friend called at about 6:30 and wanted to go fishing. we left the dock at 7 and were back by 9. trolled with umbrella rigs and tried to stay out of the wind. in a hour and a half we caught 11 stripers all off of the same point. now comes the bad part…no keepers. we caught 7 that were right at 20 inches and 4 more that were more like 12/13. we kept about as many as i wanted to clean. lol. we ended the night with 2 20 inchers on the same rig so that put up a perty good fight. nice peaceful evening and quite sucesful considering it was spur of the moment and no preperatio required. grab the two rods and go.
alright bye
chris
p.s. i forgot to mention where we were fishing. a point across the cove from putnums. it was about 15-20 feet deep.
USCFan55
What is your speed when you were trolling?
21 Scout
What kind of lures were you using?
21 Scout
im not sure how fast exactly. its 1.4 rpm on my boat. its slightly past the speed when you first put the boat in gear. i have a 24 foot pontoon with a 60 horse power motor. so its not very fast.
i troll with umbrella rigs. they have the 1 dollar bass spinner baits from wall mart. the blue heads with white skirts work best. i also have one with yellow heads and white/red skirts that works ok.
it just looks cool in the water with 18 spinner spoons and 9 skirted jigs. its draws some attiontion to say the least.
i just thought of a better way to tell you how deep. i stick two rods out. one back about 50-75 feet and one back about 75-100 feet. you just dont want them right next to each other cuz you do alot of fast turning when trolling shallow points. anyway, back to my origional point, one should be about 5-7 feet deep and the other about 7-10. if they are really close to the top of the water…slow down.
Hey bud when we go Friday I’m not pulling U-Rigs. I’d rather just tie a rock on the end of the line cause that amounts to the fight you get. Glad ya’ll had a good time though, and maybe I can get you turned on to using live come Friday. Anyhow take care and God Bless,
Coach B Herring
Columbia, SC
CoachB@TeamFCA.com
Is it any wonder Jesus choose Fisherman for his disciples?
yea i know that live baiting is a funner fight and more sport to it. i just use umbrellas cuz they work and they are free after the origional investment. you dont have to spend 30 bucks on herring and there is really no prep required. if a friend called at 6:30 i wouldnt be leaving the dock to go live baiting at 7 like i can with umbrellas. i didnt think we were going to mess with them at all on friday plus im really looking foward to using live bait since it has been a while since ive done that.
I tried that umbrella rig thing last week… no luck for me… what is the trick to keeping it deployed straight, when you put it in the water ?? mine has 9 weighted “storm shad” type lures onit… do I need to change to something else ?? I still like to live bait, but sometimes just need some “meat” for the freezer and grill !!
21ft Carolina Skiff w/115 Yamaha 4 stroke !!
Several things help with umbrellas.
Most people will run at least 2 (one on each side) and vary the depth/distance from boat.
I like to use big trailers on the jigs. I have several rigs with different lures. I have some with plain jigs with chart trailers, some with road runner lures, and one with storm’s shads.
Now I am no expert but this is what I do and what I am told to do. You kinda want to run the boat in “S” patterns and very the speed also. Sometimes you even want to knock it in neutral and let them sink for a few seconds and then pick back up and this will trigger a strike a lot of times as well.
Like uscfan55 stated hit the points and humps.
Also be sure you have one of the umbrella retrievers cause you gonna hang up, like I was told years ago by an old time bass fisherman “if you ain’t gettn hung up you ain’t going to catch em” (of course he worked for one of the major crank bait company’s at the time).
Also you may want to pick up Capt Mack’s video, this helped me understand how to use them.
It also works better if you have 2 people in the boat, I run them sometimes when alone and when you hang up it can be a mess.
I also agree with the live bait, I love nothing more than planer board fishing with freelines but this time of year that is not very effective. I have tried cut bait fishing but I CAN NOT STAND IT even though it is a great method I just do not like it.
Good luck with the umbrellas
1999 Sea Pro 210cc
Suzuki 225 EFI
i agree with tprice…if ya aint gettin hung up every once in a while you aint going to catch much. i used to troll them in 50 feet or deeper and didnt catch much. you just have to use big enough line to get them unhung. id suggest at least 30. i use 40 with a 15 foot 80 lb leader tied on with a bimini twist. its kind of like a wind on leader.
now to the rig… i dont recomend the storm shad. in my opinion they dont swin straight when pulled any faster that a small retrieve. if you even cast one of them out on a rod and reel it in fast, it swims crooked at spins in the water. they are good to have rigged up on a casting rod to throw at any schools, but id leave them off the umbrellas, plus 9 of those things weighs to much. so i suggest spinner baits. they are light, swin straight even at high speeds and i would bet the fish can see them from futher away. 18 spoons (buy the double spinners) flickering in the water looks perty cool. you can go to walmart and buy the ones they have for 1$ apiece. that only 9 bucks for all of them plus 4 bucks for the umbrella (boaters world) so $13 for the whole rig aint bad. id also suggest you put some type of soft plastic worm/tail on each of them. they have packs of 6 split tail soft plastics for like 1$ at walmart. they are down and left if you are standing in the aisle at walmart looking at all of those 1$ spinner baits they have hung up at the top of that wall. id also suggest buying the blue head /white skirt spinnerbaits.
how to rig them…i just attached 7 of them right to the umbrella wire itself. no leader required. i stick the middle one back about 1 to 1 1/2 feet (***i used to have it back about 5 feet thinking the big lazy ones would hit the one far back from the school, but i never caught anything on it. i wouldnt suggest putting it any futher than 2 feet. but just my opionion.) and i stick one on the wing back about a foot also. i tie those 2 on with 25 pould flurocarbon. you might want to tie a swivel in there somewhere. i stuck trailor h
I’ll call you later Chris to set up our trip tom. morning. I want to leave out about 5am from Jakes. You can meet me there at 5am or at the Dam at about 5:15am. Anyhow I’ll get with you later. God Bless,
Coach B Herring
Columbia, SC
CoachB@TeamFCA.com
Is it any wonder Jesus choose Fisherman for his disciples?
Coach, you will get all the fight you want with a fish of good size when caught using u-rigs. Drags have to be set light enough that hooks will not be straightened and that can make it rather sporty with anything over 10 lbs. Anything over 20 lbs and you have to be especially careful. In the fall of 2000, a friend in my boat had a striper on for 28 minutes before the hook straightened. We followed the fish for over 1/2 mile and were nearly spooled three times. He got impatient or I believe we would have landed that fish. That “rock” gave him all the fight he wanted.
Good luck with your live/dead bait fishing.
Whaler, what size rod/reel you using for the u-brella. I, too, like to live bait, but, unbrella sounds like a great alternative. I usually fish with a 7’ med/heavy rod and a 6500 ambassadeur rigged with 25# test. Is that too light? Hope to be on the water soon. Thanks. Good luck.
Calm seas do not make a good mariner—Anonymous
I use Penn 320 & 310 GTI’s for umbrella rigs and a stiff eagle claw rod or ugly stick. I rig my reels with 50lb Power Pro line and a 40lb mono leader.
I also set my drags loose and turn the clickers on so if I get hung up I can reel in the other rods and then go back and retrive my rig.
Also do not be afraid to loose you rigs, I know it hurts but you can save some money but making you own like USCfan stated(can not believe I am agreeing with a Gamecock(ha ha)).
1999 Sea Pro 210cc
Suzuki 225 EFI
i agree that you cant be afraid to hang them up, but i feel you should be able to get almost all undone.
1st
get right over the hang up and pull up as hard as the line will allow. with GOOD KNOTS and 30lb or bigger line they usually come undone
2nd
drive the boat in small circles around the hang up keeping presure on the line.
3rd
whip out the anchor and drop it right on top of the rig (it shouldnt be any deep than 15-20 feet if you got it hung up) and dance the anchor around the rig until you snag it then wrench it out a there.
a few straightened hooks are better than no rig.
some tips
use a 15 foot 80lb wind on leader tied with a bimini twist and then you can get right over the snag and grab the 80lb line an wrenvh it out that way.
also to avoid geeting snaged in the first place, if you go over a sudden shallow spot (like 6 feet) than quickly tightened the drags and gun it and the rigs should come right to the top of the water before they get to the shallow spot.
ive never lost a rig and my thinking is that it cant be a terrible trip as long as ya come back with what ya left with. one lost 15$ rig can put a damper on the whole trip.
Smoakin, I was not ignoring your question - I was out of town and away from my computer.
I started out using elcheapo Shakespeare combos from BW, just to see if I liked trolling u-rigs. After a few months, the reels were completely worn out. Now, I use Penn 320’s on Penn medium heavy power sticks. Not the power sticks that come on combos at BW, they are too stiff. The reels are spooled with 50# to aid in the retrieval of u-rigs from brush piles, stumps, etc. I have gone a year without loosing a rig, but I have also lost as many as 3 in one afternoon. Even though I use 50# line, I am very careful about the drag settings because of the possibility of straightening hooks when fighting large fish.
Tight lines.