Flasher vs Dodger

[dogon dory]

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[TyBoo]

Speaking only for local (to me) waters:

[dogon dory]

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[gljjr]

Dan,

My go to hardware is a hotspot flasher in green with one side full glow pearl.To that I tie a white glow hootchie. Sometimes I'll put a glow spin-n-glow in front of the hootchie. I typically go about 30" behind the flasher. Another thing I will do is put a large ford fender on the downrigger ball itself if the fishing is slow. I'll also add a herring strip to the front hook on the hootchie.

BTW: I think the biggest difference of a flasher vs a dodger is the speed you want to fish at. I find that dodgers work best when fished very slow such that they wobble rather than turn. I like to troll faster than that so I use the flashers.

With a flasher I like to troll between 1.5 knots to 2 knots. That seems to be the best overall speed for me.

[rogerbum]

Neither - it's awful hard to beat a fresh cut-plug herring trolled behind either a down rigger or a bananna weight. But you can go through a lot of bait that way and a flasher + hoochie will still catch fish even without any bait (it will catch more fish with bait though). However, to actually answer your question would require that I had equivalent experience with both flashers and dodgers which I do not.

When I was first introduced to salmon fishing a few years back, I was introduced to large green or red flashers (with glow strips on one side) trailed by hoochies (24-36" back) and that's what I've fished with most of the time. The claim is that red is better for coho and green is better for kings but I've caught about equal amounts of each type of fish on either color with more total fish on green (but that's what I fish with the most...). I put a herring strip on the front hook and often weave the back hook through the strip once or twice to help hold it on (works best with either very fresh bait or brined bait - otherwise it can be hard to weave the hook through w/o tearing it up). So my experience is flashers work and work well but I haven't done a proper controlled experiment to says what's best.

One of my friends on the other hand swore by dodgers since that was what he was first introduced to and that's what he's always fished with. When he was on my boat, we did run both a dodger and a flasher and both performed well but we did have a slight edge on the flashers over about 3 days of fishing. One particular flasher did seem to consistently outfish all other gear and the only unique thing about it was that it had a "fin" on the underside near the back that gave it a bit more action. Also, in my experience a relatively heavy leader 30+ lbs is better than a light leader as it helps to transmit the action of the flasher to the hootchie more efficiently. Of course, after my friend caught more fish with the flasher, he now likes flashers.

Typically, when I have a discussion about which fishing gear is best it goes something like:
"How do you like fishing with X?"
"X sucks, I've NEVER caught anything on X"
"Well, how often have you fished with X?"
"Never"...

I've had similar experiences in discussions about location - e.g.
"I've never caught anything at Y"
"How often do you fish at Y?"
"Never"
So many opinions, so little scientific method....
Now that I've been at this for a few years and am getting fairly good at keeping the freezer stocked, it's time to for me to get more scientific about it and to start exlporing more ground (that's easier to do when there's plenty of fish in the freezer)...

Roger on the SeaDNA

[dogon dory]

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[CAVU]

Dan,
I can't say which is best but I know that what people think is best changes often. Almost all my salmon experience is on the west coast of Vancouver Is. 15 years ago as a novice I was told the best thing to use was a green Hot Spot flasher, with a whole herring fixed in one of those plastic holders. Over the years that has changed to herring dyed green or pink, to hootchies, coyote spoons, apex lures, and recently to large 7" plugs. This year most people wanted to troll these lures without a flasher or dodger to get more fight out of the fish! Several fishermen were atch the flasher to the downrigger ball and atch their release clip about 6-8 ft above it so they had a "false flasher" working but not atch to the fishing line. As for me, once I discovered I could catch more salmon than I could eat using a flasher and hootchie, I abandoned the rest. I especially did not like dealing with herring each day, trying to keep it fresh etc. So my advice would be to pick whichever you like and stick with it. If you keep your line wet you will eventually catch as much as anyone else.

[starcrafttom]

short list of rules for dodgers or flashers, if using lures with out their own action (squids, flys,...etc) us a short leader length, 12 to 20 inches. if using lures with action (plugs, spoons, bait, wobblers) use longer leaders 20 to 42 inches. plugs and spoons can be used by them selves. use heavy leader 20 to 50 lbs test. the shallower you are fishing the farther behind the boat you set your line. In other words is you are fishing less then 30 feet let out a 100 ft of line before you clip into your down rigger. if you are 30 to 50 ft deep set at 50 ft. anything over 50 ft deep set at 5 to 10 ft behind your down rigger. last one match the color of your lure with the color of your dodger/flasher (except humpys white dodger red lure) also (sorry) green for deep and red or silver for shallow

[Mighty Bite]

My rule of thumb is Dodgers for herring, plug cut or whole and Flashers with artificial baits, hootchies, and most of the other myriad choices created by various ingenious entreprenuers whose primary goal in life is to "hook" an innocent fisher and separate him/her from their gas or lunch money.

I vary my leader length, from 30" top 40" depending on the socks I'm wearing or if I got my coffee with breakfast. It seems to me that leader length can make a difference at times, but it is tough to quantify.

I'm big on experimenting. I was given a hot tip on a great lure, which entailed the use of neither flasher nor dodger, this past weekend. Matter of fact this lure showed up in the cockpit of my boat when I dropped into the business end of 3rd Byte to prepare for another day of fishing for silvers in PWS. A primarily green schemed "Mag Wart". They come with a pair of treble hooks but this one had hook replacement surgery and was fitted with single hooks replacing the trebles, clearly preferable to me as well as the donor.

Short summary of performance was: This baby really worked! Look Ma, no flasher, no dodger.........no extra hardware, fish like it, "ole boy likes it. So, there is another alternative, Dan. one that makes the dodger/flasher conundrum moot. Besides, it feels much better not having hardware dragging around between the tip of that high tech rod and lure.

If you're going to be a hard nose and insist on the flashers, color probably doesn't matter a whole lot...........but if you're smart you'll go with the green ones. Stop by and I'll loan you a selection to try.

Herring are kind of a pain but having said that I have been using them quite a bit. Since I found a super brining recipe. They produce 3 or 4 to 1 over a hootchie. If using the green or blue label herring, I use the Pro-Troll roto-chip bait holder and if using the purple herring I like to plug cut them. The Salmon University brining recipe keeps the herring firm, bright and blue throughout the day. The last herring out of the bag looks just like the first one. The herring will keep for weeks under refrigeration.

Thanks Dan, for clarifying the reason why Tyboo keeps his Honda running. Shucks, I thought he was just doing his part to keep the down trodden oil industry afloat.

[Wheeler Dealer]

Bait Bait Bait

Chinook - Cut plug herring / Purple lable

Coho - Cut Plug herring / Green Lable (although have caught really big Coho (18lbs.) with Purple while trying for Chinook)

Steelhead - Sand shrimp

Greenling, Ling Cod, Sea bass, Sea-run trout - Sand Shrimp

Trout - 1/2 Nightcrawler

I will say that these were also the tactics I was introduced to, BUT, I have tried most all the other ways as well and always catch more with just a well presented bait

Jon

[TyBoo]

[dogon dory]

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[Sea Wolf]

If you're really into "scientific" observation and analysis, you can get an underwater TV camera that is specifically made to fit on your downrigger cable and looks back at your offerings and any following/striking fish, as long as they're within viewing range.

Right now down here in California, at least, Harbor Freight Tools has an amazing set up for only $100! Includes 50 feet of cable and an infared LED light source inside the module with the camera to light up dark places. You can see the fish take the bait, turn away, or just swim along as the case may be.

I've seen these in use and they're pretty amazing, although I'm not sure how you interpret the observations other than that the fish took the lure/bait or didn't. Would you count a "long look" as a close encounter half way between a strike and a swim away?

Another toy for those with too much time on their hands? Maybe so, but I can't wait to get out and try it out!

Could also have a great number of other uses, as you can see very clearly into what otherwise is total darkness in either above or below the water's surface.

So far, it appears to be a first class product, at a fraction of the usual $1000 cost. Joe.

[Bearbait]

"Trolling sucks" pretty much sums up my opinion on the subject. I like to feel the fish strike and have a good fight, and for the fish to be able to jump unemcumbered by a string of crap behind it. I like catching them on light casting rods rather than heavy trolling gear. Some places the salmon are so spread out that you need to troll to find them, but If you're fishing silvers out of Valdez you don't need to troll. You have 2 choices, cast to fish near shore or find schools in deeper water and chum them up to the boat.
If there are lots of fish in Valdez harbor you can fish the shoreline just west of the Ferry dock at high tide, the fish are concentrated there because of geography. Cast right up to the rocks in 5'-10' of water with bright wigglewarts. If you see an area with jumpers they are probably with a school, stop and cast to them, they'll take a cast lure just as well as a trolled one.
If there aren't big concentrations of fish in the harbor yet go outside potato point and you'll find a few spots where silvers pile up against the shore (look at the geography, you'll figure out where). It should be clear enough that far out that you can use pixies instead of wigglewarts. Stop and fish for 5 minutes then move if you haven't caught a fish.
If it is early in the season and there just aren't many fish in close yet, go out until you find jumpers. Stop in the middle of them and tie a flasher with a 6oz weight below it on an extra rod. Drop the flasher down below 50' and quickly retrieve it to the boat, the school will follow it right up to the boat or cut herring into small pieces and throw one in every 10 seconds, same result. Then you can cast or just drop a pixie in the water on 10' of line and watch them fight for it. Sometimes there will be 50 fish right under the boat and it's lots of fun trying to keep it away from the small ones so the big ones can get it. Once you find a school of fish and get them under the boat you'll never want to troll again. When I take people out for silvers, after about 2 hours everyone is tired of salmon and then we go fish halibut.
This works anywhere you find a school of salmon, I've used it in CA, WA and here. Most fisherman out there won't believe it, that's OK. Maybe another time we'll talk about catching silvers on topwater bass lures, now that's fun!

[dogon dory]

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