While waiting on ice, thinking about trolling & watching a realtime strike

[musky8it]

I won't know if my setup on the Eyoyo Underwater camera will work but if it does it will be awesome to watch in realtime a walleye, musky, pike,etc hit my lure while trolling.

The Eyoyo UW camera has accesaries to attach to your rod and run the camera cable along your rod for bobber fishing. I'm gona try to use this to troll and watch strikes.

Here's a ruff drawing on what I'm gona try. I may have to add a float to counteract the weight of the camera. The hard part will be trying to reel in fish and hand pull(like fly fishing) the camera cable in at the same time. There is a UW camera called the water wolf that takes video of a strike while trolling but its not real time you watch it later off a scandisc.

While waiting to try this for summer fishing I'll be waiting for ice so I can try this UW Camera icefishing, that's what its mainly for.

[wax_worm]

Will be neat if you can make it work.   Have seen some guys do it with smallmouth when fishing ARigs, but don't know what camera they were using.  May have been the one you mentioned.   That cable is going to provide alot of water drag so you will have to probably add some weight to keep it down at the depth you want depending on how fast you troll.  Can't tell from the pics oh the web if the cable end of camera is conical or not .  It may want to spin on your line unless a float of some sort is put on top or weights on the bottom to keep it upright.  I know from using an aqua vu from a bass boat when on the trolling motor the cable drag causes the camera to run a ways back from vertical.   The deeper we used it the bigger the bow in the cable and harder it was to keep it down where we wanted it.  Had to stop moving or troll slow to remove the bow in the cable caused by the drag of the water.

[musky8it]

tks for the input WW, hadn't thought that far ahead yet on if the camera would spin, hoping it doesn't. It does weight 4.6 oz so hoping with that weight it will be enough to keep it on the bottom side of the line.  2mph is probably about the fastest I would troll to start with and since it is a camera I'll no right away if it starts to spin at higher speeds. I've watched a few musky/pike fishing videos of the "water wolf" camera and none show it spinning but its shaped thinner, has no cable, and no idea if its heavier/lighter.

 It is cone shaped so there shouldn't be to much drag. As the photo shows the tip is rounded not blunt so that should help to minimize drag. The cable is approx. 3/32, looking at a line dia chart its dia is about same as 500lb test line so it may cause some problems. It probably will want to ride higher than the trolling line. The more line out I'm guessing the more cable drag, I'll probably start with about 30ft out.

Its all a guess until I get out, Almost went a few days ago when it got up to 50 but didn't. If it works I'll be wishing I bought the DVR model, this one has no recording feature.

[musky8it]

Here's a couple videos of what I'm hopeing to see. The first shows some awesome pike strikes the 2nd walleye one isn't the best.

10 Minutes of Underwater Pike Strikes - Water Wolf Underwater Camera
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Z0QfRIr6EQ

Underwater Walleye Trolling Bites, Strikes & Follows 2019
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AwwvZvjikxY

[wax_worm]

tks for the input WW, hadn't thought that far ahead yet on if the camera would spin, hoping it doesn't. It does weight 4.6 oz so hoping with that weight it will be enough to keep it on the bottom side of the line.  2mph is probably about the fastest I would troll to start with and since it is a camera I'll no right away if it starts to spin at higher speeds. I've watched a few musky/pike fishing videos of the "water wolf" camera and none show it spinning but its shaped thinner, has no cable, and no idea if its heavier/lighter.

 It is cone shaped so there shouldn't be to much drag. As the photo shows the tip is rounded not blunt so that should help to minimize drag. The cable is approx. 3/32, looking at a line dia chart its dia is about same as 500lb test line so it may cause some problems. It probably will want to ride higher than the trolling line. The more line out I'm guessing the more cable drag, I'll probably start with about 30ft out.

Its all a guess until I get out, Almost went a few days ago when it got up to 50 but didn't. If it works I'll be wishing I bought the DVR model, this one has no recording feature.

You might be ok at that speed.  However, the aqua vu I used to use in the boat was not conical on the opposite end of the lens so that surely added to the drag, but I also had two lead weights that came with it attached to the bottom.  They were pretty heavy, I would guess 4 oz each so about half a pound and it still bowed from vertical when using the trolling motor to scout around, especially if 15 to 20 ft deep.  It will definitely take some tinkering to get it dialed in.  I hope you have more patience than I do when you get out to try it as I would probably say screw it and give up after about 5 modifications and it still not working as planned.   

Another thought....don't they use lead core 'line' on lake michigan to troll for salmonoids and keep help add weight to keep the lures down?  That could be an option to help keep the camera and lure at depth, but I have no experience with lead core line, how to use it and cost, etc.

[musky8it]

Well, didn't get to use it ice fishing, never got out. So now waiting for a little warmer weather to try it trolling. We post results even if this forum gets little action during the summer.