Fishing

I know the general area of where some Lakers are at on Flaming Gorge. How would you best search for them with your sonar then make sure your on top of them?

Welcome to the site Buck23, I'm going to move your post to a board where you will likely get a better response than this one.
WH2

BFT administrator and moderator

Look for under water humps or ledges. Lakers like to hang out in areas where they can move from deeper water to feeding areas in more shallow water. They hang out on the bottom so use your bottom tracking with zoom so you can more easily identify them laying on the bottom. Some times you will see a stack of them just off the bottom where three or more will be holding close together and are more easily identified.

So after you know where the humps are, what would be the most productive way to scan for them? Would you set your sonar to like 200mhz and look just directly under the boat or would you set a wider sonar beam then when you find them change to a smaller degree cone to move right in on top of them? I'm wanting to jig for them.

I would start with a spit screen showing both settings. As you see fish on the wide angle cone you could then use the other screen to get right on top of them.
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Light travels faster than sound.

So some people seem really bright until you hear them talk.

That sounds good. I'll give that a try. What about the sidescan on the Humminbird. Would that be useful for deep Mac's?

I’ve tried side scan on my humminbird but its difficult to spot them because they often are in deeper water and tight to the bottom. The best method in MHO is with the split screen showing both a zoom screen of the bottom and a wider sonar. Then as a bow nut said switch to 200 kHz after you locate them to get on top of them. Often they show up just as a different color blob on the bottom with little target separation. Other times there is more clear separation. If your lucky you will find a stack of three or more which for jigging that’s what you are after.

Just motor around your selected area back and forth until you spot a few to jig for.

What about trolling with downriggers for the mac’s. Would you run close the the bottom or on the bottom? I guess I’m wanting to know a good technique for trolling?

Trolling is what I like to do. It keeps me more awake. I get too bored by jigging. I run my weights about 5 foot off the bottom no more then 10 when they are not active. I look at the weight it will kick them up out of the mud and then when the lure comes by they strike out of madness not because they are hungry. I will run two different depths to try to cover my area better.



Bestlakerlure.com

are you after the big lakers are the pups

the pups are all over and not that hard to catch the pups are under the kokanee

the big lakers are hard to catch

first buy a Flaming gorge fish n Map most fishing stores sell them it marks where to fish for them
I hope you have elect downriggers if you are going to troll for them
a lot of lures work, but two I like best are spoons and flatfish.
the big ones you keep your lure on the bottom, you can lose downrigger balls and lures maybe even your downrigger. trolling speed sometimes is over 2.5 mph

a lot I catch are on the bottom about 100' down
I will PM you something that may help

So you like the weight to kick up the mud or the lure to kick up the mud? Or both? How far back do you run behind the weight?

I use the ball to kick up the fish. We run around 2.4 to 3.4 speed, I rarely get hooked on the bottom due to the lure I use floats so it runs above the ball most of the time. I run 125 feet back earlier in the year then as the year goes on I get with in 75 foot back. It all depends on the sounds of the motor or running a trolling motor.