For You Trotliners

[Martin]

The Flatheads are starting to bite. I got a 13 1/2 pounder last night and it's twin the night before. I only have one short line out right now. I think it should only get better over the next month or so. Using whatever sunfish I can catch with a tiny tube on an ultra-lite. (Half the fun is catching the bait).

[Hunter91]

Congrats!! Sounds like some good eating

[Martin]

Well I'll kick this ole dog one more time. lol.

Got another nice Flathead last night. It is noticeably bigger then the other two. I haven't weighed it yet due to OLD batteries in the scale. We'll get that fixed later this evening !

Hey Hunter91, I see where Lakebumbs record Yellow Perch has been beat. A whoping 1 pound, 11 ozs I believe is the new record. See the story right here on OA's home page.

[mclothier1]

Martin,

What part of the lake are you trotlining?

Ill be there in a month with my family. Im not much into trotline action, but some of the other guys in the family are.

We are staying on the west side of DD point.

I dont think we are picking the right places to set them up, but ????

We usually locate them in the back of coves kinda out of the way so we hopefully dont bother anyone. We check them several times a day, and at least once at night.

We also bait them with sunfish. This year I might try trapping some crawdads to put on the lines.

any trotline tips you could share would be appreciated.

thanks!

[Sam]

On Tuesday I went out of Cape Fair and fished Piney Creek and coves around there. We caught a bunch of white bass and crappie, and I reported on that in another thread. What I didn't mention is that we talked with a couple of guys who were catching perch to bait their trotlines with.

They'd been doing real well and told us they'd caught several big flatheads. They held up a huge blue cat, 30 lbs. or so, to show us.

We saw a couple of trotlines while we were fishing Piney Creek and the cove below it, I don't know if they belonged to the guys we talked to or not. They were obviously being tended and were well maintained, and they were tied between stick-ups in about 20 feet of water pretty close to the cove mouths.

In case he doesn't see your question, Martin lives on the Cow Creek cove a couple of miles by water down from Kimberling City, so I'm sure his trotlining is around there.

[Martin]

Mclothier1, Sam is correct. I'm in the lower lake and just across from the DD road "maze". I use timbered coves and keep my line short mainly because the longer the line, the more chance of it getting hung up in a submerged tree if a good sized fish gets on. I usually try and run the line parallel to shore in anywhere from 11 to22 feet of water. Tie between stickups and pull the line tight. I put one good sized weight in the middle which will pull the line down 5, 6, maybe 7 feet down.

You don't have to get way deep to catch Flatheads at night. If you're on the DD point area, you are very close to Spring Branch which has probably hundreds of un-tapped places to trotline. Just please, remove the lines when you are done with them. And good luck !

[Hunter91]

Hey Martin,

I knew about LB's record being broken. MDC notified him of it shortly after the new record came in. You must be right about the flatheads. I fished the Baxter area today caught several short bass, some rock bass and bluegill and one 5.5lb flathead caught on a swimming minnow on a chunk rock point. May have to try the trotline and limb lines.

[mclothier1]

Martin,

Yeah we are right across the lake from cow creek, we have run our trotlines there a couple years ago and only caught one flathead all week.

And yeah we maintain them, also have metal tags with our names on each line, and removed when we leave.

I dont think I have heard of spring branch? where would that be?

[5 Keepers]

Martin,

Yeah we are right across the lake from cow creek, we have run our trotlines there a couple years ago and only caught one flathead all week.

And yeah we maintain them, also have metal tags with our names on each line, and removed when we leave.

I dont think I have heard of spring branch? where would that be?

Little Cow is just above Point 6 Cow Creek is just below it and Spring Branch is the next one down.

[mclothier1]

Thanks, 5 K

I think this is our 5th or 6th year staying at Lone Pine, and I still dont know the names of all the coves and spots. But Im getting better!

One thing I am good at.... catching the bait! I can sit on the dock and catch 70-80 sunfish in no time at all! I guess you can say im the bait master.