Fishing with live eels tips & tactics

[Merrillizer™]

Seen a few folks looking for help with eel fishing. I personally dont have much experience "deep fishing" with eels, you know....the 3-way swivel w/ weight rig? I have done that in the past in the Piscataqua with decent results, but those days have come and gone lol. I have more experience "plugging" eels or drifting them over rockbeds and mud flats. I'm no expert by any means, but I have had a lot of success just in recent years, and learned a lot from the best eel plugger I have ever known. To start, I used to use larger hooks, but after fishing with Joe (aka Roccus) for a few summers, I quickly learned that smaller hooks are key. I like 4/0 Gami Octopus hooks when plugging live eels. I use a 2.5' to 3' flourocarbon leader. Although most of my eeling is done at night and the flourocarbon doesnt come into effect as far as light refraction, but its durability is helpful, especially when running over mussel beds and rock beds. I hook the eel from under its "beak" and up either through an eye or through its head. Your eeling rod should have some "give" up top, as not to rip the lips of the eel off when casting. That can be a serious waste of bait. Roc can help much more with this, as he uses a custom Lamiglass fiberglass eeling stick.

Another less-known and underrated trick I learned from Roc was to snell your eeling hooks. The snell knot allows the eel to "track" better through the water during your retrieve.

Cast it, and reel it in the way you would a swimming plug. Sloooow.....just fast enough to keep it off bottom. Keep your rod tip around "10 o'clock" during the retrieve. When you feel a bump or a slam, lower your rod tip towards the fish, and when the line gets taught, BUTTONHOOK 'EM!

Maybe we can turn this into an Eel "How-To" eel rigging tutorial of some sort with some input from Roc, and I will convert it to .PDF format and upload it to the site and make it available on the How-To page.

[Roccus]

Nice post Jonny, when I have a few minutes, I'll re read it and add (not much to add, it's an imformative post) anything I can think of, I've got a how to prepared (pictoral) on rigging a dead eel, good thing to know when the blues come a chompin...

[Merrillizer™]

Please do! I know the guys will appreciate it mucho grande. Wait a minute, what the hell is mucho grande? Shit maybe thats really legitimate


I'd love to add another How to to the How to page. Hopefully some folks are finding them helpful. I get a lot of emails from folks, I wish they werent so afraid to post!

Dont be bashful!

[Scout]

I'm very interested in fishing with eels and reading every post. I have used them only once several years ago with not even a nibble. I was casting them into the surf, new nothing about fishing them, but everyone said they work great. I was in the bait store on sunday and a guy was in there buying a couple dozen. At the price of these things it must put some fish on his plate. Keep the info coming. I might give them a try this weekend. I didn't know you could use them dead. If I have extra can I take them home and freeze them? have any of you had any luck ttrolling them? I have a 6 horse kicker so I can get to real slow speeds.

[Roccus]

Scout,

If you want to consistanly catch big fish, eels are the way to go.. bass will eat them day or night, but theyare a better night time bait, especialy in the shallows/...

Any motor noise will spook fish, an electric is the way to go, I've had way too many nights ruined because some careless nimrod came flyining in and busted up the pod of fish.... silence is golden....

Dead eels can be frozen, but rig them first... I'll post up the How to on it ASAP...

[mr. bones]

Good info.
One of my larger bass came off a rigged dead eel fished off a rock pile at Fort McLeary in Maine. Bass made a vicious tail slap and then engulfed the eel after I stopped it and my drag started to scream. 20 minutes later I brought a 38#r to shore.
The strike scared the crap out of me as it was pitch black at 2:30 in the morning
Great memories!
Dave

[Merrillizer™]

Originally Posted by mr. bones

Good info.
One of my larger bass came off a rigged dead eel fished off a rock pile at Fort McLeary in Maine. Bass made a vicious tail slap and then engulfed the eel after I stopped it and my drag started to scream. 20 minutes later I brought a 38#r to shore.
The strike scared the crap out of me as it was pitch black at 2:30 in the morning
Great memories!
Dave

Awesome! Those are the best ones, at night. Things do go bump in the night!

[Scout]

Well I bought 3 eels today and only used two. I got nothing on them. I was casting rhem and just letting them drift from my boat. Work the shore from piscat all the way to boars head with only one short. Get this I caught a flounder on a small diamond jig and a scate on a chunk of mackeral. I think my leader was just to big. Besides that the fishing was real slow. Sure hope it picks up.

[Merrillizer™]

You gotta git inside some of those rocks along Hampton, or sit in one of the "rockbowls". Plug that eel like a lure.

Hows S&S been with their eel stock this season? Havent been there in awhile. I remember a few seasons when they were usually out of eels altogether.

[Scout]

Okay guys I'm definitly doing something wrong. The last 2 outings I have fished with nothing but live eels and have nothing but aggravation. I have been casting them into rocky structure and letting them do thier thing. They usally come back as a ball of eel that I have to cut the line in order to fix. To fix this problem I wack them real good and send them back out. I haven't even had a bite on them. I drifted the river using a 3 ounce weight and still nothing. Last time out I bought a 1/2 dozen and I let 3 go when I was done. Any help would be appreciated.