* Night Trolling for Walleye

image from : tipsonfishing.com

Night Trolling for Walleye
By Tim Allard

The green, red and white navigation lights from other boats slowly glided through the darkness, setting the ambiance for another night fishing adventure. Within a few minutes of starting a trolling run, I connected with a fierce and feisty walleye that hammered my shallow-running minnow bait. Through the flashlight beam
the fish became visible. Once boat side it was netted and quickly released. I returned my bait to the water, gazed up at the stars and breathed the cool, evening air - Ah, the joys of night trolling for walleye. If you've yet to get hooked on night fishing for walleye you're missing out. Walleye anglers can have all the latest bells and whistles in tackle or know
the latest techniques, but the basic fact remains that walleye are low-light feeders. They become active at dark and fishing for them when the sun's down puts the odds in your favour.

Trolling Locations Areas to cover when trolling during the night for walleye include breaklines, points, sandbars, and shoals next to deep water where walleye can easily move into shallow water to feed. Cover is also critical to your
search. Walleye will often favour areas with weeds or rocks as cover attracts prey but also aids these predators when ambushing forage. It's best to fish a variety of structures until you locate walleye, keeping in mind that fish will roam various depths ranging anywhere from two to 20 feet of water.

Trolling Techniques

It's tough to beat the silent hum of a trolling motor or a paddled canoe to avoid spooking walleye, but long-lining with gas motors is also an effective method. S-turns are a good pattern to follow when trolling. Refrain from using rod holders. They work well in the day, but at night you won't feel (or see) a fish hit or be able to monitor the action of your bait if you're not holding the rod. GPS units are an excellent addition to your boat when trolling as they allow you to navigate at night as well as return to productive areas by storing waypoints instead of relying on landmarks as reference in the dark.

Keep it Simple

When fishing at night keep things simple and organized. Don't bring too many rods or try to fish with more than two anglers. Keep gear (like nets, pliers, and flashlights) at the ready. If you're boat has them, use the onboard lights to help you find your way around but use orange bulbs which attract bugs less than white ones. A headlamp is another great piece of gear to have on board, allowing you to keep both hands free.

Top Tackle Choices

Crankbaits and minnowbaits are the stars of nighttime trolling. Various wobbles and wiggles appeal to the different dispositions of walleye throughout the season, so keep a variety of straight, jointed, narrow and fat billed trolling baits in your tackle box. Shallow running baits (like a Rapala J-9) work well for trolling over the top of weeds to avoid hang-ups. Deeper running baits (like Cotton Cordell's Wally Diver) work well for probing the edges of breaklines or around shoals. Another top trolling choice are spinner rigs tipped with worms, leeches, or minnows.

Safety

Unlike walleye that see well in the dark, anglers loose the reliance of their number one sense when night fishing - sight. To keep your night trolling adventures safe, use your boat's running lights and wear a life jacket. Exercise caution around other boats as depth perception is dramatically reduced in the dark. If possible, get on the water an hour or so before nightfall so your eyes can adjust to the changing light conditions. Finally, leave an itinerary with someone on land, including time on and off the water and fishing area, and bring a cell phone or other communication device with you for emergencies. All these points should be standard whenever boating, but they are especially important when night fishing. Give night trolling a try this season and hunt walleye when they're feeding and active. Not only will you likely find them more aggressive than during the day, but you'll also likely experience little (if any) boat traffic or crowded fishing spots, which is a welcome sight to any angler, even in the dark.


Adapted From
Ontario Fishing - Night Trolling for Walleye

* HOOK BASIC

image from : jaysrods.com

Most fishermen prefer to use more than one hook on their line when handlining. We will now show you how to prepare a line with one hook and also with several hooks. First let us look at the hook itself and then at different types (Figures 3 and 4).
Ten different kinds of hooks are shown in Figure 4. Hooks Nos. 1 and 6 are double hooks with average bend and short shanks.

Hook No. 2 has a wide gap and short throat.
Hook No. 3 has a short shank and wide bend, but still a narrow throat because of its long, bent point.
Figure 3. Hooks all of the same size but of different types
Hook No. 4 is different from the others as it has two slice and an inwardly bent eye, whereas hook 5 has an eye that is bent outward.
Hook No. 7 has a wide gap and long throat, with a rather short shank.
Hook No. 8 is characterized by its long, sharply inward bent shank.
Hook No. 9 has a wide gap but short throat and an outwardly bent shank.
Hook No. 10 has an old-style normal bend and throat with a long shank.
Figure 4. Hooks of various sizes and shapes (double and single)



When selecting a hook for your handline, several factors have to be kept in mind, i.e. shape, size and material.
Shape
As the jigging, jerking action gives a constant movement to the baited hook, the fish has little chance to sniff at it, but bites or swallows it immediately. Thus the shape of the hook should mainly be related to the size of the fish to be caught and the bait used.
Look at Figure 4. In some fisheries the most common hook shapes for handlining are Nos. 9 and 10, while hook No. 8 is widely used in others. Still other fisheries use No. 3.
All the other hooks have been used for handlining, but little is known of their catching efficiency in comparison with the more commonly used ones. However, it is advisable to use a hook with the point bent a little to either side, left or right (reversed or offset). The reason for this is simply that if the hook happens to become flat in the mouth of the fish at first snatch, then it is possible that it will be pulled or jerked out of the fish's mouth before the fish has had time to chew on it or swallow it. If there are other handliners in the area, it would be advisable to look at their results.
Size
It is important to use not too big a hook and to cover most of the hook with the bait, whether artificial or fresh bait is used. As a very general rule the gap of the hook should never exceed half the width of the mouth of the fish that you want to catch, and most often it should be much narrower (Figure 5).
Material
Hooks are generally made from ordinary steel (sometimes stainless steel). To stop them from rusting they are coated or plated with bronze, tin, nickel or even gold. Large hooks are galvanized or even tarred to prevent corrosion.
Figure 5. Relation between the size of the hook and the fish's mouth



Originated by: Fisheries and Aquaculture Department
http://www.fao.org/

Text: B. A. Bjarnason
Illustrations: M. Carlesi

The designations employed and the presentation of material in this publication do not imply the expression of any opinion whatsoever on the part of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations concerning the legal status of any country, territory, city or area or of its authorities, or concerning the delimitation of its frontiers or boundaries.
David Lubin Memorial Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

Bjarnason. B.A.
Handlining and squid jigging
(FAO Training Series, no. 23 )
ISBN 92-5-103100-2