Downriggers??

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steelie

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Great site Wayne. Thanks again for all the info, reports and responses to my previous questions! I've got more though...
Coming next week, I believe our plan is to head north, leaving from Bullfrog. I've loaded up with all the suggested lures, plastics, etc...suggested on the site here. Sounds like fishing still slow :(
COME ON HEAT!! GO AWAY ALREADY!!

Do you all think I should bring the downriggers? I really don't enjoy trolling like I do casting to be honest. But if I'm gonna have to do it, I don't want to do it half way.
The family is not going to like tripping over a couple of huge downriggers all week if I just stash them on the houseboat...but I'm not going to like a week of slow fishing watching the graph with fish just out of reach either.....

Should I bring them, or leave them home?
 
steelie said:
Great site Wayne. Thanks again for all the info, reports and responses to my previous questions! I've got more though...
Coming next week, I believe our plan is to head north, leaving from Bullfrog. I've loaded up with all the suggested lures, plastics, etc...suggested on the site here. Sounds like fishing still slow :(
COME ON HEAT!! GO AWAY ALREADY!!

Do you all think I should bring the downriggers? I really don't enjoy trolling like I do casting to be honest. But if I'm gonna have to do it, I don't want to do it half way.
The family is not going to like tripping over a couple of huge downriggers all week if I just stash them on the houseboat...but I'm not going to like a week of slow fishing watching the graph with fish just out of reach either.....

Should I bring them, or leave them home?
Click to expand...

I don't use down riggers because I have my own trolling technique. Sometimes down riggers out fish me but this week may be different. I know how the fish in the southern lake are doing but I have not been to Bullfrog recently so they may be responding differently. Good Hope may be completely different.

Based on my Southern lake knowledge I would head out at first light scanning for surface disturbances - no matter how small. When a few fish are seen rising, get to them quickly and throw topwater lures to the splashes. After they go down, then troll in the boil area and watch for them to come up again. We are trolling at 12-15 feet with diving lures. No need to go down to 30 feet or deeper. The active fish in the area respond to that approach. When they come up again, quickly retrieve the trolled lures and go back to surface lures. They normally come up about 3 times and we troll twice in the area then we move on looking for the next "small" boil. Then we repeat the process. We catch as many or more fish on the surface than trolling. Our targeted fish are just resting and cooling off before coming back on top.

Now will the fish at Bullfrog respond the same way? If they are holding at 30 feet or deeper then you may need a down rigger. I attack these deeper fish with jigging spoons. Hover over the school seen on the graph and then drop spoons right into the school.

So you will have to decide. Chase the boils and troll shallow and then go deep with spoons, or if a downrigger is a better fit for how you like to fish then bring it along.

My mini-down rigger is a Lucky Craft XD Pointer (large size) in Ghost or Chartreuse shad color.
 
I have fished a couple of times with downriggers in the fall at Powell in the bullfrog area with mixed results. We have done quite well certain years and terrible other years. I would bring them and use to locate willing fish - then go to spoons.

We use Kastmasters at ~3.5mph at 25-35 ft deep. At that pace, its hard for your downrigger weights - you've got a lot of blow back. It's also a lot in the way setup as I'm sure you know. I can say that the only time to use downriggers is during the shad abundant times of the fall in my view. So if not now, when?
 
I tried them once with a deep diving crank bait and it tripped the diver and let it roll up, may not have rigged it properly but gave up on them them as I didn't have confidence in them.
 
I'm with Wayne on this as far as the down riggers. We use flicker shads and flicker minnows. The larger size ( I think its a 9 or 11) is rated to troll at 19 to 22'. They are relatively inexpensive around $6 each. I prefer the pearl or shad colored ones. Pulling these at around 3 MPH with 150 feet of line out we will bounce of the bottom in 25' of water. I don't often troll for stripers, but when I do it's not any problem catching them if you can spot them on the graph. I use snap swivels on my trolled lures helps their action, plus if them come up on top and boil for a while you can swap lures in about 15 seconds.
 
I had my downriggers on the boat with me. I leave them stowed for two reasons. One is the work to set them up and watch them as I’m usually the only one fishing. The other reason is you never know when the bottom is going to come up at Lake Powell and eat the weights. I’ve had over thirty years of success catching stripers at Powell trolling Shad Raps while watching out for boils. Then the Raps come in and the kastmasters go down, and the fight is on.
 
Goldie has offered multiple times to buy down riggers for our boat. I also go solo most of the time and I find it hard enough to troll solo yet have to deal with down riggers on top of that. I’ll catch less fish and I’m OK with that. I’m still on the lake 6 to 8 times a year. Sq
 
We don't take our DR's to LP either. Snaps weights work well on cranks if you need a little extra depth, you can typically get down another 30-35% of their rated depth with a 2 oz snap weight. The Precision Trolling App is a great tool. The guy tests hundreds of cranks at different speeds with different lines, setbacks etc. using a scuba diver with a measuring tape to get accurate dive curves. You can purchase the entire library or individual crank baits.
 
Thanks guys. I think I’m gonna take them....unlikely to use I guess, but it’s a 7 hr drive for me...I’d hate to end up going that far and still being 10’ too far away from the fish.
 
What i do us bring a couple of leadcore rigs. Leadcore is spectra line wrapped around lead to get your offerings/lures down deep.

If i have trouble marking or finding active striper this technique always seems to work.

It is used here where i fish in Southern Californias highly pressurized striper lakes and catches when nothing else will.

Using 3-4 colors or deeper with a 3-4 ft leader of mono (flouro is too stiff) run a white shad sized streamer like fly. While trolling you “strip” fly back and forth with your hands. What this does is make the fly dance in water like a lost shad and it gets bit like nothing else.

Once bit other anglers on boat should immediately drop either spoons (i prefer flefly’s in 1-2 ounces) or tube baits such as redrum or ultra light brands in white shad colors with 3/8 to 5/8 weights to sink quickly down to striper school.

This “system” if you want to call it that has worked incredibly well when other anglers struggle.

Of course i always have a topwater lure tied on at all times, just in case.
 
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