Buckboard 6/19 - 6/20

We fished from Buckboard Friday and Saturday and enjoyed some great weather for fishing, but the catching eluded us for the most part. Guess we were about due for that substantial humbling as we were getting big heads as to our Kokanee prowess based on our last couple trips. There were a few boats picking up some fish, but judging from the radio and the ramp there were a good number of others doing as poor or worse than us.

Bill shook off couple small kokes first thing Friday morning, then nada except a couple small Mack pups and rainbows untill we went back to the camper for lunch and a nap at 2. Went back out at 5 and almost thought we weren't going to have a koke dinner until about 7 PM when we picked up a couple 2.5 pounders. Those both came on a chartruese dick Nite spoon a foot above and three back from a Rapala Deep Tail Dancer that we were long lining. A bit nontraditional, but the downriggers set ups were not doing it so we had added that and a planer board out to one side.

Sat we fished from 5:30 until 1, including a stint with the circling fleet between Squaw Hollow and Skunk Cliffs, and only hooked up with one small Mack pup near Big Bend.

Thought maybe we'd go down to Lucerne, but decided to call it and come back later. It was raining as hard when we got home as when we had left on Thursday. We'll be back after the weather stabilizes for a bit.

Sorry the catching wasnt better for you but at least you had a good time. I am leaving Tuesday for a week up there I hope we can have a few catching days. I am going after Macs for a few days also. Hopefully they will cooperate. Either way, I am not at work, Out with friends and I am fishing. Cant complain about that.thumbsup

Smokepoles, I dont know if you got the idea from me or thought of it yourself but it is almost always in my spread. I tie a three foot leader to the eye ring of the hook on the taildancer. I sometimes use a 2oz snap weight 40 ft in front of the TDD, then back another 60 off the board. I have caught a lot of fish on that set-up including the first Koke of the trip the last time I was down there. I caught a 24" mac on the TTD here on Jackson Lake on Friday evening. I call it the cutthroat killer here because while downrigging for macs I always flatline that set-up and usualy land some nice cutties on it. I run needlefish or serpents off the TTD. It is always good to try different things to catch fish. You never know what they will want . JL

Had thought about it for a while and read a couple things about trolling double rigs. I run mine a bit different: I put a barrel swivel in line with about a foot of line (10 or 12 lb same as main) to the TDD 11. Above the swivel I use a clip swivel, 3 ft 8lb line, and small, light spoon.

Does putting the spoon directly from the TDD effect its action or ability to dive?

BTW, I also ran a new set of in line planers and really liked them. They did well with the set up described before, even through a good chop, but not sure that they could handle the 2 oz weight. We'll try them for hybrid stripers this week as planers are the standard rigging. Check them out along with a link to the video: www.swboards.com