adrenalin

I am going to try MIkes eyes flies he sent me last year for lakers, I think I may have that one.What color dodger do you run in front of it?

The white/pearl pro troll flasher.

This is one of Mikes eyeflies, #9 White Glow Eye Ghost, www.eyeflies.com it took a ton of Lakers for us last year.

In April they are on shallow water structure near baitfish and love Orange and yellow spoons. In May-June use a white Luhr Jehnsen dodger and a yellow spin and glow bouncing the bottom with a lead ball. Lakers LOVE yellow. Whether it's flies, spoons, flashers, or whatever. If you need fish and have big hooks on the bottom put some yellow on the bottom, and you will get lakers.

Adam, June is the toughest month on the lake in my opinon. Going deep is a good idea, just be careful out there, you will most likely be all alone. The other option that might work is fishing Racine, the fishing is WAY better in June there, than in Milwaukee. The other thing that helps is fishing for whats available. Some days if you want to have a decent catch and Lakers are what's biting you got to fish them or go home with 3-4 fish. Fish hard and when you find them stick with them. A double during the June Lull is worth spinning on to me.

Can't go wrong with Ande or Big game, I use them both and they are great.

Everybodies saying autopilot, but the best tournament fisherman have a guy that never leaves the wheel.

that picture of russ's boat is from Racine's small boat basin where the launch and festival grounds are. it is the southern entrance in the picture. that and the eastern section of the racine harbor were created by encircling part of the lake.

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as far as the center rigger, i can not speak for Russ, but i have had great success since switching from four down riggers to three. i actually rarely ever tangle anything because of it. i had much more tangle problems with four downriggers on my old baha.

Yep I'd never run 4 again. I never net fish in the prop wash so it's the best place for a rigger, leaving both corners open to net fish.

My buddy has the same setup and loves it also.

What size kicker did you go with? I want to get one someday, but I'm not sure what HP to get. I want to get one with a remote throttle, and have it tied into my steering somehow, Any suggestions? How does yours handle a 28' boat. Mine is set up almost the same as yours so any input would be appreciated.

We got a 15 horse 4 stroke long shaft. On a calm day it will push the boat about 6-7 mph. Never had a day where it wouldn't move us fast enough. It's mounted on a Panther bracket with power trim. We also got the TR1 Gold auto pilot and it works awesome.

I would get the kicker simply because of the saftey factor. Saftey over equipment anyday. You might not think it is neccesary but the first time you need it you will be happy you had it. I have had it get me in saftley when something happen to our main engine about 5 times over the last 15 years. If your in rough water with no power you could be in some serious trouble.

I guess I'm an odd ball I use 20# wire no backing fill the spool. Takota 600 reel and talora 7ft wire rod. I like thinner wire for getting deeper with less line out, but my wire rods double as thumper rods for lakers.

This is the biggest coho of the year at about 10 pounds.

Our biggest king was about 17 pounds, the worst year for big fish since I started fishing.

When your fishing way deep for coho you will get them on coho stuff. Flies with gold in them work well. Actually if you went way deep mid summer you will get them on that stuff too. Most of the time your flies are probably to deep for steelhead.

My wife andI went to Punta Cana for our honey moon and it was awesome. We stayed at the Excellence Resort. She wanted to go deep sea fishing but I really didn't have an interest, but we went anyways. It really sucked for us, half the people got sick and we never saw a fish. The captain just put out the baits and drove in circles for 4 hours. Even my wife thought these guys were a joke, she said to me "those hooks are so rusted even if one hits we will never catch it." We never tipped and should have asked for our money back. Like daybreak said the tip has to be earned. It should be fun even if you don't catch fish.

Wow, Wisconsin tournaments are nothing at all like this. Ams get back what they put in and pros get back theirs. That would piss me off too. Our tournaments are really fare and yet we don't have a great turnout. We have big fish payouts that sometimes pay more than the 1st place prize which is really cool to see a small boat take home a big check even if they don't fish much but get the biggest fish.

Russ when we went out with you , you had that small SD that seemed to work good.

Thats one of the things I need for this spring.

You could also try using fluorocarbon leaders on your flies. It did go to mostly a spoon bite last year . I know I dragged around some mikes eyeflies for what seemed all summer with only 2 hits . We had very good luck early in the year, april though june.

Ya Jim, that small spinnie was working good on the steelhead and I do catch a ton of cohos on them, but the 8 inch are just alot harder for me to figure out. I catch tons of fish on paddles like 10-1 to spin doctors. Just my opion but I think flourocarbon is a big waste of money and more of a gimic than anything. It catches fisherman not fish. Sure it might be harder for the fish to see but on a fly leader using 40-50 pound test it don't make sense. And the stiffer action to the fly, just shorten up the leader on your mono.

Any of you guys really got your spin doctors dialed in? I just don't have the results with them that I do with a standard paddle. I got a ton of them but just don't have the confidence to put them out all the time. Do you do anything different than with a paddle, lead lengths, speed, stretch, or whatever else you have noticed that really gets them going.

Welcome, like your choice of boats.

Jim, use power pro for your backing and you won't have to replace it. I've had it on some of our rods for about 10 years and it's still good. The problem with using mono for your lead core backing is mono breaks down when it stays wet and will only last one season. With the lead core over the mono it holds the water on the line and doesn't dry out as fast as your other mono rods do. The power pro costs more but it will even out with the amount of mono you go through. Plus you get way more backing for those slob kings that rip out 200 yards. Power pro has way less stretch also so you can keep more tension with all that line out. Remember when you came out with us this summer, those outside boards that we got most of the fish on don't need anymore stretch when they are 60 yards from the boat to start with.

Just a thought,since luhr jensen was bought by Rapala the plugs are made over seas now and the quality has changed alot. Silver horde is still made in the US and is becoming alot more popular. So hold onto those old J plugs that catch fish because the new ones aren't as good.

So if you have 4 rigger rods already and just bought 4 more rigger rods what else did you plan on using them for? The only thing you can put on a rigger setup is mono or mono and 2 color. I wouldn't use a medium action rigger rod for a braid diver rod, it would be a noodle. The only thing I would suggest is 12-15 pound for spoons.

My program for catching cohos is a little different than Josh or Jims. I fish Racine and Kenosha so this will work for you out of Winthrop. It's pretty simple and you should get your limit just about every trip. First start off in a depth you know that you aren't going to over shoot the fish and then just troll East till you got your limit. Usually I start in about 100 and then troll till I hit fish. I won't turn the boat North or South unless I get a triple or quad. I fish alot deeper than most but like to catch a mixed bag. I also don't run the 00 dodgers until I'm on a big school. Spin doctors and B&B's let you go about 2mph and cover water alot faster. I never worry about finding bait, because if I find bait I should have found the fish first. Keep in mind that if guys are catching fish in Waukegan and nobody is getting them out of Winthrop yet it's not that they aren't there yet, it's probably because people aren't fishing deep enough. I've gone out of Racine many times when nobody was getting them yet and pounded the cohos out in 200-300 feet. Another thing about fishing deep is you will catch them alot deeper also. not just on the surface. Run some standard blue dolphins on the riggers and you will get cohos, kings, and steelhead. Hope this helps, but I could probably write 5 pages about what to do.

I have 2 Vector double rod holders for sale. 3 years old and look like new. This is the best picture I could find of them. Let me know if you are interested.

Jim, let me know if you need a speed control for it I have a trollmaster for that exact motor. We were actually just talking about selling it and some other stuff from the old boat. This thing is sweet. It works as a reastat and has infinite throttle control.