Planning on our spring trip. Looking for new ideas.

What are your favorite trolling lures for lake trout?

We've had the most success with blue and chrome Dr Spoons and little cleo's.

If I had to use 1 lure, it would probably be the Dr Spoon.

What would be your go to lure? What would be the close 2nd?

Thanks!

1. SR9 Shad Rap. Goes 20ft. on the troll, has a tight wobble.
2. 3/8oz. Hot-N-Tot. goes 25ft. on the troll, and has a wide wobble. We troll cranks to find active fish and areas, and then drop jigs on them. We carry 1/8,3/16, 1/4, 3/8oz. round head jigs. We use mostly BPS Triple Ripple curly tail grubs, some 3in., mostly 4in. We bring 10-15 straight tail grubs, because one time the fish wanted a straight tail and nuthin' else!(4in.). Calm wind, no riffles:forget fishing. Wind and riffles, fish hard no matter light condition. Be careful fishing too deep, especially in summer. They can be caught 75ft. straight down, but might get the bends and die!

Thanks for the reply.

What colors do you prefer?

Color bright sunny day: silver or Mylar/black finish
Cloudy: fire tiger
Lots of colors work though.

Rapala minnow rap 11, tail dancer, dives to/DT 16

T

Here's a pic of a dt 16 in the trouts mouth for reference

Nice pic! Is the ice out yet? :-)

Large Storm Lightnin' Shads will tear em up. Color depends on light conditions.

All the above lures are good ones. One of my favorites is a heavy jig,(1/2 to 1 OZ.) depending on depth, tipped with a 4 or 5 inch twister tail. White, orange, and yellow seem to be the best colors for me.

quote old_salt: "Large Storm Lightnin' Shads will tear em up. Color depends on light conditions."

What colors do you use under what light conditions?

Thanks!

large shad rap, silver and black. 2nd shad rap silver and a little orange on its belly.

Little Cleos. Blue/silver and green(not flo green)/silver. Also blue/silver krocodile spoons. Purplescent rapala taildancer.

quote timatkn: "Color bright sunny day: silver or Mylar/black finish
Cloudy: fire tiger
Lots of colors work though.


Rapala minnow rap 11, tail dancer, dives to/DT 16


T


Here's a pic of a dt 16 in the trouts mouth for reference
"

Figured I would see a response from you on this thread, Tim. It was great to meet you and talk shop last week. Have a good Christmas!

spoons are always good for trolling or casting from shore. experiment with colors(done good on blk/wht daredevil) sometimes hot colors are good-5 of diamonds is a producer. and early season 7" rapala blk/gold has been my bread and butter for trolling.

My wife is not going to be happy with the lures I end up buying from ebay. :-)

Deep diving husky jerk Rapalas. Blue and silver

We got a couple nice ones on Basswood in June of last year on Rapala purplescent deep diving taildancers. It was our first time trying this. (got the idea on this message board).

quote sammyN: "

quote old_salt: "Large Storm Lightnin' Shads will tear em up. Color depends on light conditions."

What colors do you use under what light conditions?


Thanks!"

Well, it's not like there is an exact formula. The trout will tell you. Experiment. Generally, under sunny skies, I will use bright colors like orange, yellow, white. Under cloudy skies I will start with darker colors like blue, purple, brown, green.

The point is you have to be willing to change up. If I go 15-20 minutes with no fish and my fish finder is showing fish, it's time to try a different color or lure. The trout will tell you.

Last June on Knife Lake, my son had a hot lure for lakers--a tail dancer with a blue top and red belly. He had wanted to catch one for a long time, and they just smashed that thing. Actually broke it. I also got one on a silver shad colored tail dancer.

We had the best luck just randomly trolling while on our way to and from other spots. Suspended fish, I think.

Anyway, those fish fight HARD and I'd like to go after them again. If we do, we'll take more of this type of lure.

Not exactly all about trolling lakers (really Char) --- and this video is long-- but hey-- hit your free spool and enjoy Bob.M (his trademark line from his early videos in the early 90's) on this video about huge Char!!!! Overall-- very informative. The first 10-12 minutes is really all you need to watch for good info-- unless if you want to see some pigs caught.

trophy tactics

Great video! 5 of diamonds. My fav!

We used Rapala Deep Tail Dancers for the first time last year and they really produced for us (TDD11BFL - Blue Flash, and TDD11PD - Purpledescent). These were deeper trout in Sark and Keefer. One of them was almost 10 lbs.

Another first was a BADONK-A-DONK LP, 3/4 oz., Silver Flash/Blue Back. One of the boys trolled this and another a Black and Silver flutter spoon. They out fished my Rapala Deep Down Husky Jerk - DHJ12G which is usually very productive for me. We trolled up the west side of Agnes. These were smaller trout near the surface, but lots of them.

quote WhiteWolf: "Not exactly all about trolling lakers (really Char) --- and this video is long-- but hey-- hit your free spool and enjoy Bob.M (his trademark line from his early videos in the early 90's) on this video about huge Char!!!! Overall-- very informative. The first 10-12 minutes is really all you need to watch for good info-- unless if you want to see some pigs caught.

trophy tactics "

Great laker video! Thanks for sharing.

Laker Taker sliver and green, and swedish pimples you choose your color have had luck with those. Also during the last trip I used a red and gold spoon and a green and sliver cleo , caught a laker on the first cast with each of those. Ram Lake was a blast.

Thanks a bunch for all the replies.

quote linkster: "We used Rapala Deep Tail Dancers for the first time last year and they really produced for us (TDD11BFL - Blue Flash, and TDD11PD - Purpledescent). These were deeper trout in Sark and Keefer. One of them was almost 10 lbs.


Another first was a BADONK-A-DONK LP, 3/4 oz., Silver Flash/Blue Back. One of the boys trolled this and another a Black and Silver flutter spoon. They out fished my Rapala Deep Down Husky Jerk - DHJ12G which is usually very productive for me. We trolled up the west side of Agnes. These were smaller trout near the surface, but lots of them.


"

I was looking at those TD11's in the store. Aren't they a little big?

They might look big when you look at the overall length, but about 30% ~ 40% of the length is associated with the lip of the lure. The actual body of the lure is about the same as many of the other lures in my box. They worked for us.

Merry Christmas

Rapala deep taildancer. Purplesence.

I'm a big fan of the Deep Taildancers used in conjunction with a cowbell troll rig.

The Bumping Guest Paddler strikes again........

Rapala Deep Taildancer... Yep Purpledescent and a 5 Diamonds BIG Daredevle.

+1 on the Laker Taker. For all baits on lake trout, I don't think color is critical... they are aggressive feeders. Get the lure close and they will hit.

Troutdude-
When you troll the tail dancer behind the cowbell, do you put weight ahead of it?

quote bobbernumber3: "+1 on the Laker Taker. For all baits on lake trout, I don't think color is critical... they are aggressive feeders. Get the lure close and they will hit."

What is likely is that anything cruising the neighborhood that looks like it might be an easy meal will be.

quote mr.barley: "Little Cleos. Blue/silver and green(not flo green)/silver. Also blue/silver krocodile spoons. Purplescent rapala taildancer."

+1 along with erie dearies when they want meat.

Manns 30+ (sexy shad) & Storm Deep Thunderstick (rainbow trout)

quote MeatGun: "Troutdude-
When you troll the tail dancer behind the cowbell, do you put weight ahead of it?"

I haven't yet. I suppose one could though. for me, it really depends on where I am marking them on the fish finder. The cowbell trolls will add weight as well. I just weighed one and it came in at 39.5grm. So if the fish are in 30 FOW and you are trolling a size 11 deep taildancer with nearly 1.5 oz of additional weight you are definitely below them. At that point I switch to a size 9. I'm quite certain there is plenty of specific crankbait trolling depth + added weight = true depth info out there. I just have not looked into it.

Last night I worked on my large size flutter spoon assortment. I removed all the treble hooks and replaced with either Owner or Gamakatsu Siwash single salmon style hooks. Total package is probably about 6" including Mylar.

Then I added Mylar or white marabou to the shank. Nice! These will be run on the Suffix lead core line for lakers.

However, I am quite interested in running these spoons for walleye. I have noticed big schools of large walleye moving laterally off reefs in August and suspending over deep water.....they just slide off the shallow reef , drop 30 ft down over 70 ft of water...seems like they would be very susceptible to spoons.

3/4 oz. Cleo I prefer spoons as they seem to create less drag than deep diving raps