Fishing Forum

Took my first full retired day Friday and headed for WB South. Got there later than I wanted, but at least didn't run into the long entrance line that TD did a couple days prior. 
Was on the water heading out of south marina about 8:30.
Fairly calm, warm, very few bugs, and the few power boats on the water were staying away and well behaved, so far. 



Last weekend I had gone to Sportsman's to replace some  lost tackle (given to the Bear River by TCM) and saw 4 new BL Rat-l-trap colors that I didn't own. So you just know they had to go in the basket. This Friday was expressly dedicated to getting those new lures wet. 

                   #4 Not used yet, not photoed
                      #3                                         #2                                           #1

  
 On the water, lines out with new lures #1 & #2 less than 30 min. Line with lure #1 bent over, line stripped out, then just went tight and I could visually confirm a walleye was "surfing"  out behind the boat.  Had just taken this screen shot at 9:04 a.m. when I had settled into the speed I wanted.  20 min. later had respectable walleye on the boat. 

             

  Way point marked that area, and did several loops and zigzags  thru it.  No more joy there. 
 Moved about 200 yards east and exactly 1 hour later, a WB cookie cutter Cat also voted for that # 1 rat-l-trap. So far no interest paid to #2. 
 
 

By 11:30 was getting quite hot, power squadron was spitting out from the marina like a pin-ball game. Called it a day, cleaned my 2 and headed home.

Those rat-l-traps don't dive very deep, how deep do you think you were fishing?  I was using small jointed shad rap, i  think running about 10 or 12 feet down.
The lure get lots of action because my boat really rocks, in the constant wave action.

(06-28-2020, 06:11 PM)doitall5000 Wrote: [ -> ]Those rat-l-traps don't dive very deep, how deep do you think you were fishing?  I was using small jointed shad rap, i  think running about 10 or 12 feet down.
The lure get lots of action because my boat really rocks, in the constant wave action.

  Rat-L-traps will go all the way to the bottom if you let them sink. They have no buoyancy at all, and no lip to drive them down when trolled. I pretty much control the depth by the speed of my boat.  From 16 years of playing with traps at WB I have been able to develop some pretty close guesswork.  I know that if I'm in 9-11 fow, and I have a 3" trap on the line, if I run at speeds from .5 to 1.8, my trap will "bounce" off the bottom in a fairly regular pattern. The faster I troll, the higher the trap rises in the water. When I see most of the fish marks on sonar in the upper 1/3 of the water depth, I speed up to 2.5 - 3.5 mph. When I see the fish marks in lower 1/3 depth, I slow down and watch my poles. When they start a regular "bounce" I know I'm hitting the bottom in a semi regular pattern. When the fish are marking all thru  the water, I randomly vary my speed, and do wide S turns. Doing wide turns while long lining causes the line on the inside of the turn to bounce the bottom, and the line on outside of the turn to speed up and climb up in the water. I also use jointed lipped cranks, diving, suspending, countdowns, plastics and swim baits. As well as very slow drag weighted San-tee rigs. They all have their own success rates like almost anything. And no one thing works 100% of the time. Especially at Willard.............   that's what keeps us all going back. 

Forgot to say, now you can live life without a job to drag on you. Congratulations on surviving work. Now you can live for the hole week..