Lost of lot of fishing time

Cleaning up tangles.

Yesterday I was trolling - a Brad's cut plug, an actual cut plug herring with a helmet, and a thumper spinner.

The spinner was fine, except constantly pulling it up to clean the weeds off - so much for trolling close to the bottom, but at least the tackle was working.

With the others, I kept getting everything twisted up on itself and also with the dropper (18" dropper off a slider, 6 oz and 8 oz). Of course when this happens you don't really know it, and its a knotfest and the twists are permanently set in the leader so I just had to chop it up and retie.

I had bead chain swivels and barrel swivels at both ends, no flasher. My theory is that once something picks up a weed, the swivels/chains don't spin any more but the bait continues spinning and you get a wonderful twist up.

Also, my technique was to hold onto the cannonball until I was in motion, then release the weight, but maybe that's backwards ? Should I be dropping the weight and holding the bait until the rig starts to trail, then throw the bait in and then let out line to get to depth ?

I've had this happen while trolling from a PB also, apparently I'm not doing anything particularly wrong, or the guys I was with are also idiots (more than normal for PBers, I mean).

Try this, shorten your dropper length to 8" and use weed guards above your swivels.  You can also use a two section leader with heavier line in front and lighter line on the hooks.

On deployment, I let my rig  run beside about a foot down for a few seconds to check for herring spin and then slowly lower it to the bottom.

You should have said something Pinstriper, I would have helped get you deployed without the tangled. Next trip out we will set up early and get you rigged to match mine and work on deployment technique.   

You should have said something Pinstriper, I would have helped get you deployed without the tangled. Next trip out we will set up early and get you rigged to match mine and work on deployment technique.

I DID tell you, and the only fishing advice you gave out all day was "don't do anything to prepare".

Corey, back me up, here.

I know I heard it... After he caught his salmon!

Come on now I showed y'all my rig while we were getting preped. Thinking about a repeat performance Tuesday or Wednesday if someone want to go.

I've always wondered about the tangling issue. What do you guys think about trangle flashers vs dodgers? Seems like the thumping of a dodger can be used as feedback the gears' working correctly.