Running A Trotline With James Hall

Gills? yeah.
Hey guys, James Hall here with
Bassmaster’s Go Out{side}
and we are going to
chat a little bit about trot lining for
catfish for this particular
activity you’re going to have to wrap
your arms around your inner
redneck because this is something that
is, you know, a country
boy can survive type
stuff, but it’s great fun.
For family and put a lot
of food on the table.
We can talk about what you need
and then kind of the process of how to do
it and hopefully pull some fish
in by the end of the process.
I learned how to do this from
my Grandfather when
I was still in diapers and
it’s as fun today as it was back then.
So first thing you need
is to order a trotline.
You can make your own, but I mean
I went to academy.com
and this thing cost me like 20 bucks and
it’s pretty much
everything you need to lay
out of trotline except for
a weight and we’ll go
over that in a second.
But the trotline is simply,
you know, 100 long
piece of 300-pound
braided line with some swivels on
it, so we’re going to
put this whole thing together.
We’re going to set
it out in the water and see
if we can’t catch catfish.
Hi guys, right here getting ready to
set our trout line and what we found
is pretty solid tree
right on the edge of this small Lake that
we’re going to fish and so
I’m going to get the tag
end of this trotline and
I’m going to connect it to this tree.
With the just a pretty common,
not you know this rope
is really, really strong, so you don’t
have to
get too fancy with your knot tying.
Just make sure that
it’s not going to slip.
If you get a fish on there and
it’s strong enough to hold.
The weight.
There we go.
with the weight of the
weight and the weight
of the fish and so now.
What we decided to do
is get upwind of the tree.
And because we want this trotline
tight, we’re going to
push off and let the wind help
keep this line taut as
we start adding hooks.
So now we’re going to
start adding these drop hooks
For these drop hooks
it is very, very simple.
’cause this whole line right here
is basically just loop
alright, so this all tights tight.
Your hooks attached at the bottom.
All you have to do to
attach it to the swivel is to put one
into the loop through and then
open up that loop of line.
And then pop your hook through.
And pull it tight.
Then you have your
dropper line ready to go.
So we’re adding a
chicken gizzards to this trotline.
They stay on the
hook really, really well.
Catfish just about anything.
It smells nasty enough so you
just pop your hook through there.
And let her dangle.
So the final step
we have our trotline out.
And now we want to
pull it as tight as possible
before adding our weight.
So I’m using this troll motor to
push against it, because again,
we want whenever a whenever fish bites
it, it needs something firm
to pull that hook into kind
of set it into its mouth.
So we want the trotline
really tight and kind
of see all of our baits there.
I want to get it as tight as possible.
And then I’m going to tie this weight on
Right here.
Kill the trolling motor
it is getting too tight.
Get this weight tied on?
You can do whatever sort
of knot you prefer.
I do the
Mixture of em.
Just to make sure one will hold
it the other won’t.
So alright, whatever.
White tide on.
Now again we will get this thing
as tight as we possibly can.
That way.
You also want to
the way we’ve set this up is
it started shallow at a tree and
there’s a little Creek channel
that comes through here on the side.
And so we’re going to be fishing
multiple depths, which is
important because sometimes
fish they’re going to be shallow.
Sometimes they’re going to be deep,
and if you have hooks in every single
part of that water column, you’ll be
able to identify.
Exactly where these fish are
holding and then you can really focus
on that depth, so you see our
lines getting tight.
I’m about ready to drop this baby.
Yeah, there we go.
And then overboard it goes.
Ploop ploops.
And.
we’re trotlining Here Kitty Kitty.
Yep.
Did he swallow a hook?
He did
no, it’s in his stomach.
Is it in the stomach?