Lake Champlain United - Forums

I seem to get more action on my cheaters then I do on my riggers. Also, I can have the rigger at 30 which puts the cheater at 15 yet if i raise my other rigger to 15 and put the same spoon on I don’t get the fish like I do on the cheater. Any ideas why? Ball spooking them vs the stealth of the cheater?

It’s the depth. We are fishing under the fish with our main lines and hooking em up on the cheaters. It is the time of year with cold water so close to the surface causing this right now.. it won’t last long…

Good chance at that depth the ball may be spooking em and they are more confident hitting the Cheater… you probably got it… maybe increasing the rigger setback 10ft could make a difference…

That would be my guess…

Fish on!

It was interesting yesterday. Early on fish were hitting both cheater and spoon at 30 ft equally. As morning wore on they hit only the spoons at 30 ft. Cheater went untouched the last couple of hours.

Thanks for the replies. I was starting to question my rigger set ups.

It also could be that the cheaters move more oddly as you are trolling causing the bite If you have a underwater camera you may see this

just bought 2 down riggers. what are Cheaters? paul m

Catching fish is something that anybody can do their first time out, however is never a guarantee right up until the day you move on to the big lake in the sky. I'd suggest listening to the best fishermen the most, but at the same time, remember that there are always exceptions. The more I learn about the subject, the less it feels like I know.

On the rigger ball spooking the fish, I'm sure it's possible. However, when the common knowledge tells you that at the time of the year that the fish are skittish, use planers, and set your lures way way back, I can tell you we see fish on the graph following our rigger balls all of the time. They come up, follow them, and go back down. Our lures are probably 100' behind them, way, way, out of the sonar cone. Those fish are checking out the balls. Sometimes I wonder if the sonar pulses itself scare the fish off, but, I can't quite bring myself to shut it off.

I hear you, Jack. In the spring when everyone is running 100' ++ setbacks off boards, I've had salmon grab the lure on the surface as I'm letting it out 10' behind the boat! You just never know. I do believe that if you are catching most of your fish on cheaters that you are fishing beneath them with the mainline, though. Or, they are being spooky that particular day and don't like the rigger balls. It's tough to tell so it's great that we have options with our spreads to try to find some hungry, cooperative fish!

Cheaters are a line about 4’ long that has a swivel on
One end and a spoon on the other. When u are trolling w the riggers the main line will bow back between the tip of the rod and the ball. You take the swivel and attach it around the line going to the ball and then u toss the lure out behind the main line. The spoon will sink to the middle of the bow which will b half the depth the rigger is at. When u get a fish on the the cheater it will slide all the way down/back to the lure on the main line. They call it a cheater because u are running two lures off one rod.

Last post was for paulm

I catch LT and Salmon with a small chinook diver leadered with a spoon and run it right under my trolling motors propwash about 10 ft under. Caught many this way. Propwash attracts.