Kim City - Nov 22 - Deep bite with regular Fluke

[Dock-in-it]

Fished this morning and had a good limit early. The fish were postured around trees by a 40 to 60 ft drop. The regular Fluke worked good (5/16 head) and one on a swimbait. I decided to commit to active target this morning and it worked good. When fishing deep,  forward facing sonar has its challenges.  The boat is slightly moving, the fish are moving and your descending bait is moving. And compared to 2D sonar, you are interested in 1 inch of the screen vs the full screen on forward facing. The Ghost trolling motor pedal is super sensitive and will move way too much with just the slightest pressure. So that makes it difficult to track your bait away from the boat.

I was able to catch them under the boat today.

WT about 58.

[Johnsfolly]

Congrats on a couple of nice bass! I love throwing a fluke, but have never tried them in that deep of water. Maybe if I wasn't fishing from the bank that would help 😅

[bobby b.]

1 hour ago, Dock-in-it said:

postured around trees by a 40 to 60 ft drop

Excellent - so did you present the Fluke vertically or was horizontal movement of the bait needed?

Also does Lowrance "active target" have an adjustment for down viewing only and did/would that help?

[sfiser]

I'm also interested in how you were fishing it.  Casting and working it vs. fishing it vertically.  Also, do you mind telling us what jighead that is? 

 

[Dock-in-it]

With the fluke, it works pretty good vertical because you normally have to keep it right on top of them for several seconds. If I see fish up to 20ft away I will flip to them and if they ignore it I will move the boat over them to keep the bait in their face. It is pretty difficult to fish a horizontal presentation aiming for a particular fish because the fish will not sit still and it takes your bait numerous seconds to fall prior to starting the horizontal retrieve. So if the fish moves left, right, up, or down the horizontal retrieve is wasted. Trying to track your lure on a horizontal retrieve is pretty tough. 

Active Target does allow you to physically adjust the transducer for down vs forward. I believe you need to keep it in forward position. The forward mode does a pretty good job of looking straight down. The forward mode helps with searching. I wish you could touch a button to alternate between down and forward. 

The forward mode is fairly easy to make an accurate cast if the transducer is pointing straight ahead. If the transducer is pointing left or right it is extremely difficult for me to make an accurate cast and see my bait.

The jig head is a 5/16 with a simple round head and a 4/0 gamakatsu hook. These jigs are poured by a friend using a standard mould. Gamakatsu makes a lighter wire 3/0 that I will use on my next batch of jigs (stock 11413-25).