Musky trolling baits

I am thinking about trying my hand at trolling for musky and I am looking for any info that will help. Lures? Colors? General areas? Speed?

Thanks,
Greg

I’m going to try some Ernies, I’ll run between 2.5 and 4.0 mph. I have heard some guys run up to 6 mph.

I was thinking about doing the same thing. Looked at the Ernie it dives pretty deep for ML?

If it is in your budget, I would recommend a 12″ Supernatural Headlock or two. These baits hunt and wander, triggering strikes when other lures don’t. Otherwise, 10″ Jakes work great too. To mix it up, I run a jointed bait like a jointed Legend Perch Bait.

Cheers and hook-sets!

Was thinking about trying a big dirty from Northmen. They have a cool action.

Fished with a guy last summer that always has out at least one five of diamond spoons. He also like to include a lure or two in the prop was.

There are many great lures out there that you can use trolling. If you are going to troll inline spinners, make sure to have a great swivel. When trolling I like to attach my lures on with split rings instead of quick snaps. Good luck.

I’m new to the musky trolling game but based on 3 weekends of experience my go to bait is quickly became the Rapala bent lip Super SSR. Last summer I started off with a Jake, inline spinner, and Rapala bent-lip shad… After running them approximately equal time in the water on my first 2 weekends of learning to troll the big baits I had 5 strikes on the SSR and zero hits on either of the others. I added a few more SSRs to my game this Spring and it paid off almost immediately with my son’s first Muskie experience and then my new personal best on back-to-back trips.

Will

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If trolling in the weeds I like running bucktails or spinner baits. Super bou, cowgirls, ghost tails, lungen tails etc. If trolling on breaklines and open water you can still run blades, but sometimes crankbaits work better. Jakes, grandmas, giant flat sticks, Depth Raiders, headlocks, etc. I wish their was an easy answer on which ones to buy, but you really cant go wrong with a black double bladed bucktail in size 8 or 10 colorado blades and a 10″ jake or grandma. As far as speed goes I usually stay around 3.2 mph. Don’t be afraid to speed up and slow down here and there too.

Hope this helps!

Thanks for all the info. Has anyone tried trolling a Waxwing? I won one in a raffle after a musky tourney and the action looks cool. Check out the video.

Pauleye wrote:

I was thinking about doing the same thing. Looked at the Ernie it dives pretty deep for ML?

I was out playing with it tonight. 30# Braid @ 3.0 mph with 175 feet of line I was running 24′ deep. So, playing with the amount of line out and the speed you should be able to run one on Mille Lacs. However for Mille Lacs I think I would run a Rapala Super Shad @ 2.5 mph. Great action but won’t run as deep. You likely are also running heavier line or braid.

No less than 5 mph.! Super Shad Rap or a “Junior Husky” 5 of diamonds is all you need…NO less than 5 mph.

I HATE trolling for muskies..LOL

For those of you wondering about running depths, I would recommend Musky Mike’s Trolling Secrets. It’s a book giving trolling depths for musky lures with various line weights and amount of line. Here’s an example for the Erie, since Brian was talking about it. I got it on the Google Play Bookstore, so it’s with me on my phone.

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Aaron, I don’t see a allowance for speed or is that covered elsewhere. I assume pulling a Ernie (or other bait) faster will drive it down farther?

I am not sure how much of a difference speed makes with cranks. But it will be interesting to hear what people have to say.

I believe that he maintains speed does not affect depth of trolled crankbaits. Not a physics guy, but I’ve always understood crank it down fast to get it to its max depth, but once it’s there, it won’t keep going deeper no matter the speed.

From what I’ve found speed doesn’t play a huge role. Obviously with something such as a bulldawg pounder the slower you go the deeper it runs but for most crankbaits trolling at 2.5-4MPH I don’t think you will see a significant difference in depth if any.

Will Roseberg wrote:

I’m new to the musky trolling game but based on 3 weekends of experience my go to bait is quickly became the Rapala bent lip Super SSR. Last summer I started off with a Jake, inline spinner, and Rapala bent-lip shad… After running them approximately equal time in the water on my first 2 weekends of learning to troll the big baits I had 5 strikes on the SSR and zero hits on either of the others. I added a few more SSRs to my game this Spring and it paid off almost immediately with my son’s first Muskie experience and then my new personal best on back-to-back trips.

Will

I will have to try some of these. I always thought they were too small

Pat McSharry wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>Will Roseberg wrote:</div>
I’m new to the musky trolling game but based on 3 weekends of experience my go to bait is quickly became the Rapala bent lip Super SSR. Last summer I started off with a Jake, inline spinner, and Rapala bent-lip shad… After running them approximately equal time in the water on my first 2 weekends of learning to troll the big baits I had 5 strikes on the SSR and zero hits on either of the others. I added a few more SSRs to my game this Spring and it paid off almost immediately with my son’s first Muskie experience and then my new personal best on back-to-back trips.

Will

I will have to try some of these. I always thought they were too small

I think a lot of it has to do with the bait source where I’m fishing as well. I think the Super SSR is perfect for lakes where Panfish are the primary forage base and the lake I’m on is small and has bluegills, crappies, perch, and bullheads. For a lake where there’s a population of larger baitfish such as tullibees or Ciscos I would expect that the larger profile baits with a slower wobble like a Jake would work much better.