Lake trout fishing

[adyy]

Hi,

Next year I want to try my hand fishing for lake trout. I have around my area a few mountain lakes populated with some trout.
Are there any of you going after this type of fishing? Is there any special technique involved? Any special lures?

Adrian

[Mattman]

Thru the ice or open water?

[adyy]

Open water, from May to September.

[Garfisher]

Through my limited experiences laker fishing, vertical jigging is a good method to catch fish (assuming you have a depth finder handy). Lipless crankbaits and soft plastic swimbaits rigged on jigheads work pretty well, I'm sure tubes and jigging spoons would work as well. Simply drop the bait down and watch it on the depthfinder looking for any fish. Be sure to cover various depths as they can be anywhere below the thermocline (if there is one). If you have a fish come up to the bait, try reeling the bait away trom the fish, if the fish is real interested it will hit. Sometimes they aren't willing to chase, so experimenting is key. You can also troll or downrig but I haven't had too much experience with it.

[adyy]

Thx Garfisher.
Is it really necessary the depth-finder?
Do you have any lippless cranckbait that you would reccomend?

[FrankW]

Hi adyy,

If your lakes have big Lake Trout the best way to catch them is deep trolling with big baits. The same size plugs that are used for Salmon and Muskie. The last picture is typical of the Lake Trout plugs but I prefer white or yellow. You can see how big the baits are in the two fish pictures. A good place to troll is over deep water humps or structure.

If you have small Lake Trout they like to cruse the shore line especially around points. You can catch them from shore with any kind of gear. I use to catch them with streamer flies on a fly rod. These fish will run 15" to a couple of pounds. If you catch one or two and the bite stops, they will swim by again as the cruse up and down the shoreline. Or another group will swim by.

Frank

[adyy]

Thx FranckW.
Impresive photos !!!

I've read a lot about trolling, but . . . I would prefer the classical spin fishing.
I've read also about jigging spoons and fluttering spoons, but still I have to experiment with them.

The lakes I intend to fish are mountain reservoir lakes. The shore has an almost 45 degree slope.
Normally when you stay on the shore, a few feet in front of you the lake is allready very deep. That kind of lake.
As I tested fishing there, a few years ago, there was no activity near the shore. Or none that I could see.

Are there any tricks regarding the water temperature/weather/time of year/time of day that could help?

[FrankW]

I don't have any information about water temps and suck in your area. My experience was in Alaska and never paid much attention to such things. If the weather was good or not raining too bad, we went fishing.

Frank

[adyy]

Ah, ok! I like that approach.

[Scott F]

Depending on water temperature, lake trout can be found in 6 feet of water or well over 100 feet. Without a depth finder, you'll spend a lot of time fishing where they ain't. Just after ice out you'll find them scattered in shallower waters. By mid summer, they will be in the deeper water. How deep does your lake get? When I fished for them in Canada, near the arctic circle, in July, the river water was still only 40 degrees and I was catching them on plastics barely under the surface. In other lakes we trolled over open water using big musky plugs on a 3 way rig with 3 or 4 ounces of weight to get the baits down to 60 or 70 feet. Guides at the lodges use portable downriggers to get dead bait down to the depths the lakers were hanging out. A depth finder is absolutely required to know where the fish are and how deep they are. I knew one guide who would put his clients on the shore with a rod and he would take their big spoons out by boat over 100 yards from shore and drop them over the side. They'd wait a couple of minutes for the baits to get down to the depth and reel them back in. You can drop spoons over the side of the boat and let them fall 50 to 80 feet and jig them but you have to be right over the fish. That's why guys troll, to cover a lot of water.

[Garfisher]

I've caught a couple on a Rattlin' Rapala, however any will likely work. Lipless Cranks work best on aggressive fish, passive fish are likely to not chase the bait and will likely just have a look at the bait.

[adyy]

Hi ScottF,

Looks like you have a lot of experience.
Ok, looks like I have to get a fishfinder.

Now, are the 100 USD one's enough for this? Or do I need to get a more expensive one?
Like these:
http://www.cabelas.com/product/Boating/ ... t104588280

http://www.cabelas.com/catalog/product. ... BIK-021610

[Scott F]

Either one of those will work. The bigger screen will give you a bit more history in case you aren't staring at the screen 100% of the time.

[dhottle]

Lakers preferred water temps are 48-52 degrees. If you find bait in that water temp you will find lakers. Tip ,lakers spawn in the fall. You will find them shallow at that time. You can also find them shallow in the spring before the water warms up substantially. As far as baits, lakers like big baits. They will hit smaller stuff if there are smaller bait in the system. They like spawning over shallow reefs & rock.
Pick up the most recent copy (winter 2013/2014 edition) of the In-Fisherman. Matt Straw has a real good article on lake trout in that issue that covers most of the better baits. I have extensively fished for them in Canada and felt that the above article was spot on. The below fish was caught on one of those baits that he refers to as "car parts".

[adyy]

Thanks dhottle.
Looks like teh article is available online: http://www.in-fisherman.com/2014/01/14/ ... t-fishing/
I've read it once yesterday while returning from the ski trip and looked like a good article.

Also it looks like that magazine (in printed format) is not available in Europe.
(I live in Eastern Europe.)