HitMan

With the increasingly clearer water conditions occurring very rapidly, silver spoons are the go-to color of blades because they can be used in all different conditions and days. Each color blade also has it's go-to for specific species as well. Gold blades are often used in rainy and fog conditions, for steelhead, and in muddy or not clear water areas. Copper blades are also used in rainy conditions, for walleye, and in muddy or not clear water areas. These are the three types of blades used for Salmon and Trout on Lake Michigan, with the most popular being silver, then gold, and then copper. Silver is the most popular frankly because anyone can go fishing at anytime and be successful. While others, like myself, have certain colors of Stinger spoons in silver, gold, and copper to use, if needed for specific and certain weather and water conditions, even though these may only be used or needed a couple times a year.

Their reasoning is based off the previous years of South Haven's reputation for having high winds and waves on either Saturday or Sunday. There has been a few concerns the last couple years about why it wasn't called earlier, lots of little boats quitting early, not safe fishing conditions and the list goes on and on. This way they can cancel the 24' or less division and let both the AM and PRO tournament proceed like normal when others think it is too rough or unsafe for the 24' or less boats and boats that are less than 24' can't complain it is too rough if they are fishing in the AM or PRO divisions. So they are just trying to eliminate the criticism and complaining from the smaller boats.

I definitely like that!

I like the first one in blue maybe as well?

Here is the updated and finalized agenda and registration form for the 2008 Muskegon Charter Boat Association Salmon Seminar. Hope to see you there!!! http://www.muskegoncharterboats.com/seminar.htm

Most all electric downrigger should be able to run adequately with a 12 pound ball. We fish with Cannon Downriggers and have no trouble fishing everyday with 15 pound weights.

We use 20 pound Gamma Flourocarbon Leader Materials on all our slider lines, diver leaders, and copper and lead core leaders. But, both P-Line and Seaguar make great flourocarbon too. Otherwise, 20 pound Ultra Green Maxima mono is hard to beat.

Hook choice all depends on what bait; i.e. J-Plugs, small spoons, magnum spoons, flies, cut bait rigs, etc. The most used hook on spoons is a "round bend" treble, but a lot of people have been switching over to single hooks as well. We use Gamakatsu and Owner "round bend" hooks on all of our spoons and a larger Owner musky type treble hook on all our flies and cut bait rigs. Hook choice ultimately comes down to personal preference, but the most important, and often overlooked key, is the sharpness of a hook. In your case, I would recommend the VMC treble for spoons over the Eagle Claw, but we do use the L375 Eagle Claw on our J-Plug harnesses. Similar to rods and reels, the price you are willing to spend, determines the quality of the hook.

Just a couple overhand knots to the reel spool should hold it. If it ever gets that low, for who knows why, the no stretch in the wire isn't going to be on your side of the battle. 30 pound test is a good choice and it is 7-strand stainless steel wire. A roller rod is of course the best choice, but depending on what type/brand of rod you are thinking about using with a Twilli Tip, the wire will blow out or wear away at the guides and it isn't great on the wire itself either. We used to use it without a roller rod, but it ate up rods pretty quick. I would say get a roller rod up front as it will save lots of headaches and potential problems in the long run.

If using wire for divers, I would never use anything but the Magnum Dipsy Diver. The Magnum diver takes the advantages of wire and makes it even better and way more effective, with less line out! Size 1 divers are always used with super braid only, usually for fishing higher in the water column.

The limit is still 50 perch because they are being caught on Muskegon Lake. The 35 fish limit is only valid on Lake Michigan waters, so beyond the invisible shoreline is considered Lake Michigan. Thought this might help for future reference! Good Job!!!

Yes, I agree. The copper will definitely be more efficient for you. We troll a lot faster than you ever would. Probably 2.5-3.3 is what those numbers are based on. You can get away with a lot less 30 pound copper than with your lead core. The numbers for the slower speed may even be 7'-8' per 10 yards of Copper. So your gain with copper will be faster than with lead core. Hope this helps!!!

Copper comes in two popular sizes. I personally like 30 pound test and would think that is what you would want to work with as well, especially for walleye. 30 pound Copper sinks approximately 5'- 6' for every 10 yards let out. Meanwhile, 45 pound Copper sinks approximately 7'-9' for every 10 yards let out. 300' of 30 pound Copper would fish around 50'-60' and 300' of 45 pound Copper would fish around 70'-90'. Of course, this all depends on your trolling speeds, currents, etc. These depths are all based off experiences using the different Copper rods we have as well as the calculations given to us by the Copper suppliers. So from what you said, maybe 100'-225' of copper lengths would be in your ballpark for walleye. But the 30 pound is WAY easier to work with than the 45 pound, so I would definitely use the 30 pound. Just an FYI, the 225' lengths of the 30 pound has been our best Salmon rods on Lake Michigan for the last two years from May until October.

I agree! It was a great event!!! Tim, thanks for all the work you put into this event!!!

My vote is for Tiara or BlackFin. The better big water fishing boat is definitely the BlackFin. The more reasonable boat is definitely the Tiara.

From my understanding, there will be a lot of free raffle prize giveaways throughout the day. Because of this being the first ever seminar, goodie bag status is yet to be determined and will be based off the amount of pre-registrations that are received. Hope this helps and hope to see you there!

As of right now, we are fishing in the South Haven Steelheaders Big Jon Pro/Am and the Grand Haven Offshore Challenge Pro/Am.

Hypnotist LG Rapture Fly for the past 6 years!!!

I will be there selling tons and tons of flashers, flies, spoons, j-plugs, j-plug harnesses, cut bait rigs, cut bait heads, planer boards, line, divers, etc. Lots of stuff is used, but there will also be a lot of brand new in the package items. See you there!!!

Mono and sinkers work extremely well when fishing offshore for surface fish down to 10-12 feet. Lead core gets your lure away from the boat and down from 10-70 feet. There is no way to use enough sinkers to get a spoon down 40 feet and still have the correct motion on the spoon or whatever the bait may be, other than lead drops. That is why the lead core comes in handy. It gets your lure away from the boat and down and the lure still moves correctly and lead core rods are fish catching machines because of it.

Shallow is sandbars on beach and pierheads to 50-60 feet. It worked extremely well in the mud and channel when the salmon run was on in Grand Haven. You could definitely tell where the most salmon where stacked up too. We also used it right when we got it down in St. Joe for browns. You could see the ripples in the sandbars and the browns to the sides in 8-12 feet of water. We also ran into an unmarked shipwreck on Sunday during the South Haven tournament and it definitely marked that with a cool picture once we figured out what it was. Overall, the deeper the water got, the less uses we found for it and the harder it was to read. But, we definitely didn't put a lot of time into trying to figure it out either because of our other fish finders. I am sure it would work if you figured out all the features, etc. It did work well offshore to locate suspended schools of bait as well as in near shore.

Chip used it the most as I am never near the wheel very often. I don't remember the exact distance we used on both sides. But, it was far enough to make it worthwhile. Maybe 200-300 feet? I don't remember right off hand right now. But, when we made it 50-100 feet or so you could see a lot of details.

We are Pro Staff for Cannon and Humminbird. Putting that aside, there was a lot of anticipation last winter when they announced the new side imaging units. Last year we had the 997c SI Combo. We didn't know what to expect. The unit ended up being fantastic. The side imaging was hard to figure out over deep water, but worked great in shallower water like you assumed. It showed clouds of bait to each side of the boat and every rock. We even located clouds of bait offshore with it. It takes alittle while to get used to, but is extremely cool and useful. We also used one of the smaller units on Hardy Pond and for bluegill fishing last summer, and that is when the unit thrived. The unit would be fantastic for steelhead river fishing to easily determine if there are logs, trees, fish in specific holes, etc. It would save a lot of time fishing holes that aren't holding any fish. I am no expert at reading it yet, but if you have anymore questions give Vince a call at Captain Gary's. Good Luck!

The best thing to do is to use a SPRO heavy-duty swivel with some melted shrink wrap over the top of it. I don't know the name or size right off hand. I have tried all the different knots and techniques to connect copper to backing and to leader, etc. Nothing has worked as well as the SPRO swivel technique. Let me know if you are interested and I will dig up the other information. Hope this helps!