Spoons for spring trout

By Gord Ellis

My 7-year-old son, Devin, collects Pokemon cards. If you have children under 12, you already know all about them. If not, I probably won't be able to adequately explain the Pokemon phenomenon to you. It's a Japanese trading-card game of cartoon animal characters with special powers and names like Pikachu. Kids world-wide have been Pokemonized. Devin reads Pokemon magazines and sifts though cards, memorizing names and actions of the characters. Unlike some parents, I haven't discouraged my son's Pokemon fixation. The reality is that the apple never falls far from the tree. I'm a collector too.

Proof is in my basement, where I store hundreds of Electric blues recordings from the 1950s, dozens of classic fishing books, heaps of topographic maps, and a dozen tackle boxes full of trout spoons. They're my Pokemon, and like those ubiquitous trading cards, they have funny names and special powers

Spoons come in all shapes and sizes, but for clarity, I'll divide them into three groups. There are classic oval or teardrop-shaped spoons; long, skinny swimming spoons; and compact jigging spoons. All three types can dupe trout and are especially effective in the cold water of spring.

Classic trout spoons look like the business end of a teaspoon. They're generally oval or oblong and concave. They have an enticing, erratic wiggle when pulled through the water. Some popular ones include the Little Cleo, Delfin Alligator, Luhr Jensen Little Jewel, Acme Tor-P-Do, and Gibbs Koho.

For spring speckled trout fishing, thick-bodied spoons like the Kamlooper and venerable E.G.B. are great when cast from shore or boat and reeled back slowly and steadily. A spoon's fluttering action agitates trout into slamming it even in the coldest water. It's a rare fish that doesn't at least take a look at a spoon. At break-up, even cast spoons on top of floating ice and then pull them off to flutter towards bottom before you start to retrieve. This is an especially good trick around rivermouths. The best spoons for small lakes and rivers weigh between 1/4- and 1/2-ounce, although you might want to go as light as 1/8-ounce in shallow water. Thick-bodied spoons are also good for shore casting to Great Lakes steelhead, coaster brookies, browns, or lakers. Bump up spoon weight when fishing big water in the wind; it can throw a light lure back in your face. Go to 5/8- and even 1-ounce spoons when conditions call for it

Classic spoon types are great for flat-lining early spring and late-fall trout in lakes. One of the deadliest trolling spoons is the Blue Fox Pixie, which has a coloured plastic insert. Big trout love these things, but trolling one comes with a price. In my experience, they spin like a son of a gun, although using a ball-bearing swivel helps. They catch trout, though, especially steelhead. The Len Thompson is also a great trolling spoon, with a special appeal to lake trout, and who knows how many monster Lake Ontario brown trout have fallen for the charms of a Little Cleo?

For trolling, also consider the half spoon, half wobbling plug, West Coast salmon slayers produced by Apex and Gibbs. They're quickly making their mark on big-water Ontario trout and salmon.

Long, thin spoons have a tighter wiggle and a more pronounced shimmy toward the back end. A few popular brands are the Mepps Syclops, Acme Kastmaster, Williams Whitefish, Gibbs Gator, and Luhr Jensen Krocodile. These spoons are commonly trolled, but they're also awesome for casting.

One mild March day a few years back I had my best-ever afternoon of shore casting on Lake Superior. My lure was a 5/8-ounce brown perch-pattern Krocodile sporting a bright brass finish on the other side. On my first cast a fat steelhead grabbed the spoon on the drop before I had a chance to turn the reel handle. Six more trout followed the first, the last of which permanently took the spoon from me. Those pre-spawn steelhead, in water barely above the freezing point, went bonkers for the lure's tight action. I've seen ice-water trout react to Mepps Syclops in much the same way.

Jigging spoons are the most under-used and perhaps misunderstood style. Popular ones include the Hopkins, Rattle Snakie, Swedish Pimple, Gibbs Minnow, Zzinger, and the Crippled Herring. With few exceptions, these spoons have little curvature and almost no action on a steady retrieve. A jerk-and-pause retrieve, however, can trigger even the most negative trout into clamping on. Cast it out, let it sink, pull the rod tip to the side, and then reel up slack. Hits almost always come as the spoon falls and you're reeling. I've cast 1/4-ounce Hopkins and Rattle Snakies to spooky spring brook trout and have been amazed at their suddenly positive reaction.

For steelhead and Pacific salmon, the Zzinger has an impressive track record. It's an updated version of the Buzz Bomb, another classic in-line jigging spoon, but looks a lot more like a minnow.

Jigging spoons, meant to be worked vertically, are always worth a try if fish are not hitting a horizontal presentation. By the way, try a jigging spoon in a river. They're excellent wherever trout are deep and you need to get down quickly to bottom. A trout spoon's finish is probably less important than most of us think it is. Most anglers lean towards silver on sunny days and brass or gold on overcast days or in dark water. I'm a contrarian, however, and fish brass in sun and silver under cloud, with good results. Colour is even more problematic. Do trout prefer hot red over orange, or fire-tiger over solid chartreuse? At times it seems they do, but why? That question is hard to answer. Blue and silver, red and brass, and chartreuse and silver are popular combinations for trout. A strip of pearlescent tape on a spoon never seems to hurt either. The bottom line is to always experiment.

Use at least a 7-foot spinning rod when fishing all but the smallest spoons. The lighter your line, the farther you can cast, but using less than 6-pound test almost guarantees you'll never get a snagged lure off bottom. I like limp 8-pound test on a smooth front-drag reel. For throwing spoons heavier than 1/2-ounce, I use an 8 1/2-foot graphite rod with a stiff butt and a forgiving tip. For shore casting, a 10-foot rod is even better for tossing a spoon way out there. Baitcasting combos are the best choices when trolling big spoons on the Great Lakes.

Here are a few other tips. Some spoons come with dull or poor-quality hooks. Buy quality replacement trebles. Also, many factory hooks are too small for the spoon. Bump up a size or so, especially if you expect to tangle with some real horses. Single Siwash hooks are popular options for trolling spoons. Use the best quality ones you can find, and keep the points razor sharp. I use a straight snap, no swivel, when casting spoons. Many of them, particularly jigging spoons, lose a lot of action if tied to a snap-swivel. One can be useful when trolling, however, as some spoons tend to spin.

The cold water of spring offers some of the hottest trout fishing of the year, and fishing spoons is one of the most consistent ways to catch them. Choose the right spoon and you'll be fighting trout faster than my kid can say Pikachu.