Cumberland Striper

I'll start by saying I'm green when it comes to striper fishing but I sure want to figure it out. I pulled shinners on four down rods on Saturday afternoon and Sunday morning. Carolina rigged with 1.5 oz. weights, 6 foot leaders and 3" to 4" shinners. I counted off line between 50' and 75' and trolled at about 20% on my motor; from the looks of the angle of my line I'd guess I was down about 38' to 65' feet. I stayed in about 95' to 125' of water and saw fish on my electronics most of the time. I pulled all over the mouth of Indian and across from it Saturday. Sunday morning I pulled from Indian to the dam on the south side. Nothing! Any advise for a rookie. Any advise would be great as I plan to try it again over the Thanksgiving holiday. On a good note, my son, dad and I fished the C-river a couple of times and kept 20 fish and my 11 year old boy released 2 slot rainbows just over 19".

A few tips would be to troll around first that try to find what depth the schools of baitfish are and try to put your bait at that or a little above that depth. I was down a couple of weeks ago and did not find one single school of shad on the main lake or any in the creeks. They should be getting shallower and shallower these days so make sure you are not trolling too deep. When you say "Counted Off" the line, hopefully you was using a line counter for it is real easy to get too much line out. If you was not, they are pretty cheap at Bass Pro. Don't just troll in a straight line, Swing back and forth when trolling for the lines on the inside of the swing will slow down and the outside will speed up. If you get a hit in the swing this will tell you to speed up or slow down your straight trolling depending on which side of the boat the hit came on. Keep an eye on your graph and when you go over a big school, time it so that your baits will "Settle" down into the school. By Thanksgiving the shad should start moving up into the creeks some so check out the first 1/2 mile or so of the major creeks for jumps or other activity. Vary your shiner size, try the biggest in the box and the smallest for the Stripers will go in spurts and sometimes want bigger or smaller food. Don't just put your lines out and troll all day long. Reel them in and change depths plus see if the shiner is still on board. I have trolled all day before then reeled in my 5 lines to see that 3 of them were Shiner-less. Especially, the bigger ones can work themselves free by thrashing around and working the hook free. I don't know why I am typing this for I fished for 3 days and only landed 1 keeper so I am not much an authority but this is what I would try. Good Luck and hopefully some of the other "Better Striper Fishermen" than me will chime in for some more advice.

Not a better striper fisherman. We were down last Thurs./Fri and didn't catch anything. We did mark some fish and shad up in the ck about 1 mile. Saw a couple of individual fish hitting shad on top, but that was it.

Elnut, you said earlier you were a big, ugly guy...you need to be more specific on Lake Cumberland. You don't use a very unique back floater do you?

No unique back floater here, and as far as Cumberland goes, my trip a couple of weeks back was my first to the lake in over a year. My guess is that it will be my last for a while as well. Used to fish C Land for smallies until I found that other hole in the ground that holds water called DALE HOLLOW. Never made a trip targeting smallies to Cumberland since and won't ever again unless they drain the Hollow. Big Ugly Guy, Tracker Pro V 17 with 90 Mercury usually fishing by myself at Dale or Ky Lake.

Thanks for the reply; It's great that we rookies are willing to share and learn from each other. I'll take your advise and employ it on my Thanksgiving holiday trip; maybe I'll be able to put my dad and son on some fish. Wish more folks would share info; every time I'm out, there's lots out fishing but few sharing.

If you are headed to Cumberland over Thanksgiving, there is a good chance that the stripers will be up shallow by then. They'll do this when the lake turns over. They'll also head back in the creeks. You can use the planers/live bait during the day, or find some mud flats and hit them with jigs or cranks after dark. Can be a good time for stripers.

Andrew

I fished early Saturday and had one takedown on a shiner. As the day went on I pulled 8 rods at different depths with no luck. I watched 3 other boats (guides) using alewives and they all caught fish in the same area I was. I really think the type of bait you use does matter. Shiners will work but the prefered food is the alewive.

Good Luck!!