Trotline Construction Question

Hey, as many of yall know, i am big on using trotlines. I am planning on building a few new trotlines and have heard of some people using parachute cord as their mainline. What i was wondering is if i do buy some of that stuff, what all does it change in my construction besides prolly not being able to fit a swivel over the line? Also, has anyone actually used any of this stuff? I can only seem to find it for sale up to 100 ft in length.

It works very well holds up strong and last longer I used it back when I was jugging and loved it. Get online and you can find big rolls.

I haven't tried it, but would like to know how it works for you. My first thought is that hooks will get hung in the outer covering,



j49

Build jugs instead...

i am mostly a river/creek fisherman, so jugs do not work as well for me, as most of the areas i am working are around neck deep or shallower. Recently i have started to use a canoe for quicker movement, but still like to wade and string out the lines. My usual for trotlines is that that they have a swivel between two knots that i can then use one of those trotline clips into and allow the hook to drop down from there. I try to keep them at about 25 hooks. When building my own, usually i buy one from Walmart and then stretch out the mainline and then my own rope and do my knots along with their beads, because i know the spacing is legal. Gonna have to message the people i am seeing it for sale for to see if they will sell it in length of 150 ft instead of stopping at 100....lol

I have used it, dont care for it. I use 1/4" braided nylon rope wih 8/0 swivels, swivels from catfish connection and rope from memphis net and twine, both rated for 900 to 1000#. If you fish rivers like me you will get hung up, and you can pull this stuff free.6/0 swivels are about as good and work good with 3/16 braided nylon rope. Rope avilible on 1000' rolls

Newt (one of my YellowCat teachers) taught me to run a trotline across the river at an angle. One reason was you could have more hooks. The other was that it allows you to angle along the depth instead of running straight across. On the TRinity River, I would set 35 hooks on them. However, on narrow rivers such as the Navasota River, I would trim back to only 25 hooks. But even at a diagonal angle, it was too many hooks, so I would run it like a V. And sometimes for angling around obstructions, I would use a tie-line. I would add weights to keep the line from being too high so that a motor might tangle with it.

I have not used parachute cord, so I could not help you there. On shallow water lake trotlines & river trotlines, my leaders are 36"+ to about 40" apart. On the Big Water (Lake & over 20' deep), I set the leaders from 48" to 60" (4' to 5') apart.

I borrowed a tip from santee cooper rig for spring sets in shallow water where their was a lot of boat traffic. I use weighted lines and a float on stagins to raise the bait up into strike range.
I used old cast net weights for sinkers. Unlike Lynn I use very few hooks, most of my lines are 5 hook rigs with stagins spaced at 10' apart. Tied fast at bank and run down stream a an angle to stay close to the bank, then a 50' rock line with a big rock to anchor the in stream end. A heavy rock is required when fishing in windy weather. I like the close to bank sets as thats where I catch most of my yellowcats. I dont target blues or channels.

You can order 500 and 1000 foot rolls.