# Trolling in a Yak???



## Ry440 (May 11, 2011)

So I've been thinking about this for a while. I wanna try trolling for walleye at my local reservoir. How should I go about this, as many details as possible are greatly appreciated! (btw, I'm from Lorain county and always looking for yakin friends)


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## Bowhunter57 (Feb 9, 2011)

Ry440,
KeithOH is the one that I blame for getting me addicted to trolling.  It works great and for a large number of species of fish.

You'll have to sit in you kayak and remember where your paddle strokes will be, so that you're not hitting the rods while you troll. You don't want them too far out of reach, but at the same time you don't want to be wacking them with the paddle either.

Traveling/trolling at approx. 1.5 m.p.h. (according to the gps on the fishfinder) seems to be the optimum speed for most lures to perform well and to get a good hook set. 

Hopefully, there will be some others that will post their pics of their kayaks with their rod holder set ups. Here's my Vapor.


















Also, here's a pic of my transducer mount. It works great, doesn't get snagged on anything...but, it takes about 20 to 30 minutes for to get an accurate water temp. reading. The black putty surrounding the transducer is Duct Seal.

















Bowhunter57


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## Ry440 (May 11, 2011)

Bowhunter57 said:


> Ry440,
> 
> Also, here's a pic of my transducer mount. It works great, doesn't get snagged on anything...but, it takes about 20 to 30 minutes for to get an accurate water temp. reading. The black putty surrounding the transducer is Duct Seal.
> 
> ...


Thanks for the advice! Is your transducer a thru hull? What fish finder do you suggest?


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## backlashed (Mar 19, 2011)

Larry and I both use the Scotty triple mount for our rods holders. It allows you to troll with 2 rods and mount your graph between. I'll post a pic of my setup sometime, I have a few more Scotty doo-dadds attached to mine. 


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## Bowhunter57 (Feb 9, 2011)

Ry440 said:


> Thanks for the advice! Is your transducer a thru hull? What fish finder do you suggest?


Ry440,
The transducer reads through the plastic...there's no hole in the hull plastic. The "trick" is to not allow any air bubbles to get trapped between the Duct Seal and the hull...also the transducer and the Duct Seal. I used some windex to clean the hull, rolled the block of Duct Seal on to it, then pressed the transducer into the Duct Seal...all the way to the bottom and then pressed the edges around the transducer to hold it in place. It's never moved. 

As for suggestions...if you get a b & w screen, get a high resolution, like a 16 bit. I opted for the base model color screen in an Eagle. Most of the base color models are the same price as a high quality/resolution b & w screen. I prefer the seperation of opjects with a color screen. Also, a GPS is a good feature, as it will help you mark an area where you're catching fish and it'll tell your travel speed for what works best while trolling.

Bowhunter57


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## GanderRob (Mar 30, 2012)

How long can you go before having to recharge your battery?


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## USMC_Galloway (May 13, 2011)

If I had to put a number on mine, I would say 12 ish hours, or 2 day trips. I have a higher grade model than you will find on most yaks. For the basic FF's you could get 3-4 trips out of them before you had to charge. 

I have never had mine go out in one day of fishing, and I do some marathon kayak fishing,(10-12 hours). 

As for trolling, it is an amazing thing from a yak. As Dan said, it is very important to keep the rod holders out of your stroke.


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## Bowhunter57 (Feb 9, 2011)

GanderRob,
I agree with Larry about the amount of time a charge lasts. I never charge mine through the summer months, because it's the battery for my rider mower.  So, it gets charged once a week.

Also, I purchased a soft sided lunch pail to carry it in and that works out great. It has a hard plastic interior box that holds the battery very well and all I do is unzip one end of it for the terminal connections.

Bowhunter57


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## RebelWithACause122 (Mar 29, 2011)

I can't remember the amp-hour rating on the battery I use for my Fish Finder, but it is about 2.5 inches by 4 inches by 7 inches, and I would estimate that I get at LEAST 40 hours out of it. Hard to say for sure, but I do know that I charged it up in March this year and haven't charged it yet SINCE. According to my handheld GPS, I've put over 45 miles on my kayak this year, all of those miles have been on lakes, no rivers, and while I have spent a lot of time trolling, I've also spent hours working slowly along a shoreline. I would estimate that I've got somewhere between 40 and 50 hours of use so far on this charge. I've never run it all the way down, since the battery instructions say that it's fine to charge it from a "partially-discharged" state, and I always figured that I'd rather charge it extra often than have it run out on me... but now I kinda wanna know just how long it'll go.


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## silverbullet (Apr 14, 2004)

i use a 7 amp hour battery to power my light and ff. Works great. Ive attached a pic of my set up facing forward last night, Yes, i fished after dark trolling for eyes off lorain. Ended up with one miss and one 26 incher. Everything worked great.


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## BJR (Apr 11, 2012)

A good method for walleye is drift fishing. With a fair wind at you back and a nightcrawler harness, you can do a slow drift which will probably give you the speed you will want for walleye. Sometimes I will paddle into the wind for a long while and enjoy a lazy drift back to my starting point. If you enjoy drifting, you can adjust your speed with a drift sock or even a small pail tied to a rope.


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