How to Rig a Bottom Bouncer?
We’ll just state the obvious. Fishing for walleye is just plain fun. Thrilling and fast-paced, catching walleye means an angler has to be quick-thinking when it comes to fishing this predator. That’s why we asked walleye expert, Dale Gilbert, to share his extensive walleye knowledge with us. A walleye master, Dale, has fished walleye from Arkansas to Canada and Michigan to Montana, and he doesn’t disappoint.
When setting up a rod for a bottom bouncer, you can use the same rods that you use for crankbait trolling. Watch and learn as walleye expert, Dale Gilbert, shares his best tips for trolling for walleye with rigs.
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Video Transcription
Setting up a Rod for Rigging for Walleyes
We're going to talk about setting up a rod for rigging for walleyes and it's basically something that you're going to troll for walleyes with some sort of weight to get things to the bottom, some sort of a leader, and basically I use the same rods that I used for crank bait trolling. Again, this is a Swate Local Series rod. This is again, the eight and a half footer with a 10 pound Fireline, and basically what I do is I tie things on like a bottom bouncer and this right here is probably one of my favorite bottom bouncers to me.
Best System Out There
It's the best system that's out there today. This is actually called a FinTech bottom bouncer sir. It's a quick change system, but I'll take and tie this on to my Fireline with a Palomar knot. I've got the quick change weights where I could pull the little rubber stopper out, slide my weight off like this, and I can go anywhere from one half ounce up to a four ounce weight.
So literally all you do is you'll take and slide up until you get to that D, put it up over that D ring, and then take that rubber stopper and push it into the end of it like so, and that creates your weight. In this case, I've got a one and a half ounce weight, and then to this weight for rigging, it's got a little swivel and a snap here. I'll take whatever I happen to think is going to be the winner for the day. In this case, I've tied this up with about a three foot leader, hook that to your swivel clip on your bottom bouncer, and you're good to go.
The Bottom Bouncer
So here's my bottom bouncer, if you can picture this hooked up to my line from my trolling rod. So this is going to go on like this with a little spinner and it makes for a super, super setup for rigging for walleyes, and you can do this again, with a variety of rigs. Slow death rigs are one of my favorites. These little maxlier spinners are one of my favorites. They do a really, really good job. They'll spin a lot easier than a regular spinner will. Makes for a really, really good set up.
Again, the quick change, so if I get a little bit deeper water and I want to fish in 20 to 25 foot of water, I can take that off and put a two and a half, three ounce weight, and I'm good to go. That's my perfect setup for trolling for walleyes with rigs.
If you've got any questions or need any further information, just stop by any of the North 40 Outfitters stores or check the website at north40.com. Thanks for watching and hope to see you again. Thanks.