A lot of people around my area fish with shiners to catch trout.  I am wondering how they detect a hit?  I see some people use bells at the top of their rod while some people use a bobber on like the 3rd or 4th eye of their rod hanging on the line...

 

Whats the best method for detecting a hit?  What methods do you people use?

 

Thanks

 

 

 

Shiners for trout? Around here we use salmon eggs(red)with a kernel of corn (canned) or just a nightcrawler. To be honest, I don't know if trout will go for a live bait such as a shiner. When I use shiners, I make sure they are already in the pond/lake since introducing such a prolific species can cause damaging effects on other species in the water. When we use the above bait, we put a slider weight (1-2 oz.) before the (small) hook. This allows the "stingy" strike and lets the trout swim away with the bait. When this happens, the rod tip dips and if a rod tip bell is used, it sounds the alarm of a strike. Then we pick up the rod (the spinning reel bail is left open), close the bail and when there is some movement away from shore, we set the hook. This bait/hook setting works some 90% of the time on medium to large trout (1-3 pounds) and for lake trout (over 4 lbs.) we use night crawler worms.

Yes, there are sizable lake trout in SE MA - at least in one very deep (60 feet)"small" pond in Plymoutf, which I hate to name since enough people fish it already. Many years ago a local university did some trout habitat experiments in this small pond and several kinds of trout were (rainbow, Brown, etc) stocked with "no fishing" regulation in effect. After a few years the study was done and the state allowed "catch and release" only for a couple of years, then open to take home with the only (very important)regulation of "No live bait of any kind permitted". I have taken several Brown trout of up to several pounds (largest was 11 pounds) from this pond with salmon eggs and corn. I always wondered if this was the only pond with such large and numerous trout in the eastern part of the state. Other ponds/lakes that are/were stocked by the state usually produce small (1-3 lbs.) trout due to the heavy fishing.

If you've ever fished the Wachusett Reservoir you will see that everyone catches lakers and bows on shiners.  A lot of smallmouth too!  

Well, I guess you can never be too old to learn something new! Probably because I never fished for trout in any lake larger than Lake Massapauge in Sharon, I wasn't aware of this info.