Fishing alewives on meat rigs

A quick questions regarding fishing alewives on meat rigs. Are they fished whole, as cut bait, or both?

Just started last year with meat.  What I’ve experienced is when starting the ballyhoo stripes are best/most user friendly.  They last along time and are tough.  Take out of package put on pre tied strip head and they roll well right away.  If you want to run full herring on big heads then check out nofishnick on YouTube.  He shows how to take the full herring brine them to toughen up and keep the scales on also he shows how to fillet them to fit the heads and roll better.  I’m thinking this brine fillet would also work on alewifes.

Algoma, just a heads up that most guys use either herring or ballyhoo strips that come in packages sold at bait shops.  They are typically strips that are a fillet of half a fish, scales on one side and meat on the other.  Then you slip it into a trolling head and toothpick it in place.

That said, the herring comes as whole fish and can be used that way, either with a trolling head or without.  To complicate things more, guys on the west coast will use whole herring, with the heads cut off at an angle and a bevel, so that they spin through the water.

In my opinion, if you're just getting started the prepackaged strips and pre-tied trolling harnesses are the way to go.  There are some pretty good instructional videos on YouTube if you search there.

Good luck, hope this helped!