Willard Tubing Trifecta 6-8-23 (With Video)

[TubeDude]

My Garmin was full of fish on the west dike. Did you have lots of fish where you fished.  I'm wondering where we're all the fish hiding two weeks ago. I have some new trolling gear made from some old flat fish with a 5 inch line and worm I want to try,  much like your new hybrid rigs. May go back soon again.

Actually, I was seeing very few fish...only one here and there.  But most of the fish I caught did not show up first on the sonar screen.  Even with the quiet of the float tube I think fish move off when I go over...just as they do with boats.  But they can be attracted back to the lures.  However, the one walleye I caught came from almost right below my tube on a deep diver crank that I had just dropped down.  As we have discussed before, Willard is a big lake...with even more water this year.  You can hide a lot of fish in small areas and if you don't find those areas you don't find fish. 

About the "hybrid" lures.  I have been making several different kinds but still have to test a lot of them.  However, the principle of modifying one lure with another...or by adding bait hooks...is a proven principle.  Anyone who fishes flashers and squids for kokanee is using a form of hybrid lure.  And many anglers fish tandem rigs...with two lures the same or different.  Sometimes multiples attract more attention.  There is actually a couple of videos on YouTube showing how to rig and fish flatfish with crawler rigs for walleye.  Here are pics of some of the hybrid lures I have been making.  In my experiments so far I have found that putting the crawler rig on the rear of the lure kills the action.  But rigging on the middle of the body has little effect on the action.  So if your flatfish or other lure has a lot of wiggle it will continue to do so even while trailing a worm behind.