Outriggers for fishing, who uses them?

Hi folks,

My last trawler came with outriggers that were used for getting my trolling lines outside of the wake. They worked very well, with lots of fish caught. My current boat does not have outriggers and my fish count has been dismal, even in the Sea of Cortez, where you can catch stuff dragging a tee-shirt!

So my question is how many of you use outriggers while trolling? For those of you who do, I would love some advice on length, brand, and location for mounting. I need to catch some fish soon!

Thanks, Bill

I don’t have OR’s but mounted a rocket launcher on each outboard railing. The angle can be adjusted, which places the lures outside of the wake. I then hang one to two poles on straps in the middle of the boat, also off the railing. This allows for 3 to 4 lines to be trolled. It’s not a fancy set up compared to what can be done with OR’s, but has worked fairly well so far.

Also, have you tried trolling cedar plugs? I haven’t fish in the Cortez, but They have been the hot ticket in our area for quite a while.

Your question is pretty general, hard to answer without more specific info as to what you are fishing for and what baits you like to use, and what your wake looks like at troll speed.
You might try putting your baits further out, or slowing down a bit to clean up the wake.
Also it there’s a high place on your boat, (radar arch or something)try running a line from there.
That said, I get bit frequently on a line run real short down the center, right in the soup!

I have Taco out riggers on my center console and love them.
The poles are telescopic and removable so they do not take up much space when you are not using them plus they are easy to store. I do not think it would be hard at all to find a place to mount the base on a trawler.

Thanks for the replies so far. My last trip down I tried cruising at about 6-7 knots, thinking that the lures might have better action, rather than running at my normal 9-10 knots. We had one hit that didn't get hooked, and a small Skip Jack caught on our way in. We trolled for about 80 miles with only those hits. I used cedar plugs, big plastics, feathers, you name it. I've had success in the past, so I have some knowledge about what I am doing. For my next trip I am bringing down a pair of off-set pole holders (rocket launchers) that fit onto my regular holders. Hopefully, that will get the lures outside of the wake. I'm keeping my eyes open for a good pair of used outriggers also.

Cheers, Bill

The only purpose I've ever experienced with outriggers is for the purpose of trolling more lures. 4 rods off the stern can get too close and you can get tangles. Two rods off of the back and two off of out riggers and there are 4 lures across a wider spread.

Sometimes we'd run umbrella rigs off of the two rods on the stern to troll deeper depths, and the two on the outriggers at higher depths. If we're only hitting deep, we'd skip the outriggers and just run umbrella rigs off the two rods in the back.

I can't imagine why you'd get more hits on the outriggers if running the same way (e.g. far enough out back, deep enough, same lure, etc).