FIshing around Schuyler/Willsboro and a mystery

[Vtfishinglady]

Hi all, been a while since I last posted... we've been fishing pretty successfully the last couple of years on the main lake, using our cruiser and dipsy divers and catching a fair share of lake trout and the occasional salmon. But our season always seemed to end in August as the fish went deeper and our divers wouldn't go deep enough (or we didn't know where to look). And given the out-drive boat, we had to take out early October and miss the Salmon coming to the surface waters as well as the early spring runs. This year we decided to get a fishing boat with outboards and extend our season as well as install downriggers.
Our experience has been pretty bad with the downriggers. In fact, for the first time with this boat we've put in dipsy divers as well as the down riggers this past weekend and had good luck with the dipsy divers again (several small salmon and a bunch of 5 pound lakers. We're using 10 pound finned Cannon balls and trailing either dodger or flasher, then snubber and our typical lures (that we're catching with on the dipsy divers. We're using Chamberlain releases set really light for bait setting. We're running the flasher or dodger around 15-20' behind the balls and the spoon 3-4' behind that. We've tried going <2mph as well as 2.5mph. Seems we had more general luck on the dipsy's at 2.5mph.

In any case, here is my report. This past Saturday and Sunday, while cruising around Schuyler reef and the shores south of Willsboro bay. Not very early (10am on) and catching several small Salmon (15") at around 70' and Lakers (70-80') in the 5 pound range. We caught everything on split copper/bright orange spoons. We tried many other colors, but nothing else hit. We caught them all on Magnum dipsy divers while our downriggers, at the same depth, same colors, remained totally silent.

Any thoughts? I'm sure we're doing something wrong.

[Sleepswithdafishes]

Hi Maybe try bringing your lure closer if using dodgers. The purpose of the dodger is to give your lure movement. In my experience 12 to 16 inches works much better!! Sleeps

[jim]

I was just north of Schuyler island off of Port Ken point and north a bit. I've been running vertical flashers and the small spoon back 4-10 feet with some luck on other days but, the morning was slow so i started to experiment. I removed the vertical Green flashers and placed the small spoon 30-40 feet back on one down rigger(no flasher no dodger). Within 5 min i had a small keeper salmon. I removed the flashers on the other side and put the lure back 25.
My target was 63 feet i dropped one rigger down to 68' feet with a 10lb ball 100-130FOW this should place it at about 63 feet going 2.5mph(Line angle a bit less than 20 deg) and the second just above it at 63 feet(just above target temp) I started to pick up shakers on both down riggers. (No cheaters and only one line each rigger since i was solo)

Orange/Green copper or all bright orange and copper seem to be hot.
The thermocline in that area seems to be at around 63 feet for 55 deg. Likely changes a bit but I don't have a continuous prob on the down rigger. I tried to pick up speed to 3mph to see if that helped target the larger fish but ended up with a bunch of releases and no fish.

[Vtfishinglady]

Thanks Sleepswithdafishes and Jim, We'll give your suggestions a try next weekend.

[Lavman]

This is very relevant thread for me as well. We washed lures for several hours Sunday morning with no luck at all. We run two manual downriggers and two slide diver lite bites. For the first time I tried stacking two more lures on the main line of one downrigger and tried attaching a set of spoons to the back of the ball on the other with the release attached to the trail end of the spoons, clipped the lure back about 3 feet from the spoons.

I think my problem is that we were trolling over 250 to 300 feet of water marking fish down at 125 to 140 and only have 100' of rigger cable on each rigger and the slide divers - I had 250 of line out trying to get them down as deep as I could. I think I need to target shallower waters!

Good luck fishing lady, I am with you on the experimenting trying to get some action going. I am very eager to get a fighting fish on the rod and put it in the hands of my Dad, wife and children. They have been very patient with me while I try different things off the back of the boat to get these fish - the fish that the fish finder shows are down there - to bite! LOL!

[Vtfishinglady]

This is very relevant thread for me as well. We washed lures for several hours Sunday morning with no luck at all. We run two manual downriggers and two slide diver lite bites. For the first time I tried stacking two more lures on the main line of one downrigger and tried attaching a set of spoons to the back of the ball on the other with the release attached to the trail end of the spoons, clipped the lure back about 3 feet from the spoons.

I think my problem is that we were trolling over 250 to 300 feet of water marking fish down at 125 to 140 and only have 100' of rigger cable on each rigger and the slide divers - I had 250 of line out trying to get them down as deep as I could. I think I need to target shallower waters!

Hi Lavman,
We see lots of marks down deep too, but no takers. We've not fished in 250 feet of water (trying to stay 90-180') on humps and steep banks and never really having the ball down lower than 125' on any structure. I have read many posts of people bouncing the balls off the bottom. We've tried that too (again no deeper than 120' or so. The only thing we did there was destroy a downrigger clutch after getting hung up (new one on the way). I was wondering if the deep fish are more dormant and come shallower to feed. But as a beginner with downriggers I'm hoping some of our more experienced players will respond to your thread. We'll continue to use our divers in parallel so we can experience some fishing while learning the downriggers.

Terri

[Tire Jockey]

I never use flashers or dodgers. 25 to 35off the release been running between 60 and 80 down and also running #30 jet divers 125 back. We boated over a dozen small salmon a few bass got 4 white fish that were huge and yellow perch and a small laker. This was on Sunday. Was done by noon or so.

Best results were in 200 FOW or less.
Hope this helps you guys out.

[Lavman]

Thanks Wayne, we are headed back to Converse this Saturday to try again. Also, my Dad is going to pick up some heavy spoons to try jigging lakers with. Should be fun, I will try your tactics, thanks for the 411!

Stick baits or spoons? Both?

According to my GPS I am running between 2.6 and 2.9 mph. Is this good?

[Tire Jockey]

Thanks Wayne, we are headed back to Converse this Saturday to try again. Also, my Dad is going to pick up some heavy spoons to try jigging lakers with. Should be fun, I will try your tactics, thanks for the 411!

Stick baits or spoons? Both?

According to my GPS I am running between 2.6 and 2.9 mph. Is this good?

I've just been running spoons. But I'm sure stick baits will work also, mix it up a little and see what works best for ya.

I run between 1.9 and 2.3, always had good luck around those speeds. I've always thought anything over 2.5 is too fast for me, although i know a lot of guys do run faster with good luck also.

Fish on!

[Lavman]

Great, thanks Wayne, good stuff. We'll give em hell Saturday

[Tire Jockey]

Good luck to ya!

[Lavman]

VTFishinglady: I hope this dialogue proves useful to your initial post, did not mean to run off with your thread. Seems like there is some new things you (and I will try too) can try and maybe have some luck with those new riggers.

[Vtfishinglady]

Thanks Lavman and Wayne, we're going to nix the flashers for now.. and move the lures a little farther back of the balls and see what happens.

Thanks again,
Terri

[fishingmachine]

get rid of all the bling,flashers,dodgers an stuff,just run spoons of the same size and action 50 to 100 feet behind the balls.set speed by watching the spoons behind the boat,when they go back and forth with an occasional flip.you have got it right. run this same speed down deep,,,,this is why you need a fish hawk,of course,this is only my opinion

[Reelax]

get rid of all the bling,flashers,dodgers an stuff,just run spoons of the same size and action 50 to 100 feet behind the balls.set speed by watching the spoons behind the boat,when they go back and forth with an occasional flip.you have got it right. run this same speed down deep,,,,this is why you need a fish hawk,of course,this is only my opinion

I agree 100%. yesterday I had 5 fish aboard before Raz had his 1st. I started with no bling and Raz had blue blades and a doger on his slide Diver. Once he went with no flash he started picking up fish... Bling has it's time. Just not yesterday.