 mph you are still right on and at 4 you lose 20' at 100' then at 3 mph you should only lose 10' at 100'. but then cut that in half at 50' you should only lose 5' at 3 mph. so at 55' the weight should be at 50' then with a 30' lead off the weight I figure I'm gaining another 10' which puts my crank at 60' with fish at approximately 65' which puts my bait just above the fish and anyone that knows about walleye known they mostly feed up but not always.

sorry for both lengthy posts., but I'm just trying to help the op as much as I can. and by going to cannon he doesn't have to depend on anything I say.

[Fishing Tiger]

Hi PRD,

We are still between boats here (new one is being rigged next week hopefully), but up until a few weeks ago our downriggers have been our bread and butter accounting for most of our keepers in July and August. I am scheduled to go out and help tune some one else's riggers for them here shortly and I will post what we find.

Generally we work spoons on the riggers and put the Bandits etc. on boards. Here are our basics that have consistently produced.
We have been working the line from roughly North of the Huron dump to the weather buoy. Trolling near 3.0 MPH most days.

Suggestions: Use 8 or 10 # weights at these speeds. We use a fish Hawk to dial in exact bait speeds and depths but if you don't have one I would strongly recommend S turns to help you find the best speed. Remember speed changes if you change boat direction. Particularly if you go up or down seas.

We also oscillate our riggers until we dial in a depth range.

The small spoons were producing best but the larger ones should be coming on any time now, I just haven't been able to confirm this.
Also your choice of Chicken Wing is solid. Also try, Nascar, blue chrome and wonder bread, all have been strong producers this year depending on sun - chromes spoons with sun and copper with overcast.

I hope this helps, don't give up on those riggers!

[West Basin]

Fishing Tiger is right - use a device like the Fish Hawk - Salmon Fishing: Determine Fishing Speed and Water Temperature with Fish Hawk Electronics - and you will know almost exactly how deep your lures are running. Using a device like this is the only way to really know how deep your lures are running. If you are going to fish this way a lot, then take the time to learn how deep various lures you are using are actually running.

Fishing Tiger - how well does the Fish Hawk device work? I purchased one back in the summer but unfortunately I haven't been able to try it out yet.

[centerpoint]

Fishing Tiger is right - use a device like the Fish Hawk - Salmon Fishing: Determine Fishing Speed and Water Temperature with Fish Hawk Electronics - and you will know almost exactly how deep your lures are running. Using a device like this is the only way to really know how deep your lures are running. If you are going to fish this way a lot, then take the time to learn how deep various lures you are using are actually running.

Fishing Tiger - how well does the Fish Hawk device work? I purchased one back in the summer but unfortunately I haven't been able to try it out yet.

yes that works great but if you are on a bugget and set your graph up correct on side image your cannon ball will show up as a black line it works well for me

[sherman51]

marking a lot of fish helps to locate them but I've also had great luck when not marking a lot. but enough to keep me fishing. if you are marking fish then you have to dial in speed and depth to set your riggers. eyes feed best when going up a little to get the bait. with spoons and cranks, I've had better luck running as close to 2.8 as possible. for harnesses, I have done better at 1.6 on days. but most of the time I run a little faster at 1.8 to 2.0 when trolling the summer months.

as for depth with cranks, it's more of a guessing game. you want the lure at or just above the fish. you have to guess what depth the crank gets plus the depth of the rigger. if you're below the fish you may catch a few but you may not catch anything. I like to err on the shallow side and then drop the weights a little at a time until I find the sweet spot. but more times than not I'm usually good on depth when I start. shallow divers will dive much less than deep divers with much guesswork. in water less than 40' I don't allow for any blowback and allow for the dive of the lure. if I mark fish at 30' I set my rigger about 22; to start. this should put a shallow diver just above the fish.

[Fishing Tiger]

West Basin,

We have had zero negative issues with our Blue Tooth Fish Hawk. We get a full season out of one set of batteries (4 AA).
The best part is it integrates with our Solix and Optimas. I haven't figured out how to get it to control the Ultera yet.

I can't imagine trolling without it!

We now know depth, speed, and temp at our baits. It is amazing how far off the GPS speed can be. We use the temp feature allot in the early Spring and late Fall, can be very different than surface temp, and helps find the active from inactive fish on the graph.

[PRD]

When my FishHawk was working with an 8 lb ball at 35 ft on the rigger FH said it was about a foot higher, think I was doing 2.5 at most

Out soon to try north of Huron