Crash and Burn
by Jason Mitchell
The bottom bouncer is an incredibly effective and versatile piece of
equipment for walleye anglers.
Over the past few years, there seems to have been an emphasis on using
the bottom bouncer as more of a rigging tool. The bottom bouncer can
become a tool for efficiently presenting a live bait snell or harness
precisely through structure. With this application, the presentation
is often fairly vertical or close to a forty five degree angle. Many
anglers who prefer to use bouncers in this method preach to never
let out too much line or let the bouncer drag. This is generally a
slow and precise method of presenting the rig through rock, following
break lines and generally staying on structure. There are plenty of
other ways to use the same bottom bouncer as this piece of wire and
lead offers a unique level of versatility.
There are a handful of days each summer while guiding where the fish
should be where they were the day before but are not. Frustrating
and mentally exhausting when everything is the same as the day before
except the fish are gone. The reality is that there are all kinds
of reasons after the fact but out on the water, there are no rules.
The fish could move anywhere for a variety of reasons. They could
be up the shoreline, deeper or shallower, off relating to some entirely
different structure. The more frustrated I get as the clock ticks,
the faster I find myself fishing. Very frustrating when you make a
handful of decisions, tried what should work and still can’t get back
on top of fish. By now, the sun is beating into my brain and my customers
start second guessing every decision I make. Unless you have some
really good info, too much running at this point can make the situation
much worst as far as trying a different part of the lake twenty miles
away. I can guarantee you that the fish that were in the area yesterday
didn’t all pack up and move that far. They usually move, but usually
you can see the part of the lake they moved to from where you found
them the day before. Sometimes, dropping water pulls fish out of the
bays and rising water pushes fish back into bays further but you can
bet that the fish are somewhere you can visually see.
I don’t know how many days
where I have been reincarnated from the whipping post by dropping
some heavy bottom bouncers down and moving quickly through areas in
an attempt to find fish. There are a couple of factors that make this
bottom bouncer dragging so effective. First, a heavy enough bottom
bouncer keeps you just off the bottom regardless of speed and easy
to adjust with fluctuating depths. A heavy bottom bouncer and harness
is much more versatile than even a crankbait behind lead core. You
can burn over the top of a five foot hump and fish all the way down
to twenty feet by making minor adjustments to your speed and amount
of line out. You can do the same with lead core but not nearly as
easy.
If you have somebody in the boat that isn’t staying on top of finding
the bottom, the bottom bouncer is much more idiot proof if you have
enough line out and going fast enough where the fish just hooks itself.
Another factor is that the mile and a half to two mile an hour speed
that you can move these bouncers through areas is a really nice speed
for logging sonar data and marking fish with your electronics. The
final selling point, speed is often an overlooked trigger. There are
so many times where we have a tendency to fish slower when we think
we have the location narrowed down. Common sense tells us that sitting
on top of fish makes more sense than moving fast and spending a portion
of our time out of the zone.
When we are fishing memories, we often have the sweet spot dialed
into our heads and we often have a tendency to fish the spot slow,
maximizing our time where we have a hook down where we think there
should be fish. Most days, this strategy makes perfect sense and the
fish make you look good. There are those days however where for whatever
reason, you can fish slow and swear there isn’t a fish within a mile.
Kick up the speed and all of a sudden the same fish that couldn’t
muster the ambition to snip at a squirming leech on a light, dainty
snell will attack a harness sped through the water.
The mistake many anglers make is not fishing heavy enough. Use a bottom
bouncer that finds the bottom. This is not finesse. Also, use a heavy
main line. Many anglers are using a heavy duty Fireline for added
sensitivity but there are also anglers that swear by <?xml:namespace
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/>Berkley 10 pound XT for this application. You want a tough and
abrasion resistant line because when you have a heavy bouncer crashing
along way back behind the boat, you will find snags and you need to
power through them. The snell needs to be heavy as well regardless
of whether you use a plain snell, spinner harness or bead. Plain snells
work well because with a heavier snell, you can kick up the speed
and not worry about your bait spinning so much that the line twists
into a mess. Many anglers are rigging half night crawlers to spin
on purpose.
Ten to fourteen pound Berkley XL is perfect. Even with the heavier
mono snells, the half crawler can still roll and spin seductively,
especially if you use the tail end of the crawler. Just adjust your
speed and adjust your crawler on the hook until you get a nice roll
through the water that really gets the soft flexible tail to flap.
This crash and burn tactic of using heavy bottom bouncers and heavy
line to find fish may seem crude to some walleye anglers but the effectiveness
can’t be denied. If the fish aren’t hooking themselves, you aren’t
going fast enough. No feeding line or dropping the rod way back, the
fish are just bang, bang and on. Dragging the wire and lead is effective
and efficient when the chips are down.
What can really be surprising about using this method is exactly where
you stumble into fish again. Sometimes, fish just end up on a part
of a flat or shoreline and there is no visible indicator that the
fish should be where they are. This aggressive use of bottom bouncers
is a great way to find these fish.
Follow the Leader
by Jason Mitchell
The idea that walleye may indeed follow a lure for a significant distance
before striking surprises many anglers. Many anglers have this mental
picture that fish just lash out and strike a lure as the lure appears,
like an ambush. While there is no doubt that plenty of ambushing is
going on under water, walleyes in particular will often follow a lure
for a surprisingly long time before striking.
There are situations where walleye have a tendency to follow or lurk
behind the lure with what seems like a nonchalant attitude where they
could just as well take the bait or leave it. We have watched schools
of fish follow a crank bait for thirty yards or more, shadowing the
bait nipping at the heals until something tweaks the restraint of
one of the fish. Usually, this trigger might be a stop or pump to
the lure to cause something irregular or perhaps the lure bounces
off a rock. Some slight trigger might be all that is needed to turn
followers into takers. This may explain some of the effectiveness
with planer boards while trolling. The board may give the lure just
a little bit more action; more starts and stops than a rod hanging
out of a rod holder. Because of this tendency for fish to snap on
something irregular like a sudden stop or stall in the bait or a change
in speed, many of the best trollers are always holding at least one
rod, giving the lure more action.
This challenge to turn followers into takers can indeed be a challenge
at any time of the year. Cold fronts or weather changes can just put
the fish into a mood where they aren’t lashing out at baits. Fishing
pressure can also crop down the intensity of a bite. From our experience
however, this following tendency is most apparent in the spring when
the water is cool and many of the fish are shallow. Anglers who can
consistently convert a high percentage of following fish into fish
that chomp are going to catch many more fish come spring.
People often assume that shallow fish are fish that are eating. Yes,
but there is much more to shallow fish than just finding something
to eat. Early in the season, these fish may get active once a day,
late afternoon or early evening after the sun warms the water a few
degrees. The bite becomes a guessing game of timing. Hit a good spot
too early and not see a fish, hit the same spot an hour later after
the water temperature jumps a few degrees and the fish are on the
bite. When the fish are really on the bite, the reality is that it
doesn’t really matter how you go about your day, you are going to
probably catch a few fish.
The key to really catching fish is figuring out ways to turn fish
when they aren’t really on. What we have found is that we can catch
many more of these turned off fish by making longer casts. Back the
boat off the spot and make longer casts. I dare say that a longer
cast catches three times as many fish as a short cast when the fish
are in a funk and aren’t snapping. What is a long cast? I would say
the distance of a basket ball court. Longer casts catch many more
fish early in the season or whenever fish are turned off and the reason
is simple. When the fish aren’t snapping at the baits, you are generally
dealing with a bunch of followers. Fish that just want to follow your
crankbait or jig. Longer casts give these fish more time to eat before
you run out of room at the boat. Often, the change of direction as
a lure begins to rise towards the rod tip is a very powerful trigger
so be ready as you finish your retrieve. A few stalls or pops as the
lure raises towards the boat often snaps the restraint of following
fish for us. So don’t reel the lure all the way to the rod tip.
To back the boat off the spot and fish the area effectively by casting,
you need to use baits that will cast well. On Devils Lake the past
few years, one of our better baits that cast well is a Salmo 8F Perch.
We have caught a lot of big walleye on this bait. Other classics include
the Countdown Rapala, Husky Jerks, Rattling Rogues, jigs with Powerbait
and swim baits. Lighter line can also aid with casting as does a longer
rod. Depending on your height and arm length, a seven or seven foot
medium light action rod is great for getting that whipping action
necessary to launch baits into the upper deck. We have designed a
couple of rods that excel for pitching crankbaits and jigs into still
water. These rods are the Jason Mitchell Elite Series JMSS70MLX and
the JMSS76MLXF. We built these rods out of a hard to find graphite
that is of superior quality which makes the rod unusually light to
hold and helps with the fatigue of fishing all day.
When walleye fishing this spring, be aware of the fact that turned
off fish don’t lash out at baits or ambush but follow and nip. When
you encounter situations that turn down active fish, back off and
be conscience of what is happening under water with how fish are attacking
your lure or bait. These slight adjustments can often help you catch
fish before or after the prime window of opportunity is over.
