Mastering Dead-Bait Trolling: Essential tips and techniques

Mastering Dead-Bait Trolling © Sailfish Boats

The common ballyhoo ranks as the most popular dead bait option for offshore captains for good reason: Almost everything that swims offshore will eat them, they are usually easy to find at your local tackle store and inexpensive to buy. What's not to like?

You can buy ballyhoo pre-rigged or rig them yourself, and many rigging options exist. For example, if you're targeting fish with sharp teeth, like king mackerel or wahoo, you need to use a wire leader. But for other species like tunas and dolphin (mahimahi), nylon or fluorocarbon monofilament works much better and will produce more bites than wire. We will get into leader theory and rigging later, but for now, let's discuss how you deploy the baits behind the boat.

Ballyhoo should be trolled between four and six knots typically, and where you place them in your wake makes a big difference. Live ballyhoo often "skip" across the surface when fleeing from predators and you want your dead baits to mimic that action. So, when you set the boat to the speed you want to troll, say five knots, look back at the wake. You'll see a series of waves emanating from the stern off to each side, that's the wake.

You want to place your rigged baits on the "face" of one of the those wake waves, so it looks like it is running downhill. That creates the skipping action we're looking for. If you're fishing two baits off the outriggers, place them on different waves, maybe one on the fifth wave back, and the other just behind it on the sixth wave.

Choose the exact wakes according to how the ballyhoo looks when it's working. There is no universal right or wrong place to put them and a lot of that will depend on sea conditions and staggering the baits on different waves helps prevent tangles when you turn the boat. Just make sure they're skipping along the face of the wave just forward of the wave crest.

The same goes for flat lines. These baits go much closer to the boat, usually on the second and third waves. You can pull flat-line baits right off the rod tip, but it's often better to pull them from a lower angle to create the right action. To do that, use a light rubber band looped around your fishing line and attached to a cleat or even the reel handle to keep the angle of pull low. The rubber band will break when a fish bites.

Experiment with bait placement on the waves of your wake and adjust them frequently to get just the right action. You'll catch more fish when you do!