Hello, i am new to targeting salmon

[Jabber]

Hello all, i am new to salmon fishing the southern shores of Lake Ontario, port dalhousie, port weller, jordan station.  i have a 20ft. tyee with riggers and was wondering how to get started, what to look for, depths,  what to use at this time of year, color, patterns, spoons, fly, meat heads??? Any info will help. If anyone would like to join me on the water, you are more than welcome, I am normally fishing alone, Thank you

[SpoonPullers.com]

[mercury25]

Jabber welcome to tne addiction I sent you a PM with my cell number I can help you out.

[TyeeTanic]

Welcome.

It's going to take a couple of years to figure all that out.

Some starting thoughts, really quickly .... you will eventually end up with down riggers running 30 lb mono line on rods, good for spoons and meat on paddles. You will also run wire line dipsey (7 strand is good, need a special rod to handle wire ... rapala rsc, shimano talora even better but $$), you also want to run leadcore early in the season and copper through the season again special rods needed ...

Salmon is all about finding the fish ... where are they on the lake ... and to give you a high level idea. They start at Niagara (mature salmon), move USA south shore east, then hop across the lake on east end (Port Hope to Toronto) and then move west ... but that is very general ... you'll find them everywhere at any given time, just the numbers rise and fall.  At end of season (like now) they start staging at river mouths.

Finding salmon is not only about geography on the lake, but depth. You'll want to target 42F to 52F water temperatures. It will be good to have a device like Fishhawk X4D that tells you temperature at any depth in the water.  Then you'll know where 42F is and 52F is and distribute lines throughout. Without this, google Lake Ontario Temperature Transects ... and you'll find a chart that is updated at least daily to give you an idea of where the good water is.

Once you target the right water ... you need to start with a variety of lines (riggers, wireline dipsey, long lines) and colors and see what works, then start biasing that setup on other lines. Early in the season silver, blue, chartreuse seems to work. Middle ... green, blue, black/white/glow works, Late is bright colors ... purple, red, orange.

Speed is important, and not your GPS speed, but the speed the lure is travelling in the water, which will be different to GPS because of water currents (which are significant). You want to hit between 2 mph and 3 mph lure speed, starting at 2.5 mph, trying that and then modifying up and down to see what works, and in what direction of travel.  Fishhawk X4D will tell you that ... otherwise, you're guessing and can only really rely on the GPS.

Most importantly ... talk to guys at the marina who also fish, form a network, and share intel.  Fish move, things change, and if you have a group of 20 guys constantly fishing ... you can pretty much keep on top of where the fish are, and what is working.

[Salmon Sublx8r]

Welcome.

It's going to take a couple of years to figure all that out.

Some starting thoughts, really quickly .... you will eventually end up with down riggers running 30 lb mono line on rods, good for spoons and meat on paddles. You will also run wire line dipsey (7 strand is good, need a special rod to handle wire ... rapala rsc, shimano talora even better but $$), you also want to run leadcore early in the season and copper through the season again special rods needed ...

Salmon is all about finding the fish ... where are they on the lake ... and to give you a high level idea. They start at Niagara (mature salmon), move USA south shore east, then hop across the lake on east end (Port Hope to Toronto) and then move west ... but that is very general ... you'll find them everywhere at any given time, just the numbers rise and fall.  At end of season (like now) they start staging at river mouths.

Finding salmon is not only about geography on the lake, but depth. You'll want to target 42F to 52F water temperatures. It will be good to have a device like Fishhawk X4D that tells you temperature at any depth in the water.  Then you'll know where 42F is and 52F is and distribute lines throughout. Without this, google Lake Ontario Temperature Transects ... and you'll find a chart that is updated at least daily to give you an idea of where the good water is.

Once you target the right water ... you need to start with a variety of lines (riggers, wireline dipsey, long lines) and colors and see what works, then start biasing that setup on other lines. Early in the season silver, blue, chartreuse seems to work. Middle ... green, blue, black/white/glow works, Late is bright colors ... purple, red, orange.

Speed is important, and not your GPS speed, but the speed the lure is travelling in the water, which will be different to GPS because of water currents (which are significant). You want to hit between 2 mph and 3 mph lure speed, starting at 2.5 mph, trying that and then modifying up and down to see what works, and in what direction of travel.  Fishhawk X4D will tell you that ... otherwise, you're guessing and can only really rely on the GPS.

Most importantly ... talk to guys at the marina who also fish, form a network, and share intel.  Fish move, things change, and if you have a group of 20 guys constantly fishing ... you can pretty much keep on top of where the fish are, and what is working.

Easy peasy.

[riff_raff_fishing]

You can easily get overwhelmed with all this. Figuring it all out and gradually building your knowledge and skills (and equipment) and seeing improving catch rates is very rewarding. I took this up 3 years ago and do ok in my 16 footer. Mainly I fish solo and mainly I fish with two downriggers and spoons. I rarely get skunked. Early morning around sunrise and evening around sunset are the hot times when the fish are aggressive and active. You have to accept though that sometimes they just aren't around. I only got a Fish Hawk last year. You can catch without one. I would say a sonar/GPS is essential. If you put some spoons down around 45 feet and troll at 2.5mph surface speed (your lures will probably be moving close to this speed at their depth but currents do cause it to vary) you will catch fish. If you see them on the sonar at a different depth then try to put your lures just above them.

Between the "hot bite" times you can catch steelhead all day if you head out to deeper water, around the 200ft deep mark, and put your lures in the top 40 feet of water. Steelhead are active all day and are great fun as they love to leap out of the water during the fight. But only do it in guaranteed good weather.

Best of luck, don't get overwhelmed, and read spoonpullers regularly. There is lots of great advice on here.

[jds]

I've been fishing on the big lake since 1990, running a 17ft. Starcraft.  The best advice I can give someone new is "keep it simple".  You are better off having a few lures at the right depth, at the right speed than a bunch of junk rods scattered all over.

 Start with 1 rod on each rigger, 1 flasher, 1 spoon. An easy starting point is: spoon back 30ft. on The lower rigger, flasher 15ft. back, and 10 ft. above the spoon on the upper rigger. The flasher attracts fish in close. if they don't hit it, and drop back down in the water column, the spoon is swimming along underneath.
 
 Fish the marks you see on the fishfinder. Vary speed between 2-3 mph. Never troll in just a straight line, make wide "s" curves. The lures on the outside of the turn will speed up, the lures on the inside will slow down. Pay attention to which side fires, and adjust you speed accordingly. Predator fish hunt looking up, it's better to have your lures  above them than below them.
.
The fish will tell you what they want that day. Change out lure size, type, and color until you get bit. Don't get lazy! If you see fish on the screen, stay with them and continue to change your presentations every 30 min. or so until you hook up.

Once you get comfortable with the riggers, then add other presentations.

Good Luck, and keep asking questions!

[jds]

One more thing..... this was posted on this site in 2008. I actually copied it and saved it to my fishing reference files...  Makes for some good reading.

https://www.spoonpullers.com/forums/index.php/topic,869.msg26949.html#msg26949

[drjoe]

#1 Salmon fishing is not cheap , be prepared !
# 2 Keep it simple to start run spoons first ; color rules on Lake Ontario ! For more information you can send a PM !

[waterdownredneck]

JDS, fantastic thread you pasted from 2008, that’s a lot of great research the OP conducted.