I got a wild hair last night after working a 12 1/2 hour shift and decided to go fishing on Lake Murray. I called up two friends and we were on the water around 10pm. It took about 20 minutes to get everything rigged up before I started putting anything in the water. I was going to troll with six lines out…2 U-Rigs off the outriggers, 2 Stretch 25+'s straight out the back, and two top water lures.
I had the u-rigs and the stretch 25’s in the water and as I was going back to my tacklebox both u-rigs and one stretch hit! A triple hookup! (Actually it was a quadruple hookup because one of the u-rigs had two fish on it!!!)
They were consistantly hitting between the towers and the swim area on the lexington side of the dam. It seemed like that was the only place we actually caught any.
All in all we caught 20 fish, 7 of which were around 19-20" so we ended up with 13. We stayed out until around 4am when we just couldn’t get any more bites.
Got the deck bloody for the first time!
This is the U-Rig that seemed to work the best. All the double hookups were on that rig. $25 from Boaters World on Harbison Blvd.
Thanks yall! The fighting belt/harness was being used only because it was brand new and my first time using it. It was pretty much only put on for the pictures…but actual fish WERE being reeled in at the time.
Looks like I’m going to head out there tomorrow night around 8-9pm again and see if I can do it all over again.
Yeah, I was going to rip a little on the belt but figured let you enjoy your moment. How about some details on how your ran them. mph, depth, downriggers or leadcore.
Yeah, I was going to rip a little on the belt but figured let you enjoy your moment. How about some details on how your ran them. mph, depth, downriggers or leadcore.
MPH: anywhere between 2.5 & 3 (mostly around 2.75)
I don’t have a trolling motor so that is simply the motor in gear
Depth: not really sure. I just let the u-rigs out until the line that I could see entering the water was around 50 yards back. I had no clue of how deep they really were.
As for the Stretch 25’s, I let the line go back about 30 yards.
Downriggers: Don’t own any as of yet
Leadcore: Don’t have any of that either. I’m not 100% sure I understand everything about “leadcore”
I was just using mono on all my reels except one that was dragging a u-rig. That one had 65lb braid with a 20’ 80lb wind-on leader of mono.
Hilarious didn’t even know how deep the u-rigs were and were pulling 'em out left and right! Some people (myself) rely on detailed charts and downriggers to nail them down to the nearest couple feet without boating 20! Congrats!
I basically did the same thing he did the week before for two hours without a bite. Right place at the right time I guess. Plus a little luck never hurt anyone.
I’m thinking about opening a guide service…Clueless Striper Fishin.
I stopped by Lake World today and talked to Richard (I think that was his name…big guy/white beard) for a little bit. He said I had the best fishing report for trolling on the lake this week that he had heard of.
I’m going out again in about 2 1/2 hours to see if that luck is still with me.
If you see the only boat out there with outriggers, come by and say hello. I’ll be around the towers again
The leadcore is very simple, all it does it let you know how far deep your lines are and it sinks.
It does take some decent size reels though, I have a couple of Pflueger 50’s with levelwind and TLD 15’s that I use for leadcore.
You just use 1-2 oz bucktails, cisco kids or any lure and the leadcore will normally take it 3-4’ per color. It is commonly called poor mans downrigger.
I normally pull one line on downrigger and 2 leadcore lines(only have one downrigger and need to get another). The downriggers really work better because you can use lighter tackle and you will know exactly how deep your lures are.
I have also broke out the outriggers for leadcore and that way you can add two more lines but it can be a LOT OF WORK if you get in trees
Also do not take too much grief over the harness, I use a couple of the belts when using leadcore and it really helps. Heck some of the older guys up here on Hartwell even use electric reels for leadcore line. You can easily have out 150-200 yards which is a long hard fight with 10-15lb striper
