Night fishing

[lakelander]

i could use a little help setting up for night fishing. Such as picking the location to fish this time of year such as depth and bottom type, the best type of lights, rigging, and best bait hook location Feel free to be as detailed.

[Florida]

tell us what type of boat your fishing from? Pontoon/conventional, how long a boat do you have, r u fishing large lakes,small lakes,etc.Wht do you mean by best bait hook location? For instance if your asking "best bait" and your talking night fishing for speck's,than there is only one bait...minnows.......unless your talking night fishing for something else.... like catfish ???? Tell us more...............

[lakelander]

the target fish is specks. i have a pontoon 20' and have mounted two eight feet floresent lignts on both sides but is halogen better? i also have two underwater fishing lights with green and blue sleeves. i was told that green is for fresh and blue is better for saltwater. i will be fishing both small and large lakes like kissimmee, toho, marian, and the winter haven chain mostly. i use minnows and gigs sometimes tipped with minnows. i have noticed that some people run the hook through the eyes and others through the back. does it make a diffenence?

what about setup location? whats important for this time of year? is hard bottom better than soft? deep hole. is drop-offs better than flat bottoms. what about structure, is it needed? i have night fished quit a bit this year and i catch a few but i'm not consistant and i feel im missing something.

thanks for any help. details is good stuff.

[Florida]

I use 150 watt halogens mounted on homemade swing out poles,yes to me halogens are way better.There is no need for any other type fishing lights when useing halogens.Hooking minnows....I hook them thru the lips but if the fish are deep I hook them thry the tail ,it makes them want to swim down.I dont hook thru the back at all.Night fishing I dont use jigs period,but day time fishing I hardly ever use minnows and use jigs 95% of the time but thats just me.If you can find hydrilla fish the edge of it,specks love hydrilla,as far as bottom goes for night fishing it dont much matter to me,I do have my favorite spots for instance on Kissimmee I fish the river bed in the lake or the river itself and in the river I fish the river bed when I do.Keep at it, right now its still, too soon for them turing on real good.Last year if I remember right it was in March when they went gang busters.One thing tho for me anyways, I never do good night fishing on a full moon and the dark side has always been best for me,thats is if your fishing the moon to begin with

[BenFL01]

Is two 12 volt lamps with reflective fixtures pointed down into the water sufficient? We draw up some bait, but are not seeing 'tons' of bait described in some of the ads for the underwater green lights.

Many people fishing night near us have the large light bars of flourescent lights and a few of the 150 - 250 watt halogen lights. They look like floating light barges... but when we talk to them (at the ramp cause their generators are really loud!#!) they don't have catches much or any larger than ours despite having 2x as many poles in the water.

Also, on night fishing, what depth has the best results? Close to the bottom, middle of the water column, or shallow. I have seen others fishing relatively shallow, but also others literally fishing a few inches from the bottom. One ole timer night fishing on Crooked lake told me he drops it to the bottom and does 2 - 3 cranks up. That was using a zebco 33 in 24 to 30 foot of water. He didn't catch much that particular night, but he assured me he has caught tons doing so in the past. This past weekend our best results came fishing about 7 foot deep in 10 foot of water on Lake Howard in Winter Haven. IS this just one of those things that you try out till you find fish the night you go?

Thanks in advance! Ben from Auburndale.