A friend in Utah asked me the other day what I would recommend for trolling and/or jigging for Walleye. He tells me he'll be jigging, but may also use it for trolling with or without downriggers. Fish will range from 2 to 15 lbs. He is also interested in a heavier similar rod for Mackinaw (lake trout) in the 40 to 50lb range bouncing 1 to 3 oz of weight. Sounds like he's talking about 4 rods to me to do all he wants to do.

Any "Utahians" out there?

He's got more money than sense and wants to start his new hobby with the "best blank and components" he can get.

Thanks.

I'd concentrate on what he fishes most and build two task specific rods designed to fish in hand. Keep in mind that you can run any rod off a downrigger, if this is something he might do on a rare occasion, he might not need a dedicated downrigger rod for each purpose.

My brother has a set of walleye rods designed for in-hand applications. Once a year he trailers his boat up to Lake Ontario and runs his fast action walleye rods off a pair of riggers for salmon. They are not ideal, but he catches and lands fish on them.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/15/2015 12:07PM by John E Powell.

the fish don't care about what the rod is made up for , all they want is the lure / bail on the end of the line I think

William Sidney
AK

Jim:

There is a huge group of guys that do a lot of jigging for Macs out here.

Is he going to be jigging for the Macs or trolling? If he is jigging, they/we use big tube jigs (8 inchers) that are weighted pretty heavy. It's almost like deep sea bottom fishing. I'm guessing he's going to need a 6ft medium heavy to Heavy rod. I use a 6ft Md heavy St. Croix sc111 blank that I cut down. It was a 6'6. Some even go as short as 5'6" or 5' because the jigging takes place directly under the boat in 30-100ft of water. If he's experienced with casting reels I'd spiral wrap it to handle the load better.

Most of the guys new to doing this kind of jigging tend to miss a lot of fish. They use "trout" rods that are nowhere near powerful enough to handle the hook set required. The trolling rods they use tend to be 8ft medium powered rods with slower actions that can't react quick enough for solid hook sets.

I hope that helps.

Joe- "Utahn"

The walleye rod he's talking about is a whole different animal and I'm sure there's lots of guys on here with good recommendation's.