canonball to lure distance

[mrhookup]

How far back do you guys set your spoons on your riggers. I know the shallower you are the farther back you set them, and the deeper the closer you set them. I was thinking no more than 10'-15' for 50' and deeper, then more as you moved them up. Then I saw a report that a guy out of Muskegon was running 50'-60' leads to his lures because he was fishing shallower than 50 feet. To me it seems like the lure would lose its action this far back or was this report just some sort of typo that I'm not understanding?

[tltorrice]

mrhookup, I have been reading what others have been doing because I had the same question. I started using a 100 foot rule. 30 down 70 back. or 80 down 20 back. I don't know if it is the way to go but it is what I am doing for now.

[mrhookup]

Hows the 100 foot rule been working for you?

[Priority1]

The 100 foot rule is a good rule of thumb, but different conditions can change things. I have taken kings on free sliders with the ball down 35 ft. The slider lure had to be in the prop wash. When it's rough I cut the 100 ft rule in half, with a min of 8 ft back.

I also use the rule of thumb when selecting lures from my Mate box. I grab the lure closest to my thumb.

[Nailer]

In years past we always ran short leads 8-12'. We did ok but never great.

This year I started running longer leads 20-40' and have had a lot more success of the riggers. Keep this in mind if your using 4 riggers. run your two inside ones deeper and shorter than the outside two. The theory here is that if a fish comes up to hit the deep one (and doesn't take it) your higher lure will soon travel over his head.

If you start running long leads make sure you try to keep your lines straight behind the boat, and try not to run cross current. long leads require longer turns.

I say yes to long leads this year. I also think the 100 foot rule is good (or 80' rule).

[salmonquest]

Rules are made to be broken though. This year I have had some success running a 15' lead 40' down but I was also running an 11" flasher off the ball and the lead ,run on a stacker about 2' up.

[Paulywood]

I was running 50-60' leads and it wasn't a typo. The lake was flat calm and we were running everything up high. I don't follow the 100' rule all of the time but it is a good starting point. Even though we lost a lot of fish they weren't due to fish not hooking up, there were other factors involved. I would say that a normal lead for me at 50' is 30'. I stretched them out on friday due to a bright sun and calm seas. It worked for me but might not work all of the time. Sometimes it pays to change things up.

Nick

[tltorrice]

As the others are stating it is a good starting point. When in shallower water I run longer leads to get the bait away from the boat. In deeper water I stay in closer. It works good for me.

[silver one]

It depends on what the fish want. Back in june a slower presentation was better so further back, as we were fishing 40' on the inside riggers and 60' on the outside with spoons. When everything started comming on flashsers that tells you the fish like a faster presentation. so in the case of saturday we shortened up our leads to 15' and 20' for spoons and 5' to 8' for flasheres. lead core was slow also so that was another indication. Normal speed it 2.5 to 2.6 shorter leads we speeded up to 2.8 to 3.0. We also had a slow start with wire and shortened the leads from 48" between the lure and dipsey to 30" and then wire took off. Start out with a mix and see what the fish like. then go with it. Like somone above said there is know set rule. Hope this helps.

[NO MO BEGGEN]

most people ive fished with run there leads out 20-30 ft. regardless of where there fishing

[LongLine]

"When in doubt let it out".