Tweet
Nice job on the video. Alan certainly has good LTT (light tackle trolling skills). Two summers ago, I started trolling ultralight rods from the kayak to catch perch on days when they were not hitting casted lures. I recall a 95 deg day in August 2012 when I paddled from Jonas Green to the radio towers at the mouth of the Severn. Once I got near the towers I deployed 3 ultralight rods and one light rod with Woody’s feather spinnerbaits and beetle spins with twister tails. As I paddled back and forth along the rock riprap, I had nonstop action on large white perch. After a while I had to bring one line in because I could not keep up with the fast action from four rods at a time.
I made my first ever trip to the Susquehanna Flats in April 2012. I had no idea how to fish there. I launched from Tydings marina and paddled out the inlet channel. As soon as I got to 5 ft depth, I tossed out a 5” Storm shad and a 5” paddletail using medium spinning rods and started trolling. Within a few minutes I had a fat 20” striper on. For the next 5 hours I paddled back and forth in different depths trying to gain some intel on where the fish were. Things were easy that day because the fish were all over the place in 4 to 6 ft depth. They were not deeper than that. I caught 22 fish up to 24” by LTT that day.
Armed with that knowledge I made two trips to the Flats last year and caught zero stripers. On one trip I caught no fish at all. On the other I caught several 18” to 20” largemouths and a 30” carp on trolled Storm shads.
In May 2013, I decided to try the same light tackle trolling techniques at the mouth of the Severn. I trolled 3 or 4 medium spinning rods with Storm shads and paddletails ranging from 3” to 5” in shallow water (<10 ft depth). I found that I could catch stripers from the mid-teens to the low 20s there with some predictability. The depthfinder helped me to know where I was, but in water that shallow it was not useful for seeing fish or bait. Later that month, I discovered one special spot about ΒΌ of an acre that produced numerous low to mid 20s fish over a three week period – the largest was 27”. I had a clear landmark. I would paddle by that spot time after time and had frequent knockdowns and caught fish. The GPS was particularly helpful in letting me pass over the same spot repeatedly. At the end of each trip, my GPS screen looked like a railroad switchyard with a dozen or more overlapping lines.
I devoted many trips to trolling in the Severn in late summer through October. I would troll in mid-river parallel to the shoreline just one cast length from the shore. Typical water depths were 2 to 5 ft. I caught numerous stripers from 18” to 22” during that time and limited out on every trip during October. During the late summer, I often trolled two small spinners and two larger paddletails at the same time. 90% of the fish caught on the spinners were perch, and 90% of the fish caught on the paddletails were rockfish.
One downside to LTT from a paddle-powered kayak is that the steady paddling for 4-5 hours wreaked havoc on my old shoulder joints. This year, armed with the new pedal-power kayak, I hope to repeat last year’s trolling success.
Alan and Jeff’s video gives very clear and helpful advice on trolling two rods with swimming plugs. That method is quite successful. My approach differs from their method by trolling 4 rods most of the time and using jigheads with soft plastic paddletails of Storm shads. Hard plastic plugs work quite well, but I do not like using lures with single or multiple treble hooks. When trolling 4 rods, I try to have a rod on each side in front of me with lighter weight jigheads. I typically toss them out about a half cast to the side. I also have a rod on each side behind me. I use heavier jigheads there and toss the line out a full cast. Surprisingly, I had very few tangles, even when I stopped paddling to reel in a fish.
I also recommend using a variety of weights, colors, and lure shapes on your 4 rod spread. On some days, one of the lures clearly outcatches all the others. Once you learn that, you can put that same lure on a second or third rod. On other days, all the lures seem to catch equally well. It pays to give the fish a choice to see how they behave.
I made my first ever trip to the Susquehanna Flats in April 2012. I had no idea how to fish there. I launched from Tydings marina and paddled out the inlet channel. As soon as I got to 5 ft depth, I tossed out a 5” Storm shad and a 5” paddletail using medium spinning rods and started trolling. Within a few minutes I had a fat 20” striper on. For the next 5 hours I paddled back and forth in different depths trying to gain some intel on where the fish were. Things were easy that day because the fish were all over the place in 4 to 6 ft depth. They were not deeper than that. I caught 22 fish up to 24” by LTT that day.
Armed with that knowledge I made two trips to the Flats last year and caught zero stripers. On one trip I caught no fish at all. On the other I caught several 18” to 20” largemouths and a 30” carp on trolled Storm shads.
In May 2013, I decided to try the same light tackle trolling techniques at the mouth of the Severn. I trolled 3 or 4 medium spinning rods with Storm shads and paddletails ranging from 3” to 5” in shallow water (<10 ft depth). I found that I could catch stripers from the mid-teens to the low 20s there with some predictability. The depthfinder helped me to know where I was, but in water that shallow it was not useful for seeing fish or bait. Later that month, I discovered one special spot about ΒΌ of an acre that produced numerous low to mid 20s fish over a three week period – the largest was 27”. I had a clear landmark. I would paddle by that spot time after time and had frequent knockdowns and caught fish. The GPS was particularly helpful in letting me pass over the same spot repeatedly. At the end of each trip, my GPS screen looked like a railroad switchyard with a dozen or more overlapping lines.
I devoted many trips to trolling in the Severn in late summer through October. I would troll in mid-river parallel to the shoreline just one cast length from the shore. Typical water depths were 2 to 5 ft. I caught numerous stripers from 18” to 22” during that time and limited out on every trip during October. During the late summer, I often trolled two small spinners and two larger paddletails at the same time. 90% of the fish caught on the spinners were perch, and 90% of the fish caught on the paddletails were rockfish.
One downside to LTT from a paddle-powered kayak is that the steady paddling for 4-5 hours wreaked havoc on my old shoulder joints. This year, armed with the new pedal-power kayak, I hope to repeat last year’s trolling success.
Alan and Jeff’s video gives very clear and helpful advice on trolling two rods with swimming plugs. That method is quite successful. My approach differs from their method by trolling 4 rods most of the time and using jigheads with soft plastic paddletails of Storm shads. Hard plastic plugs work quite well, but I do not like using lures with single or multiple treble hooks. When trolling 4 rods, I try to have a rod on each side in front of me with lighter weight jigheads. I typically toss them out about a half cast to the side. I also have a rod on each side behind me. I use heavier jigheads there and toss the line out a full cast. Surprisingly, I had very few tangles, even when I stopped paddling to reel in a fish.
I also recommend using a variety of weights, colors, and lure shapes on your 4 rod spread. On some days, one of the lures clearly outcatches all the others. Once you learn that, you can put that same lure on a second or third rod. On other days, all the lures seem to catch equally well. It pays to give the fish a choice to see how they behave.
Comment