There are bobbers; there are specialized bobbers and lately, my friend Trevor McLeod announced that he found a bobber with a brain. Bobbers may seem like a straightforward tool, but the effectiveness of any tool is left in the hands of those that use them.
So a bobber can suspend bait, but it can do much more. My favorite type of bobber is the slip bobber. This little outfit can make or break a fishing day depending on how I use it. Let me illustrate.
A couple years back I was fishing the famous section of the Little Smokey for arctic grayling, rocky mountain whitefish and bull trout. The time of year was late fall and most fish had stacked up in their wintering holes. I started with the traditional fly rod and nymph set up, but soon found myself trading in the flyrod for a little quality education time with the Aqua Vu. We dropped the camera over the side of the bridge and into the water. To our amazement, the bottom was literally choked full with fish. Grayling and rockies were everywhere, so long as we were looking within six or so inches of bottom. Anything higher and it was like a veritable ghost town. There were few to no fish.
After this valuable education, the plan was simple, drop a fly down and let it tumble along bottom right where all the fish were. I traded in my flyrod, picked up my spinning rod and set up my trusty slip bobber rig. On the bottom was a small bead head prince nymph. A couple feet up was a splitshot. The bobber would be cast upstream with the depth was set so the splitshot rode a foot or so off bottom, ensuring that the little fly was tumbling along in the rocks below. Any hesitation would be met with a hookset and lots of those hesitations turned into fish.
At a completely different time and place I found that a wireworm suspended under a slip bobber caught all the lake whitefish a person could want.
But some days these feisty whites simply wouldn't hit a stationary wireworm suspended under a bobber. On those days I converted my slip bobber into a trolling machine. I'd cast the rig out, let the wireworm and shot settle, then slowly, I'd reel the works toward me. Every now and then the bobber would look like it was sinking, like it caught a weed. Setting the hook on these so-called weeds put me into plenty of whitefish.
Bobbers are incredibly versatile tools and these are only a couple examples of their many uses. Try experimenting a little yourself and you'll be running into good fishing more often.
