The Reel Keel fishing lure has attracted the attention of Captain Eric Ciocher from the Florida coast. With 30 years of fishing experience in both salt and fresh water, Captain Eric has tested out the Reel Keel and filmed it in action for his show Ultimate Catch.

He took the lure out twice, once to film with bass and once for redfish. The bass show will be airing tonight at 6PM on the Sportsman’s Channel and replaying again in May. The show featuring the Reel Keel with some Redfish action will be aired shortly, we’ll keep you posted once we get the scheduling.

For more information about Captain Eric or Ultimate Catch check out the links below:
My Outdoor TV – Ultimate Catch
Ultimate Catch Website

As always, stay tuned for more exciting news about the Reel Keel fishing lures. Tight lines and good fishing!

Tags: Announcements, Bass, Catching by admin
No Comments »

Stream trout can be difficult to catch no matter what technique you use but here are a few tips to remember when fishing for stream trout:
• Keep a low profile and do not let the fish see or hear you. Once the fish knows you are there, it will go into hiding and no amount of coaxing will get it to bite.
• Use a delicate presentation and make sure your line or lure does not splash near the fish, or again, they will go for cover.
• Trout are extremely line-shy so use a light low-visibility leader or tippet.
• When the insects start hatching, match the catch. If you are looking for a bigger trout, match a baitfish.
Here are some tips and tricks to catch these choosy eaters.

Fishing hardware:
The majority of stream trout are taken on hardware, spinners, spoons, and plugs. Since these lure emulate a baitfish, it should come as no surprise that trophy trout are caught off these lures.
Spinners are popular for Lakers and stream trout since they produce a lot of vibration and flash even if they are retrieved slowly. You can use them on a slow retrieve to fish a pool or reel them quickly through a fast riffle.
For distance when casting on big water, use a heavier spoon because they will have enough weight to get down in fast current. For trolling purposes, use a thinner spoon since they will produce more action.
Minnowbaits have the best life-like appearance but are difficult to cast. Stand downstream of a riffle where trout might be and cast upstream. Crank the lure rapidly through the riffle and you are sure to catch trout.
When you want to fish in deep pools or for suspended trout, use a medium to deep diving crankbait. Also, try to use side planer to spread your line and catch trout that may be spooked from the boat.

Fly fishing:
Many anglers will fly-fish trout because to some it is considered an art form. Trying to find the right fly to match the hatch and perfecting the cast with a fly line is a source of fascination for fishers. It is also an extremely effective way to catch trout. The most popular flies are those that imitate larval or adult forms of aquatic insects.
A dry fly will mimic a newly hatched adult insect and usually have wings or upright hair or feathers. A hackle or a collar of feather fibers along with a feather tail or hair will give the fly buoyancy but it will have to be periodically dipped in floatant to keep it from sticking. Fish dry flies on a dead drift.
A wet fly will imitate drowned terrestrial insects, larval aquatic insects, minnows and crustaceans. Most will have swept back wings and are intended to sink. They can be fished on a dead drift or twitched to resemble a darting insect or minnow.
Nymphs will emulate larval or pupal aquatic insects but can resemble scuds, shrimp or many other crustaceans. Tie them on heavy hooks and fish them beneath the surface on a dead drift. They can be weighted so they can be fished on the bottom as well.

Bait fishing:
Trout have a highly developed sense of smell so even if they can not see bait in murky waters, they can smell it. This is why bait fishing is so popular. Bait fishing will also work well in the early spring where insects have not hatched yet and the water is cold.
Night crawlers, garden worms, and salmon eggs are very popular in some areas but in other areas anglers will rely heavily on leeches, minnows, cut bait, crayfish, grasshoppers and aquatic insects.
Baits like corn, marshmellows and prepared baits that are otherwise known as grocery baits will also work well for fishing trout. These baits can be molded onto the hook and trout that have been freshly stocked will fall pray to these baits. Other baits like these include soft plastics with an impregnated scent.
Fish natural bait beneath a small float, attach a sinker and still-fish it on the bottom. You can also weight it lightly so that it tumbles along the bottom matching the speed of the current. The latter presentation is more realistic and you will be able to cover a lot more water.

Ice Fishing:
You have to be mobile when ice fishing for stream trout. Drill a lot of holes in the ice and use jigging techniques that let them move about easily. A depth finder is also a key element because suspending trout will most often be well off the bottom.
A medium powered graphite jigging rod that is about 30 inches long is ideal. Use a small spinning reel with a smooth drag and spool up with 4- to 6- pound test clear mono. The best baits to use are swimming minnows, teardrops or small jigging spoons tipped with waxworms, scuds or pieces of red worm.

Lakers have a wide array of fishing techniques associated with them all dependant on the depth of the water. Using down-riggers you can reach these fish when they go deep in the summer by trolling with 3-way rigs or by vertical jigging. When they go into the shallows, trying casting or long-line trolling with plugs, spoons, and try to fish with live bait like cisco, smelt or sucker meat. Lakers are usually in water with no cover so you do not need to use heavy tackle. They are line shy like stream trout and a heavy line will reduce the number of strikes you get. Hardware is the best way to go, as previously described above.
Lakers can be fished just the same as stream trout. The only exception is with ice fishing. Lakers are more active in the frigid waters and are relatively easy to catch. They are found in the same areas you would find them in the summer.
The two main ways to ice fish for Lakers are to tip-up fish or jig. If multiple lines are legal where you are fishing, set out one or more tip-ups baited with dead or live fish baitfish and jig with another line. If fish are active, they will hit the jig, if not, they will go for the tip-up.

Tags: Catching, Trout by laura
No Comments »

Since pike and muskies consume a wide variety of food it is not surprising that they will strike almost any kind of bait. Action and size are more important than color. Experienced fishers use large baits to catch these large fish so lures can sometimes measure a foot in length. With a big lure, you will need sturdy tackle to cast baits of this size and to drive the hooks into the fish’s mouth.
Muskies in heavily fished waters are followers; they will follow your bait right up to the boat then wander away. The best technique to use with them is to reel your bait within a foot of the rod then dip the rod tip as far into the water as you can to draw figure eights in the water. You will not have to use this technique on pike.
Be conscious of your fishing though and practice the catch and release method on these large predators. You want to preserve the quality of pike and muskies fishing so the big fish are not removed quickly. Make sure to carry heavy long nose pliers and jaw spreaders and try to remove the hooks while the fish is still in the water. Here are some tips and tricks to catch these aggressive predators.

Spinnerbaits and bucktails
Spinnerbaits are naturally weedless bait since they have an upturned hook and safety pin shaft. You can fish a spinnerbait by retrieving over a weedy flat to keep it just above the weed tops and allowing the blade to bulge the surface. Bulging occurs when a rod tip is held high and you reel in fast enough so the blade come close to breaking the surface. It works best when fish are active.
You can also fish spinnerbaits by letting them helicopter into holes in the weeds or fish the bottom of a body of water with a jigging motion. Counting a spinnerbait to where fish are suspended also works well with. During the spring use a spinnerbait that is three to five inches long. When the water begins to warm; use a longer spinnerbait about six to ten inches.
Pikes and muskies can not resist the vibration or the flash of a spinner blade. To entice the fish even more, tip your spinners with a plastic grub or live minnow but try to keep these enticers under four inches in length or you will get too many short strikes.
Large in-line spinners are called bucktails since they have a deer-head dressing or a type of dressing that is feathered or synthetic. Just like spinnerbaits these are fished by casting at specific targets but can also be used to troll over large flats or weed lines. Spinnerbaits and bucktails are hard to beat in weedy cover.

Topwater fishing
Topwater fishing is one of the most effective ways to catch pike and muskies and is also one of the most exciting. Once the fish are in deep weeds, lures will foul but the noise and surface disturbance of a topwater lure will draw the fish out from their cover to strike at your bait. Topwaters are also great for night fishing but once the water drops below 60ºF, subsurface bait will work best.
A variety of baits can be used for topwater fishing. Propbaits will have propellers on either the back or front end or sometimes both. They work best with a steady and slow retrieve. Crawlers usually have a cupped face or arms and have a wide wobble action with a loud gurgling sound. Fish them with a straight slow retrieve works best. Buzzbaits can be retrieved rapidly and are a great choice when you are trying to find fish because of their safety-pin in-line shape. Stickbaits with their weighted tails have a highly erratic motion when you retrieve them with sharp downward jerks.

Subsurface plug fishing
Because these baits mimic the wobble and vibration of baitfish, pike and muskies find these hard to resist. If you want to fish well with a subsurface plug, choose one that runs at the depth you want to fish. If the weedbed you are casting at tops off at three feet, using a subsurface plug with a depth of 10 feet makes no sense. But if the fish are holding at the base of a deeper weedline, using a shallow subsurface plug is ideal since you can get down far enough to get a strike.
The four basic types of subsurface plugs include: minnow plugs, crankbaits, trolling plugs, and vibrating plugs. Minnow plugs have a narrow lip and slim body which give them a natural looking wobble. Crankbaits have a broad front lip to yield a stronger wobble. Trolling plugs have a flattened broad head to give an intense wobble. Vibrating plugs have no lip but the eye attachment is on the flat back to give them a tight wiggle.

Jerkbait fishing
Jerkbaits are meant to be fished with a series of jerks on the rod as their name suggests. Fishing these baits like this imparts an erratic darting action that looks a lot like a wounded baitfish in the water. Most jerkbaits are floaters but experience anglers will weigh down the hooks or the body of the lure to get it to run a bit deeper.
Short stiff rods are used so the rod tip does not hit the water when they are fishing with the jerkbaits. Fish them with a series of sharp, downward twitches of the rod to achieve a side-to-side action.
Most jerkbaits fall into two categories: gliders and divers even though their shapes, action and size can vary greatly. Gliders dart from side to side while divers dart downward. Divers will run deeper because they have lateral movement and they will track through weeds better than a lure with a side to side movement.

Spoon fishing
These are the most versatile of the lures you can use to fish pike and muskies with. They were used decades ago and are still just as effective today as they were then. You can jig them vertically in deep water or skitter them across the surface or you can troll or retrieve them at a steady pace as well as use an erratic stop and go retrieve to fish with.
The biggest decision you have to make when choosing a spoon is how thick the metal is. A thick spoon is used for distance casting and a thin one for maximum wobble. If you know you are going to be fishing in very heavy weeds and cover, select a weedless spoon. Add a soft-plastic curly tail or a pork strip to give you lure extra attraction. Usually a weedless spoon with have a single hook, make sure this hook is needle sharp.
To get an extra enticing wobble attach spoons to a braided, flexible wire leader. A thick wire leader will restrict their movement and when fishing pike and muskies you defiantly do not want to restrict action.

Jig fishing
Even though some fishers do not associate jig fishing with pike and muskies fishing, there are a time when jig fishing will out produce all other lures.
In the early spring or late fall a slow-moving jig is hard to beat because the cool waters make the fish lethargic and unwilling to chase lures. After a cold front jigs are also super-effective, they are also just as good in very clear water as well.
Consider head shape and weight when selecting a jig. If the jig is too light you will not be able to keep the jig at the bottom especially with a strong wind. Once the jig starts sinking, a pike or muskies will strike at it. If the jig is too heavy though, it will sink too quickly and give the fish less time to strike. The best weight for jig fishing is between 3/8 and 7/8 of an ounce.
In weedy cover you will need a brush guard jig but when there is a clean bottom use a roundhead jig. To keep the jig head above the weeds use a swimmer head. Once muskies go deep into rock piles in the late fall use a pyramid jig to drag along the bottom for the most effect cast.

Fly fishing
Pike and muskies make short runs when so the best thing to do when fly fishing them is to take your time and try not to horse them in. Once you get them tired out, you will be able to land them. These big fish can test the skill of the most experienced fly fisher so choose carefully.
Fly fishing works best in the spring when the warm water draws pike and muskies into shallow weedy bays. They easily take on divers, poppers, sliders and large streamers. Once the fish begin to go deeper in the summer you will need to weigh your flies and use sinking lines to reach pike and muskies.
The size of your fly depends on the size of the fish you expect to catch. Sizes for pike and muskies range in size from 2 to 4/0. Make sure your fly has a mono or wire weed guard if you know you are going to be fishing in weeds. Use a 7 to 10 weight rod with a weight forward line and heavy wind resistant flies. Usually anglers will use a 6-9 foot leader with an 8-14 pound test tippet with a 12 to 30 pound shock tippet made of multi-strand coated wire.

Live-bait fishing
Live baitfish accounted for more then three-fourths of all pike and muskies caught about a few decades ago. That is much lower today but there are sometimes when the fish are interested in only baitfish.
When the water is too cold or the bite is off for some other reason, live-bait will still produce results. Suckers, chubs and shiners that are anywhere from five inches to a foot are most commonly used. A lot of pike fishers will use dead bait fish because they smell a lot like smelt or ciscoes and appeal to the pikes keen sense of smell more then a live bait fish will.
You can use a live-bait by casting it unweighted and give it a jerky retrieve to imitate a drying baitfish. Or you can fish your bait onto a bobber rig to cast it out and let it lie on the bottom. You can also slow-troll it at the edge of a weedbed to use enough weight to keep it near the bottom.
You can rig baitfish with a single hook usually a size 1/0 to 6/0 pushed through the nose. Make sure that you attach a wire leader to the hook. Baitfish can also be used on a quick-strike ring with one double or treble hook near the pectoral fin and the other near the dorsal fin. If you do this you will be able to set the hook immediately when the fish bites. With this set-up a fish will not be able to swallow the hook and you will increase your hooking percentage.

Tags: Articles, Catching, Muskee (Muskey), Pike by laura
No Comments »