Best Striper Lures for Trolling

Our trolling line up consists of a handful of rigs that cover every spectrum in the water column and match every baitfish you will likely imitate on the troll. Each lure is designed with light tackle trolling in mind. Our trolling lures are easy to use and are designed to interface with our interactive trolling techniques.

Trolling Patterns

• Tactical Trolling: The focus on tactical trolling is to put your lures directly in front of fish you specifically know are there in situations such as striper you are marking holding on structure, staging in a rip. In this situation, a lure should be controllable in terms of depth, speed and action.
• Canvas Trolling: Canvas trolling occurs when you are in an area of scattered fish but in a defined area. You’re focus here is to cover enough ground where your lures pass over fish. In this situation, your rigs should have a big presence and be highly visible, with the idea being that the bigger the target, the easier the fish will find your lure.

Trolling Methods

•  Set It And Forget It: As the name implies, this striper-trolling lure can have its rod dropped in the holder while trolling. No extra action necessary.
• Interactive: A striper-trolling lure that is interactive is one where the angler imparts some sort of action to enhance the lure’s effectiveness such as jigging, dropping (free spool, turns or out of gear) or surging to impact the lures depth, speed and movement through the water.

Durability

• Trolling lures must be overbuilt to withstand hours in the water, impact of heavy hits against the drag and a boat moving in the opposite direction.

Putting it Together: An angler who spends a lot of time trolling will find his or herself needing a lure with each of these attributes at some point. It is our philosophy at Hogy Lures that striper-trolling lures should be able to excel in each of these patterns and venues.

Hogy Perfect Tube

There is a big debate amongst tube fans as to whether a tube imitates a large eel or a sea worm. I personally think that they imitate a sea worm. If you watch in eel in its natural habitat, it moves around quite fast and slithers from rock to rock. I picture a sea worm losing it’s way from the bottom and flowing with the current which is why I think that trolling a tube needs to be done so slowly to reach maximum effectiveness. The Hogy Tube has a thru-wire system with uniform weight to allow for a horizontal presentation when the boat is out of gear.

• Canvas Factor: The Hogy Perfect Tube is a large and highly visible target from afar, basically a 24 inch long “Eat at Joes” billboard rolling its way through the current. The Hogy Perfect Tube is ideal for long trolls along a contour line, over an area with mussel beds or an otherwise fishy area.
• Tactical Factor: The Hogy Perfect Tube really shines as compared to other tubes in the “tactical” arena. The Helix Core inside the tube (designed to swim the tube at a perfect wobble) is over sized on purpose as it adds even weight throughout the entire tube (weight varies by length). So, if you are dropping on a fish that you mark on the fish finder by taking the boat out of gear, the tube will have a “uniform” decent in the water, which is far more natural than a tube with an egg sinker if you think about a sea worm that has lost it’s way. A sea worm will sink lengthwise if it was to flow toward the bottom.
• Set It and Forget It: The built in Helix Core inside the Hogy Perfect Tube will take care of the action. Truly a set it and forget it.
• Interactive: The Hogy Perfect Tube can be dropped by putting the reel in free spook or by taking the boat out of gear or turning sharply, which creates slack int he lines. It can also be surged to elicit strikes by a quick acceleration of the boat, whether you have taken it out of gear or are trolling at a consistent speed.
• Mikes Favorite Situation: My favorite situation for trolling the Hogy Perfect Tube is in a rocky area with some current. I like to troll with the tide and take the boat out of gear to drop on targets I see on the fish finder. Usually the hits come after the boat is put back into gear on a drop.

Videos:

 

The Hogy Charter Grade Squid Lure

The Hogy Charter Grade Squid Lure is designed specifically to be fished in rips for stripers while stemming the tide. They can be cast or trolled on lead core. The play here is to stem the tide and jig the lure in various positions in the rip.

Canvas Factor: Low: This lure has a sleek profile and doesn’t make much commotion doing through the water; rather it’s a lure that draws reaction strikes due to it’s imitative finish.

Tactical Factor: High: It is difficult to distinguish this lure from a real live squid fleeing across the surface. When big stripers are keyed in on highly visible live bait, they can become very selective. This is a go to lure in a situation where bass are keyed in on squid. Place this lure in the rip where the bass are and keep it there!

Set It and Forget It: Medium: This lure will fish well enough with the rod in the holder, a handy trait when you have youngsters on the boat with you.

Interactive: Medium High: While the Charter Grade Squid Lure fishes “well enough” in the holder it is best trolled with short jigging motions paired with a series of “drop backs” by letting line up and “surges” by cranking the lure in a bit.

Capt. Mike’s Favorite Situation: This lure shines on the troll when bass are stacked in a rip feeding on squid. A very common occurrence nearby the Hogy/SaltyCape HQ on the South Side of Cape Cod.

Videos:

Hogy Charter Grade Slider

In my opinion, a “lipless” slider used as a trolling plug is the most under rated trolling play going. The lure is easy to use, adaptable and fishy as hell. A lipless swimming plug that can be fished at all depths. Suitable for striped bass, bluefish, bonito, albies and ground fish. Can be fished at all boat speeds up to 8.5 knts. The Hogy Charter Grade slider comes in a variety of natural and attractor colors.

Canvas Factor: High: This lure was designed for canvasing. The carefully balanced body has a deadly wobble that wobbles with ease at all possible striper trolling speeds. For best canvas style searching, go with bright highly visible colors such as the Albe Crack glow color.

Tactical Factor: High: A very noteworthy  feature about this lure is that it has a a perfectly horizontal descent when stopped due to its precise balancing weights. This feature is huge for those anglers who employ the “search and drop” technique where you take the boat out of gear and let the lure drop to the fish. (A technique especially effective on lead-core) The slow, horizontal drop is a more natural presentation, similar to that of a wounded herring. A jig would sink quickly and a traditional trolling plug would flat up to the surface. The lure is weighted so has some natural sink rate but would swim deeper than a few feet under the surface when trolled. This is a very useful trait in a swimming plug because unlike a traditional billed swimmer, you can easily alter the depth of this lure with lead-core by shortening the length of line out to reduce depth or letting more line out to go deeper. You can really dial the depth of this lure in and keep it there. Match the hatch with size and clolors. 5” for juvinile squid, peanut bunker, small herring and tinker macks. The 7” for full sized versions of the aforementioned and also to imitate ground fish when trolling in rocky areas for striped bass.

Set It and Forget It: High: The Hogy slider will swim perfectly with the rod left in the holder. The tip of the rod will bounce slightly when the lure is swimming properly and stop bouncing if weeds are dredged up. This lure trolls at all speeds: from snail’s pace to high speed. You don’t have to worry much about this lure once it’s deployed.

Interactive: High: Again, when paired with lead-core, you can adjust depth two ways: 1. By letting out/shortening trolling line length and 2. By taking the boat out of gear. Since this lure has a fairly nuetral buoyancy, it repsonds well to drop backs to stalk a fish that missed a strike. Furthermore, since the lure swims well at all speeds, you can surge the lure by cranking the handle on the troll to induce a strike.

Capt. Mike’s Favorite Situation: My favorite situation to use the Hogy Charter Grade slider is in situations with scattered targets where the fish could be anywhere in the water column. In open water, I find the slider really shines in a search and drop situation. (Boat out of gear to drop lure on a fish you mark on the fish finder). I also lure sliders for trolling along rocky shorelines where I tend to let enough line out so I can fish slow and low to the bottom. “If I’m not bumping bottom once in a while, I’m not deep enough.”

Hogy Pro Tail Paddle

The Hogy Pro Tail Paddle is the best-kept secret as a replacement for trolling swimming lures or bucktail or parachute jig. The lure has a built in swimming action but also has the weight and control to fish a variety of depths. The Hogy Pro Tail Paddle has UV refracting pigmentation for greater visibility at depths. Often stripers will “hit” bait and follow up with a more aggressive strike, the soft but tough plastic of these baits will encourage that kind of second chance strike.

Canvas Factor: The Hogy Pro Tail Paddle series comes in a variety of sizes, weights and colors and they are easily swapped out to adjust for the depth, speed of current, and even how large the area is when you are tolling.

Tactical Factor: The life-like flutter of the Hogy Pro Tail Paddle during a drop on a fish marked on the finder is deadly. Once the boat goes out of gear, the lure will swim its way to the bottom. With weights up to 6oz, you can target a 30′ swing in the water column by adjusting for turns, free spooking and shifting in and out of gear. No striper-trolling lure will give you as much flexibility to work throughout the water column with so little effort.

Set It and Forget It: With the built in paddle, this lure can do all of the above from a rod holder.

Interactive: A Hogy Pro Tail Paddle can be surged, free spooled and even jigged to produce the kidn of action that a hands-on angler desires.

Capt. Mikes Favorite Situation: This lure is a rock star in areas of wide spread structure or pods of baitfish, I like this lure especially in 20-50’ of water in the 5oz and 6oz weights. By taking the boat out of gear, you can get really deep with braid, not to mention lead core or wire line.

A Tip from Mike: A simple way to target scattered fish you are periodically marking on you fish finder is to pull two Hogy Pro Tails on braid or lead core line. If you mark fish, take the boat out of gear and drop the baits on the targets. I’ll troll silver and green paddles when fish are keyed in on herring or mackerel and olive eel tails when they are keyed in on sand eels. If you are not seeing targets, but you know they are in the area, the Hogy Bait Ball Brella is the way to go. Although it looks massive with all the squids hanging from it, the frame has a very small profile, minimal drag and is lightweight. The dense pod of bait that this rig simulates will bring in fish from a far.