Guys, my box has zero trolling lures. I do know that most LR boats have boat rods that you can use for trolling. Well on my recent Excel trip, it seemed the deck hands could never find the boat gear. When they did, it either had a lure the deckhand didn't like or someone else had hooked up by the time he got the lure into the water. As a result, I was the only guy that I know of that didn't catch a fish on the troll.

I know that part of the responsibility lies with me becuase I should have anticipated my turn better. But I have vowed to take at least the bare minimum inventory for a typical 5 day trip. Since this is the tackle help forum, I am asking for your help for which lures I need. By the way, I picked up two Yozuri Bonitas on sale at Cabelas (over 1/2 off). I know these are not used a lot on a 5 day, but the price was too good to turn down.

I welcome your helpful comments.

Zucker grass skirts and feathers-mean Joe Green, Zucchini, and Mexican flag-with double hooks-are a good start.

Outhouse,

Most of the time on a five day trip, trolling is done going to one of the islands where you will be fishing or on the way back and sometimes around the island you are at. There are different ways to attack the trolling rotation. Most come down to time of year, the island your at and what’s been working. Oh yeah and fish targeted too.

So to put it lightly, where and when are the keys to your questions? This year has been strange all over the pacific coast from Canada to Cabo and inside the Sea of Cortes. For trips this year what’s working today may not work tomorrow it’s just type of year.

It’s best to look at what has been working on trips right before you go on and try to match the trend for that year. The tuna as of late have not been eating the troll lures much this year and this has held true for some past years.

For me I bring 100% of the stuff I think I will need and only fish 10%, but if I left the other 90% that’s what the fish will bite on.

Socal, my next trip will be at the end of next July. This year, we (the other guys) caught mostly YT and dodo's on the troll. We did catch a few yft one of the better ones coming on a Yozuri Bonita rigged for wahoo. What I would like to do is to get the two to three or so lures that are good all of the time, if that is possible. Then I can pick up the hot lures just before I leave.

As said above Zukers are a must for me and everything bites a cedar plug, I like the plain non painted or skirted ones. July is a little early for the wahoo most of the time but like you saw big tuna will eat the Bonita type lures. Rapala type lures can be deadly for most everything also but sometimes the boats dont like people using them so contact the boat you will be riding on and see what they say.