How to Fish Two Baits, Lures, or Flies At Once

Fishing two baits at two different water depths allows you to quickly figure out what the fish are biting. You just need to know how to rig them up and when to use different combinations.

Fishing with two baits is an incredibly effective strategy for everything from stocked trout to muskie to catfish. Generally, you either soak both baits on the bottom or suspend them under a bobber. In both cases, you want to rig a tandem bait rig by first attaching a floating or live bait to the top and then adding a sinking or dead bait to the bottom of the setup. Not only is this the most effective way to fish a tandem rig, but it also helps you prevent tangles when casting.

Start setting up your tandem bait rig by tying a barrel swivel to your main line. Next, tie one to two feet of stiff monofilament fishing line to the same ring of the swivel. Add a hook to the extra line, and then add two to four feet of line to the bottom ring of the swivel, and then tie on a second hook. Add a floating bait or a live bait to the top hook and a sinking bait to the bottom hook and you’re ready to fish.

Tandem bait rigs are a fantastic way to cover two areas of the water column at once. You can rig it with a live minnow on top and a worm on the bottom for panfish or a floating doughball and a hotdog or chunk of cheese for catfish and/or carp. With a large live sucker and a dead shiner, smelt, or store-bought mackerel, you can land big pike, muskie, or gar. If you have the right hook size and line weight, the possibilities for a tandem bait rig are endless.

Fishing with two lures is an incredibly effective way to fish deep and shallow water simultaneously while trolling, or when you want to mimic baitfish swimming together to trigger reaction strikes. You can even test the effectiveness of your lure size and color without having to constantly switch them out. However, choosing which two lures to fish and how to rig them depends entirely on which technique you’re using and which species you’re after.

Trolling with two lures at the same time is a great way to target walleye, lake trout, and salmon, or whatever’s up for biting. Like the tandem bait rig, you want to set up with a lighter, shallower running lure at the top of the rig and a heavier, deeper diving lure on the bottom.

To ensure effective separation, I recommend setting up a double trolling rig with a three-way swivel. Attach the swivel to your main line, and then add two to three feet of line to the next swivel loop for your floating or shallow running lure. Next, tie four to six feet of line to the last swivel loop and add the deeper swimming lure.

Tandem trolling rigs are excellent for pairing a large jerkbait and a heavy spoon together while trolling for roving predators like lake trout and chinook salmon. It can also be an incredibly effective setup with a spinner rig on top and a larger, deep-diving crankbait on the bottom when trolling for walleye, trout, or perch.

If trolling isn’t your game, you can still fish two lures simultaneously by fishing a Donkey Rig. Donkey Rigs are set up by fishing with two lures rigged on two barrel swivels, one free sliding and one fixed. It’s a great way to cast and retrieve lures like soft plastics and swim baits as well as topwater baits and jerkbaits simultaneously.

Set up a Donkey Rig by threading one barrel swivel onto your line so that it can freely slide up and down. Then tie a second swivel onto the bottom as a stopper. Next, tie a short, 10- to 12-inch line to the first swivel and add your first lure. Finally, tie 18 to 24 inches of leader to your fixed swivel and add your second lure. You can fish a Donkey Rig by casting it out and then retrieving it with a lot of jerks and pauses.

In the fly fishing world, the hopper dropper rig is a well-known way to fish both a dry fly and a nymph at the same time. Traditionally, it’s done by attaching a length of tippet to a large terrestrial fly and then adding a nymph. If you know how to rig a hopper dropper, you can fish a practically endless combination of multiple flies at the same time.

As a fly fishing guide, I rarely ever fish a single fly with my clients. Instead, I’ll use the hopper dropper rig to fish both a dry fly and a wet fly, two dry flies, two nymphs, two streamers, or even a streamer and a nymph at the same time.

All these setups are incredibly effective for targeting fish in different areas of the water column. It’s also useful for figuring out what the fish are eating during a cold front, high or muddy water, or when you’re simply prospecting a new area. You can also increase your catch rate or just have a lot of fun when fish like trout or panfish are on the feed, because it can lead to a lot of simultaneous hook-ups.

Fishing with two flies at the same time is a lot easier than fishing with two lures or baits—it doesn’t require any extra swivels or even tippet rings. Instead, you simply tie on a fly and then tie one to three feet of tippet (depending on your depth) to the shank of the hook and add a second fly.

It’s as simple as it sounds and works with almost any fly combination as long as you tie the larger fly directly to your leader and use a smaller fly as your dropper.

I’ll use the hopper dropper rig with a dry fly and nymph to drift the banks of rivers when I’m looking for summertime trout. I’ll also use it with a streamer and nymph or a large and smaller streamer when I’m hunting for big fish. You can fish a hopper dropper rig with an adult mayfly or caddisfly as well as a smaller emerger to match the hatch. You can also use it to fish two nymphs beneath an indicator when you’re hunting deeper water.

There are a lot of anglers who might consider fishing two baits, lures, or flies at the same time to be cheating. In reality, an effective and competent angler adapts and adjusts their presentation to different fishing situations.

Like using electronics or hiring a guide, fishing with multiple baits, flies, or lures at once is simply a way to get from point A to point B more quickly, so you can catch more fish and have more fun on the water.