When to pull smoke?

[whitecaps26]

I'm relatively new to the bluewater trolling scene and after lurking for quite awhile I know this forum has gracious amounts of knowledge to share. With the fall fishing season upon us in eastern NC (assuming someone turns off the fan) I'd like to pose a few questions. When do you guys pull baits that create smoke trails? What species are ya'll targeting when you do pull smokers? Do you ever send them down on a planer? Thanks for your input, looking forward to what develops from this.

[brad regan 01]

never heard of the smoke method?

[Squidnation]

Mostly marlin for the smokers. I have caught some tunas while marlin fishing with small smoker heads but supposedly the idea of a smoke trail is to create the illusion of a bigger bait.

When I pull a squidchain as a teaser I always use a cup or smoker head on the last teaser with a lg ballyhoo

[Satans_Chariot]

bill is this what you mean?

[HOLWACHAGOT]

bill is this what you mean?

That is not smoke. That is steam! I love that pic!
Holwachagot

[Sea Draggin]

I used a smoking cup faced hex head lure to high speed troll with a month or so ago. We did very well with it on wahoo.

[whitecaps26]

Some would say that less smoke trail is better for wahoo, but then the marketing from many bait manufactures' says "good for wahoo, tuna, dolphin, kings, ect." I know that we can't pin down mother nature to definites, but i was wondering if the scales tipped one way or the other for a particular species when it comes to smoke trail baits? thanks.

[tunatamer4]

The main frame of mind is that EVERYTIME you go offshore you are trying to catch the girl in blue(forget about her little brother, but if he comes along, great)

Meatfish are bycatch and you can catch them all with smoke. Just don't pull a 15" lure if you want to catch blackfin, the size makes it a little tough.

[merry marlin]

Smoke will catch everything out there! That trail of bubbles though is mostly what you want behind your marlin lures at speeds between 8 and 11 kts depending of your lures and sea condition. Wahoos will hit those just a well but usually you're fishing with lighter rods so smaller lures that don't pull as much are better...
The typical wahoo lure is long and pointy so that you can pull it fast with minimal tension up to 18kts far behind if the sea is bad and your boat can't go faster to your hunting ground.
Most wahoo will get caught on the surface early in the morning and will go deeper during the day. The MHC crowd gets most hits on the planner rod by mid day and that would be at slow trawling speed so the smoker won't smoke!
I'd rather be pulling lures than writing this!!!
MM

[AhiSlayer]

Aloha Whitecap
There are a lot of trolling lure head shapes. All of them will smoke to some degree if pulled at an angle and speed to produce smoke.

Wahoo have an inshore cousin called a kingfish. The kingfish likes to eat cigar minnows. At one particular Florida inlet they have developed the habit of racing up from a depth and grabbing a cigar minnow, then continueing on through the air with a (cigar) in it's mouth. Fishermen in the area called them smokers.

But for some reason wahoo really don't have a reputation for jumping much. They do have a reputation for blistering runs and head shakes.

The different trolling lure head shapes are designed to do different things at different positions behind your boat. The angle of the line to the lure has allot to do with how the lure acts in the water.

Some are deep divers. That generally means to a depth of about 24inches. Some are shallow divers and some are shallow runners.

Most diving lures will smoke all the way through their dive then after a 6 to 8 second count come up grab more air and go back down.

A wahoo prefers a trolled plastic lure at a depth of 12 to 24 inches. Some lures designed with this in mind stay at this depth. Therefor no smoke because it's submerged.

The smoke doesn't throw the wahoo off. I've caught thousands of wahoo on smoking lures. The thing that throws them off is the depth of the lure and the speed your running.

If you run six knots wahoo will eat ballyhoo on the surface or six inches deep. Even tuna feathers, cedar plugs and green machines are subject to wahoo attacks at this slow speed.

But it you need to cover ground to find fish at say 10 knots then a surface lure will go untouched most of the time. But a smoking lure will cycle down to a depth that wahoo will hit it. Likewise so will a surface lure with a lead in front of it.

I've caught thousands of wahoo on marlin lures as they cycle down to the depth they prefer at that speed. Probably the least effective marlin lure at that speed is a tube lure not because of the smoke but more because of the depth it runs.

The smoke trail coming off a lure tells the tale of what the lure is doing. It's often hard for a mate to see exactly what the lure is doing but you can sometimes tell by the smoke trial if a lure is cycling properly. Some lures look like a tube, some look like they got a head shake, some got a corkscrew kinda movement on their dive. The smoke trail helps decern if the action is right or needs tweeking.

Ahi