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View Full Version : Trolling crankbaits / Percy Priest


JandSCattleCo
07-20-2013, 10:20 PM
Got everything together to start teaching myself to troll crankbaits for crappie. OH BOY. I have my driftmasters mounted up front so I started out with just the cranks (bandit 300s). Long lined them out the side. Nothing. I don't have line counters so I was going on a wing and a prayer to see how far back they were. Did that for some time with no success.

Then I tried the rigs for pushing them off the front. I got these from a guy off crappie.com, and I like the idea a whole lot. It's a rig with a swivel built into a 3 oz weight, with a leader going to a quick change. Hook the rig to your line, crankbaits to the quick change, and due to the weight, as long as your going where the line is at a 45 degree to the pole / water, its going to be 2/3 the distance of the line out. Other words, he's using the triangle postulate from algebra. This way to get a crank 10 ft deep, you let out 15 ft of line.

Needless to say, all I caught today was my crankbaits on each other. Any help would be appreciated!

Second part / rant. I will never, NEVER put a boat on Priest again during the daylight hours during summer. I was casting to deep structure and got hung up and it broke off. I moved my boat out of the way to 6 ft of water and floated while I retied. I can hear a boat screaming up the river towards me, motor full throttle, radio blaring, folks hooping a hollering having a good time. Well they see me and go between me and the bank! I was in 6 ft of water, so they go blowing up to me, realize its super shallow and full stop the throttle. Well low and behold its a wake boat and it threw a wake with 3 ft swells and this was the first time I've ever felt uncomfortable in my 1650 xpress. Needless to say I gave them one heck of a tongue lashing.

They didn't know a thing about where they were other than they were on the water.

At least I made it off the water before this storm hit!

aero320
07-20-2013, 10:53 PM
Welcome to JPP. Usually, those boaters will drive right next to you and wave.

What you are describing is fishing with Snap Weights. You can Google snap weights and learn more about the technique. The depth of your lure will be highly dependent on how fast the boat is moving as well as line size. With snap weights you do not need deep diving lures since the weight takes the lures down. I use a 3 oz. snap weight for striper and hybrid trolling in the summer and they work as well as downriggers. I use 1/2 oz. jig with Sassy Shad. The main line is 20 pound Power Pro with a 20 pound clear leader connected with barrel swivel. The Shakespeare 7' medium action Ugly Sticks that they sell at Walmart work real well with this line setup. I use line counter reels and let out 50 feet of line, attach the snap weight, and let out another 50 feet of line (they call this the 50/50 method). You can vary the weight to control depth as well as the length of line that is let out after the weight is attached. It is easier if you have a rod holder set up to hold the rod at a 45 degree angle to allow you to remove the weight as you are landing the fish. The boat is moving at 2.6 mph. The downside of this technique is that if you use multiple rods and get a fish on, the boat has to keep moving or the weights will take your lures down and hang them up. This is the setup I use with what I call my Great Lakes setup. Planer boards with as many as eight of these setups. Things get real busy if you hit a school. One day last summer I had a couple of guys with me and we had fish on five of the eight rods at one time!

browntrout
07-21-2013, 08:10 AM
Yep sounds like JPP. When I used to fish it I only fished it during the early spring and winter or at night. Other than that let the crazies have the lake.

Roy