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Posted by }<)))*> StriperChaser on August 31, 2005, 10:26 pm Looking for fall stripers near the dams On The Water Dog Days aren’t all that bad for fishing — especially if you fish below a dam for In the next two weeks I’m going to tell you how to catch the sliver flash. First trip is Keep in mind that these techniques work equally well below Cheatham and Pickwick Middle Tennessean’s know Doug Markham from his TV show “Outdoors with Doug When he and I fished below Old Hickory Dam we learned two important things that Using the Piscator Rig, we caught a few small skipjack for bait and drifted from the We drifted because boats were tied near the boils not leaving much room. There was There came a time when we got tired of catching bait before every drift, so we put Doug asked. “If the skipjack are drifting in the current, how do the fish know whether We reasoned that if the baitfish were moving, the predator would enjoy eating an easy About noon one boat left its position at the boils and we moved into the niche. Doug I caught a rather large yellow bass with my deceased bait. An hour later we were tired You know the story: Just one more cast and we’d leave. True to our word, we both His reel screamed like raccoon climbing an electric fence. “I’m running out of line! Doug said it was a big’un, twice the size of what we had been catching. So I figured he Doug pulled. No movement. He gave slack line. No movement. After trying to feel the fish without Nothing left to do but reel in the slack and break the line. And it was time to go. After Wow, were we surprised! Less than a minute later we saw the tired striper surface, We hollered with mirth, glee, and astonishment at the size of it. Doug eagerly asked me After a quick photo op the behemoth, we wanted to return it to from whence it came. We used different rigs but both worked very well. Here they are: for drifting, Doug I used a 2/0 Daiichi bait hook (black), 3/8-ounce bell sinker on a three-way swivel. Rigging for the boils: We both used 2-ounce egg sinkers on Carolina rigs with the red An alternative to using skipjack: We could have used the “Stoopid” rig – a stupid name Slide a HitchHiker rigging devise on a 2/0 or 3/0 Bleeding Bait Wide Circle hook to The reason for the Wide Circle hook is that you don’t set it. When fishing the boils Next week guide Jim Duckworth will share some of his secrets and I’ll also tell you Link: Read the Article
4.154.28.145
Wednesday, 08/31/05
With Vernon Summerlin
stripers.
below Old Hickory Dam with Doug Markham.
Dams; they’re featured in Part II.
and Hugh” show on Channel 50 and his Saturday mornings call-in radio show on
WWTN (99.7 FM).
day. Dead skipjack work just as well as live ones and there are some big fish in upper
Cheatham Lake.
boils down to the launching ramp picking up three- to five-pound stripers, catfish, and
sauger.
room for a boat but it would have been crowed and very inconsiderate of us to park so
closely to them – besides, drift fishing works very well.
about 20 small skipjack in the livewell, where they lived for only a short time.
it’s alive or dead?”
meal as it drifted by, alive or dead. It proved to be sound reasoning because we kept
catching stripers with dead bait.
quickly caught a four-pound striper on a dead skipjack.
and I needed to get home to medicate our golden retriever who had Rocky Mountain
spotted fever. But…
made one more cast. I had to hurry my retrieve because Doug got hit hard.
Crank up and follow the fish!” old Dougie hollered. And we did.
had a 10- to 12-pounder. We followed it downstream toward the lock wall where his
line became snagged on some rocks.
success, he started second-guessing himself. “If I had tightened the drag more…blah,
blah, blah.”
weaving the line from around a few rocks, the fish took off.
turn, and come peacefully to the boat.
to net it. Not even half of the fish went into the net. It wouldn’t fit in the livewell. We
guesstimated it weighed about 40 pounds.
But I told Doug to let me put my hook in its mouth before turning it loose. He just
smirked at me with distaste saying, “Get real, Summerlin,” as he slid it back into the
water.
used a 1/2-ounce egg sinker on his Carolina rig with a 3/0 Bleeding Bait Wide Circle
Daiichi hook.
Our skipjack were four to six inches long. Doug liked the larger ones and I, the
smaller.
3/0 Wide Circle hooks.
but very effective. A plastic Split Tail Shad is substituted for live or dead skipjack.
the bottom of the bend, screw the HitchHiker into the plastic bait, and cast it on a
Carolina rig.
where the hits are fast, circle hooks are simply easier and surer – the fish does the
hook-set for you.
about two other hot dams to fish this fall. Happy Hooking!
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