Running Slide Divers and Slide Diver Lite Bites
Running slide divers on Lake Ontario has its time and place. On our Lake Ontario fishing charters, we can be found using them for multiple species at different times of the year. There are a few subtle differences we employ depending on the species and the time of year. We will discuss them in this article.
When the water is cold on or near the surface and the fish are high in the column, they can be real spooky. This goes for most of the species we target including brown trout, steelhead, and salmon. Getting the bait far away from the boat helps generate bites when fish are suspended or hugging bottom in 30 feet or less. This is one area where running slide diver shine!
Setting Out The Rigs
Running slide divers allows us to stretch the baits significantly behind the slide diver, much more so than a conventional dipsey diver. Typically, we run our baits around 40 ft. behind the slide diver. To get our baits away from the boat and farther to the side, we dial the slide diver out to a 4 setting. It really helps to have a line counter reel when deploying slide divers.
When running slide divers or most other conventional divers, knowing where they are running in the water column is paramount to success. Using the Fishhawk TD takes all of the guess work out of the set-up. The TD will tell you exactly where in the column your divers are running. More specifically where the diver itself is tracking in the water column.
Where the lure itself is running can be a bit deeper depending on what type of lure it is. For example, a J-Plug will dive to around 6 ft. by itself and must be figured into the equation. Spoons and floating stick baits behave much differently. It pays to know the dive curves of the baits that you are running.
Lite Bites
Fishing spring browns requires finesse. Leadering down to 6-8 pound florocarbon increases bites especially in clear water. Here, we like to use slide diver lite bites which allows for a lighter pressure setting to trip the diver! The Slide Diver Lite Bite will not trip while deployed until you do so. We set up the slide and lite bite divers basically the same. Our main line is 50 lb test Fins spectra Braid. Next, we splice in a 30 ft. section of 20 lb. test Ande florocarbon which is terminated to a Spro Power swivel with a bead in front of it. Last, we attach a 10-15 ft. section of the appropriate pound test of flourocarbon to a snap or snap swivel.
Here are some related articles worth exploring:
Actual Dipsey Diver-Downrigger Depth
Lake Ontario King Salmon Charters