Elite fishermen share Lake Erie tactics

[Spiel]

Elite fishermen share Lake Erie tactics

 

 

August 10, 2008

Rod Watson / buffalonews.com

 

 

Local anglers might regard Lake Erie as a structure fisherman’s paradise because of steep breaklines in areas such as Seneca Shoal, Waverly Shoal and Meyers Reef.

 

But the pros who scorched the smallmouth during last weekend’s Bassmaster Elite Series tournament call Erie a “dishpan” and found their big fish in the relatively flat areas most weekend anglers ignore.

 

“A lot of people think it’s got to be like a 10-foot drop,” said former Bassmaster Classic champ Michael Iaconelli, who finished fifth while fishing not far outside the Small Boat Harbor. “What holds these fish is just a tiny break, 1 to 3 feet.”

 

Pro Brian Snowden, for instance, found fish in an area that dropped from 30 to 34 feet — but was so flat that he had to cover nearly 100 feet of water just to get that 4-foot change in depth.

 

So how do the pros find these barely perceptible spots?

 

“Use a good graph and locate the bait fish on the humps,” was winner Kotaro Kiriyama’s succinct advice.

 

But it’s not quite that easy.

 

“I drive around a lot looking at my electronics,” said first-day leader Matt Reed. He runs back and forth over an area at slow speed “looking for the depth changes, rocks and that sort of stuff.”

 

“We spend a lot more time idling around looking for things than we do fishing,” said Snowden, who finished 15th in the field of 106. In a 12- hour practice day, he said, the pros might spend only three to four hours with a lure in the water and the rest of that time motoring around.

 

One key in that tedious search is to use the graph’s “zoom” function, which a lot of weekend anglers never utilize. It zeroes in on the portion of the water column near the bottom, accentuating the small contour changes.

 

Todd Faircloth, for example, fished an area that dropped from 28 to 32 feet.

 

“It’s really hard to see that if you don’t have your zoom chart on,” said Faircloth, who temporarily moved into first place in the Bassmaster Angler of the Year race with his sixth-place finish here.

 

While looking for those little contour changes, the pros also look for fish, which are easy to spot — along with your lure — on today’s sophisticated fish-finders. In fact, on Erie the fish are deep enough that they aren’t scared off by the boat. That allows what’s been dubbed “video game fishing.”

 

You fish a drop-shot — a small plastic worm or minnow on a hook tied 12 inches or so above the sinker, with a swivel to prevent line twist — directly under the boat. You can actually see the swivel, worm and sinker on the graph as they descend — and then watch the bass come and take the bait.

 

“I’m pretty much seeing [on the graph] all the fish I’m catching this week,” Faircloth said during the tournament.

 

The other thing to look for are the gobies, the tiny invaders that are welcomed by bass and the anglers who chase them.

 

The bass feed on the gobies, said Iaconelli, who fished his drop-shots with tungsten weights because “tungsten is super hard, so you can feel everything on the bottom.”

 

Feel for the spot when the sinker starts hitting rubble instead of smooth bottom, and feel for the tap, tap, tap of the gobies.

 

The key on Lake Erie? That’s simple, according to Iaconelli: Find the rubble and the gobies in the same spot.

 

“You know you’re going to get bit when that happens,” he said.