Fish Sniffer On Demand Digital Edition 3814 June 21- July 5 2019 | Page 12

10 HOW TO... June 21 - July 5, 2019 VOL.38 • ISS. 14 The Down Low On Downriggers < When downrigger trolling for king salmon and kokanee you can run your baits from 30 to 40 feet off your downrigger ball. When trout are the target a longer set back is advised. presents Tips, Tricks & Advice For Downrigger Trolling T he basics of downrigger trolling boat it is possible to use three or more for trout and landlocked salmon stackers on each downrigger, trolling a line off each of them. As a general rule are pretty simple and straight forward. Set up a rod with a lure, perhaps teamed the stackers should be placed no closer than 10 feet apart and the lines trolled with a dodger, spool the rig out behind off them should be no more the boat, attach your line than 25 feet long. Obviously, to a downrigger clip and stacking is most useful when lower the rig to the desired the fish are holding in deep depth. water. In the extreme you could For trout, you’ll want cover a 60-foot span of the to run your offering from water column by spreading out 50 to 200 feet behind a total of six lines using two the downrigger weight downriggers. depending on the depth you Now while you might think are fishing. The deeper you that fishing six lines is sure to fish the shorter your line result in tangles when a trout can be. or salmon strikes that is usually When kokanee and kings not the case. You see, when a are the target you can by Cal Kellogg trout grabs a lure, gets hooked shorten your lines consid- and pulls the line from its release the erably. Generally, for salmon you’ll fish tends to fall straight back initially want your offering working from 10 to because of the forward momentum of 50 feet behind the weight. the boat. Many new trollers don’t realize Provided you keep your lines short, more than one line can be trolled off a a hooked trout will quickly swing out downrigger using a method known as behind and above the other lines. The “stacking”, as in stacking multiple lines biggest drawback to using wire stackers on a single downrigger cable. is that they must be removed one at a On the other hand, some veteran time when you bring the downrigger up trollers are aware of the stacking and attached one at a time on the way approach, but don’t incorporate it into down. This can be a lot of work in situa- their repertoire because they view it as tions where you need to raise and lower complicated and fear tangled lines. With the downrigger often. a little practice stacking can be a simple For anglers that won’t be using more and efficient way to hook more fish. than two rods per downrigger there is There are a couple different a nifty device on the market that make approaches to stacking lines. One way stacking a snap. Mack’s Lure offers the is to use wire clips, known as stackers. Shuttle Hawk. It’s basically a plainer These clips are teamed with releases and board that runs up and down the down- connected to the downrigger cable at rigger cable. various points as it is lowered into the The Shuttle Hawk works like this. You water. attach your first fishing line to a clip near Most anglers fish no more than two the downrigger ball and send it down. fishing lines off a single cable, but CONTINUED ON PG 21 if you have multiple people on your FISH SNIFFER HOW – TO ^ For stacking multiple lines on a single downrigger you can utilize stacking clips like these for running lines at various depths. > For a cheater leader, small low drag lures work best. Wedding Rings like these are a great choice as are small spoons and Wiggle Hoochies. Cheaters are a great way to catch extra fish thought the season. ^ A Shuttle Hawk like this is basically a plainer that moves your downrigger release clip up and down the downrigger cable allowing you to position your bait without raising and lowering your downrigger.