Thread: Solo Cranking Run

After a day of instruction by Wiskers on trolling cranks and setting up my birds, I decided to jump in. I took a buddy and we hit Blood River on Ky Lake, Thursday for trolling cranks in the 100 degree heat index. It was an adventure to say the least. Wiskers made it look easy working the I Pilot with the remote and reading the bird 98's while working 4 rods and overseeing my back rods at the same time, but when I settled into the from seat to do it, suddenly I had severe doubts. However, we got the rods out from the rear rod holders without any treble hooks attachment to flesh or other body parts and off we went.

Lesson #1, make small adjustments with the right/left buttons on the tm remote!! If not, severe line weaving will occur with the lines out the back.

Lesson #2, Continual staring at the monitor in glee at finally seeing what is in the bottom of the lake without looking up occasionally will make interesting frantic button punching on the remote and stomping on the foot pedals at the same time to keep from grounding on the bank.

Lesson #3, Statements similar to, "Wow, look at the size of that brush pile on the monitor!", follows immediately with cries of, "We're hung up!"

Lesson #4, This cranking stuff works and is Addictive!

We spent the day trolling the bay and ending up with 4 crappie 12-14 inches, 8 yellow belly's, 1 drum, 1 large catfish, and one bass. We only lost one crank bait. After using cranks and road runners, all our action, with the exception of one yellow belly, came from the cranks. While cleaning the fish I took time to appreciate the members of this site with their advice and kind remarks. Thanks to bbg on some great humminbirds, Pappy and others on advise about rods/reels, my buddy billy for the professional boat wiring, my buddy jimmy for advise on fish finders and lake cards, Rick for the humminbird covers and installing them, the guys at union city marine working on the war eagle, and finally Wiskers who answered all my newbie/rookie questions.

Lesson #5, Next outing, stop being so excited on catching large crappie on cranks and take pictures!

Thx ifish, we did find some but the worst couple of run ins were with the road runners. We were lucky with the crank hang ups by pulling all but one loose.