Cat Tip of the Day: Quick Change Adjustable Weight Sinkers

[SteveD]

With the high water this summer and the extreme currents we are facing this seems like a good time to repost this cat tip. This is an easy way to adjust your sinker weights to meet the changing current flows. You will find it simple and cheap plus it effectively does the job. Here you go:

I just finished my sinker inventory to determine what I need to order for the coming spring cat season. My sinker box weighs a ton but I always find myself ordering more sinkers. I’ve decided I need to use more of my current inventory before I go adding more weight to the box.

I have plenty of 1 ½ oz, 2 oz, and 3 oz sinkers but I’m almost out of large sinkers (4, 5 and higher) that I sometimes use during the spring high water period. I don’t use large sinkers very often so I don’t keep many on hand. The St Croix doesn’t have the current most everybody finds on the Mississippi or the Minnesota River. When I fish a slip sinker rig I almost always use a Sinker Slide and this year I plan on running 3-Way rigs too. I don’t use as many No-Roll sinkers as I used to and I prefer to use Flat Bank sinkers or Flat Spoon Sinkers. In both cases I normally just hook my sinkers to a snap rather than run a line through the sinker itself. This allows me to change sinker weights without having to retie my rig.

After I was done with my sinker inventory I got to looking at how I rig my sinkers for fishing and I decided that there had to be a way to just double up or triple up my smaller sinkers rather than order bigger sinkers that I would find myself seldom using. I had the brilliant idea that a thin key ring or even a shower curtain pin might just be the ticket to hang my sinkers on and it would clip right on my Sinker Slide or my 3-Way dropper clip. I made a quick run up to Menard’s and found their Shower Curtain Clips on sale – 12 clips for 76 cents. Then I stopped at Ace Hardware on the way home and found a perfect size Key Ring for 11 cents each.

I hung some sinkers on the Shower Curtain Clip and on the Key Ring and they will work perfect for holding multiple sinkers. I’ve got enough 1 ½ oz, 2 oz and 3 oz sinkers to last quite a while and I will just double or triple them up when I need more weight rather than maintain an inventory of 5, 6 or higher ounce sinkers. I thought I would pass on this tip to those of you in a similar situation. Save your money on those big, heavy, expensive sinkers and just use up some of your inventory of the cheaper, smaller sinkers.