Sport Fishing: Becoming a Fusion Fisherman

Sport fishing is surprisingly isolated. It’s
always incredible to me, in this day of rapid
communication, how little cross-fertilization there
is between sport fishermen in different geographic
areas. Big game anglers out in the ocean, for instance,
have developed techniques that inland fishermen can
emulate. Techniques developed for certain species on
the natural lakes of the upper Mid-west can be ideal for impoundments in the South. And yet, it seems, there is
little fishing information exchanged between them.

I happened to catch a sport fishing show on TV the other day. It was a guy out on the briny, doing some blue-water fishing.

He was describing the rig, and pointed out, with great glee, that with modern equipment he was running baits 70 feet to either side of the boat, and as much as 30 feet down. He was very taken with this accomplishment.

I would have been, too. Except that nearly half a century ago we were trolling baits on Lake Michigan that let us completely cover a moving cube of water measuring 200 feet on a side: 100 feet to each side of the boat, 200 feet back, and 200 feet deep.

So just how modern was that deep-sea anglers equipment after all?

Fact is, it may really have been state-of-the-art, so far as salt water is concerned. What happens on the ocean, and what happens on Lake Michigan---or even a TVA impoundment such as, say, Lake Cumberland---doesn’t have much to do with each other.

In the culinary world, when one cuisine is superimposed on another, they call the result “fusion.” And, despite several dozen sport fishing magazines on the newsstands, and the widespread use of the Internet, and cable/satellite TV in almost every living room, there is precious little of it going on among fishermen. Fishing information just isn’t being shared. There are no other sportsmen I can think of who wear blinders so consistently.

I’m not even talking about fisheries as diverse as the Great Lakes and the ocean. How about striped bass on Lake Cumberland, as an example. Although there are notable exceptions, striped bass fishing is, essentially, a trolling situation. In terms of the lake size and depth, and the natural habits of the fish, it is just like Lake Michigan.

Yet, the trolling lessons learned by salmon fishermen on the Great Lakes have, by and large, been lost on Lake Cumberland striped bass anglers. Sure, you very occasionally see a downrigger---mostly on a boat come down from Ohio. And side-planers have, 30 years after the fact, become fairly common. But the diversity of equipment that lets salmon boats tow lures through that 200 foot cube of water are little seen. Where are the outriggers? And the Dipsey Divers? How many anglers are supporting baits with balloons? Or towing kits to bounce a bait through the surface chop?

It’s not just big-fish, big-water sport fishing. Not a week goes by that I don’t hear southerners bemoaning how walleye are inaccessible. “They’re easy in the spring, when they’re running the rivers,” is a commonly heard complaint. “But once the summer comes in, they’re too deep to catch in the lakes.”

Here’s a little secret, fellas: Sport fishermen have been taking walleye out of deep lakes in Wisconsin, and Michigan, and Minnesota for at least a hundred years. Very few of their techniques are secrets. So, if you want to catch deep water mooneyes, you need to stop bitchin’, and ask the guys up north how it’s done.

Of all the fishermen who don’t learn from each other, live bait anglers top the heap. All over the country there are regionally popular sport fishing methods of rigging live bait that could well serve fishermen in other locales. But, somehow or another, the fusion never takes place.

In an earlier article, I discussed the sport fishing technique for upstream worms. That’s a technique I learned in the Northeast, when I was just a kid, and have used it ever since. I have never seen anyone down here use it, though, unless they were fishing with me and saw how effective it is.

But it’s no secret. I’ve seen numerous articles written about upstream worming. But all of them seem to be preaching to the converted.

Drift rigs are another sport fishing area we can all learn from each other. The best way of presenting a bait in moving water is with natural movement. Anchoring a gob of worms on the bottom is, when all is said and done, the most inefficient way of catching a fish.

So, there you are, on a rocky-bedded stream you just know is loaded with smallmouth. And you want to drift a crayfish downstream. Typical method is to tie your line to a weight, run a leader and hook off that, and hope for the best.

Hope springs eternal, they say. But so do all those rocks on the bottom, just waiting to hang your weight. Next thing you know you’re rerigging, because you’ve lost all your terminal tackle.

Have you heard of the Klamath Cinch, though? Or the Waukegan Slip Rig? These are two of several ways to minimize those hang-ups. And, using them, when you do hang up all you lose is the weight, not the whole terminal rig.

In many cases these rigs work with artificials as well as live bait. Which means they can prevent the loss of lures worth eight bucks or more.

About 90% of the time, if you’re fishing bait you’re doing it on or near the bottom. That’s because fish feed there 90% of the time.

Anywhere you travel, bait fishermen have developed specialized rigs for fishing the bottom. That’s understandable. What isn’t understandable is how little of this sport fishing information gets transferred from one locale to another.

Here’s a good case in point. Up on the Ohio River, in Western Kentucky, they’ve developed a great method for catfishing. Using a stubby rod, salt-water reels, and 80 pound line, they drift downstream, bouncing a bait (shad gut is preferred) into every hole and depression. Sooner or later a catfish, usually a big one, will be in one of those holes, waiting for the current to sweep something edible into its waiting mouth.

Most of the time the terminal tackle is an egg sinker, held in place by a small swivel. A leader and hook leads from it. Not a bad rig---except when the sinker falls between a couple of rocks, or into a crack, and hangs up. You then have to break off---losing your entire rig---and retie everything. Costly in time. Costly in tackle. And likely costly in lost opportunities.

Yet, out in the Pacific Northwest, they’d solved that problem years ago, using what’s come to be called the Klamath Cinch.

The Klamath Cinch uses a three-way swivel as the heart of the system. Your main line is tied to one of the loops. A leader and hook goes on a second loop. And a short (4-6 inches) piece of mono gets tied to the third. To that short line you clip a row of split shot, using just enough total weight to get you to the bottom, where your rig can then move at a natural rate in the current.

What happens if you hang up? As it true most of the time, it is the lead that is stuck, not the hook or other tackle. By putting pressure on the rig, the split shot slides off the line, freeing you from the bottom. It’s a simple matter to then clip new shot to the line and get back to sport fishing.

There are a half dozen or so variations of the Klamath. The most popular one substitutes surgical tubing and pencil lead for the short line & split shot. This has the added advantage of not hanging as often, because the weight, suspended from the rubber tube, tends to bounce off the rocks, rather than get stuck in them.

Up in the Great Lakes they’ve combined that rig with a classic slip rig. The surgical tubing is attached to a small snap swivel. A second such swivel locks it in place on the main line. A leader & hook then are led about 16 inches from the terminal swivel.

This rig was developed in Waukegan, Illinois, and takes its name---Waukegan Cinch--- from that town.

Throughout the country, fishermen have developed methods of suspending bait slightly above the bottom. Sometimes this is used with a drift rig. Other times it’s used from a stationary weight stuck to the bottom. Almost universally they are called “fish finder” rigs, because they let you figure out how far above bottom the fish are actually feeding.

Typical is to tie your main line to an egg sinker. Spaced along the line, on short leaders, is a series of baited hooks. Let’s say you space three of them 9-12 inches apart.

You cast out this rig, reel in any slack, and wait for a fish to hit. Most of the time the majority of your hits will come on one hook or another---telling you where the feeding fish are.

Over by the ocean they have a sport fishing finder rig that, much to my surprise, I have never seen used inland except very occasionally in the Great Lakes. This consists of a snelled hook, with a leader about 16 inches long. Before tying the end loop, the line is threaded through a torpedo-shaped float. These originally were cork, but now are mostly foam.

You use this similar to the other one. That is, a weight is tied to the end of your line. Two of these fish-finders are tied to the line about three feet apart. By sliding the float along the leader you control how high above bottom the bait will be. The closer to the hook, the higher it will float.

In addition to the inherent flexibility this rig provides, it has the added benefit of working in moving water. The other fish finder doesn’t, because as it bounces along all the baits will be at the same level.

In today’s world of high-speed communication there are no secrets. You can learn how other fishermen, in other places, solve the same problems you face. Nor is any commercial tackle unavailable. If you can’t find it in a store, you merely shop the web. Sport fishing should be in constant improvement from method cross-fertilization.

What it takes is an open mind, and a willingness to concede that, just maybe, somebody else has found a better way. Do that, and you can become a fusion fisherman. And, probably, be more successful at sport fishing.