I have to admit... I do it fairly often. If I have people on my boat that aren't "diehards" (such as my wife) I like to give them as much action as possible. If the salmon aren't cooperating up top, I find a pod of lakers down deep and target them.
I'll find a deep hole and if I'm marking fish down deep, but not right on bottom, I drop a couple riggers to within a few feet of their depth. Sometimes I try to slow down a bit... but other times I go the same speed with higher lines as well, in hopes a salmon may bite too.
I like doing this with lures right behind the ball so I can turn sharp and keep circling the pod until they start biting. Seems like it depends which direction I'm going sometimes to get them to bite.
Did this with my brother Saturday and ended up getting salmon down there... not lakers??? (88 feet down!)

We do not go specifically for lakers. I was hopping for a salomn to take to Mom & Dad but they did not cooperate. We actually were not changing anything and catching both. For some reason last time out, more lakers were bitting then salomn. For us anyhow. We were trying to figure if it was dirrection we were going but caught both going same dirrection. So much for change in speed. We were going 1.8 - 2.2 according to GPS. We shall see what happens Thursday.

We have been pretty much catching lakers inter changably with salmon is seems some days more lakers than others but usualy more salmon. The only exception is if I do see a pod of lakers will sometimes drop the rigger down to them or even a bit below and trip the line rrelease and let the lure flutter up though them. This method works enough of the time for me to make it worth the work of resetting. It's also a good way to hang lures becuase someimes we are just about on the bottom doing this. We also will just drop down a little deeper and troll for them too. Red head smeltgun has caught a lot of lakers for me this summer along with some other things. still trying to catch and 8 plus pounder this year : )

Glen

Glen

saturday we ran 2 leadcore setups with flies 7to 8 colors and 2 riggers with hardware at 40 and 45 feet and caught 5 lakers on lead and 2lakers on riggers and no salmon . sunday started out with 2 leadcore with same flies and depth same area and time and nothing so switch to 2 riggers with hardware at 55 and 65 feet and caught 1 small but fat salmon at 8:30 then dropped them down to 90 to 95 feet and started to hit the lakers . fished till 1:30 20 lakers 18 to 25 inches same color, depth , and area. alot of doubles would fight a fish stop the boat then start up right after and fish on . does anyone know what those little parasites are that are attached to the lakers .they look like little squids .

Hey Reel It In, how do you get them babies to bite at 90+ feet, the bottoms covered with them by DeepHaven at Squam.

I got a 7 pounder to bite earlier this year at 66 feet in 90+ feet of water, Salmon weren't biting so we dropped it down to 55', have done it before but never got any takers.

We catch about 3 or 4 a year, usualy small, caught a 9 pounder a few years back and a 5 and a 7 this year, except for the 7 pounder, we were never targeting them. On Winni seems you can't stop them from taking a bite, target Salmon and you get 50/50 Lakers it seems and Saturday more like 80%.

John S.

More on the subject of Lakers.

On Squam when we see those big fish laying on the bottom, we assume are old Lakers, that's were they stay. We have tried many times in the past to get one to bite, no way they just lay there with mouths open and the smelt swinm in I guess.

John S.

John S. - I hear the way to get the big, old and lazy togue is to jig(g)...a four letter word to trollers. I guess you could adapt the jigging technique to slow trolling. I read in a ME paper about a technique used for big lakers in Moosehead. They use a big (5-6") "declawed" trolling spoon as a flasher / dodger ahead of the small "bait" jig spoon (probably anything in the smelt gun to top gun size range but usually a heavier casting / jigging spoon). Mix and match colors...

I found when I targeted togue at Moosehead that the NH guide was a consistent producer trolling at 55 - 80+ ft in at least 100 ft of water. I dropped my trolling speed to about 1.2 on GPS and used small attractors that also had copper / orange. Once I figured out how to "dial it in" I started to hit them good and felt if I went back to the same spots with the same techniques from the get go that this would be a consistent producer for big togue. Never know when a big, old lazy salmon hanging out with the giant togue will hit..

was going about 2 miles an hour in 160 to 90 feet of water ,with 50 feet of leader and some were caught on a pumpkin head top gun ,but most wereon # 61 sutton with orange tape on the back. the lakers are stacked up from 75 feet to the bottom you'll see them on your fishfinder . 1 way that worked good yesterday was I would go over a big pod of them and crank up the rigger 5 feet and pop the rod or just pop the rod then their would be a fish on . theirs a big trench at the mouth of alton about 1000 yards off of blackpoint which goes southwest to northeast and starts at 65 feet to about 160 feet and the lakers are stacked up .

For whatever it's worth when I lived in Western Mass I fished out of Gate 8 on Quabbin Res. which gives up quite a few big lakers (10-17 pounds annually). Two methods were used
1. Still fishing with big live bait
2. Slow trolling with big bait (6"-10") Golden shiners with a Davis rig or big dodger.
Keep in mind Quabbin doesn't have forage base of smelt Winni does.

Dean

Reel it in --- I was doing something similar, marking deep fish that were likely lakers, then putting my presentations right in their face. After I got the hang of it I didn't need to pop the releases -- the togue would do that for me! They're not salmon, but put up a nice fight and taste great if you smoke them
-Eric

In 04 while I was on Sabago, I found some huge fish suspended 140 feet down over 250 feet. I was using silver/blue flash kings and had about a 10 foot lead off the balls. Hooked up 18 of them just trolling through them at 1.5, all between 6-13 pounds the first day. Everyone else was in 50'fishing. It was the middle of July.
Did this for the week I was there, over 60 lakers all good size. Had the fish biologist there checking fish that week, they came out with me the last 2 days and had a ball. Biggest being 2 @ just over 13lbs.

Popeye

Gotta get deep. I was reluctant to go too deep at first...but caught the biggest togue at 86-ft...and then bottom!

-Eric

I got a king one year up to Ontario 185' down over 200. Champlain is another lake you can get some big lakers in by going "down on them"

Popeye

Trust your sonar, hope you can trust your GPS maps, and prepare to raise the ball in a hurry...!