Twill23

Fishing is absolutely dynamite right now. Get out there!!! Made it down to Holland on Thursday the 19th. Got the boat all ready and got to watch her splash! We'll make a long story short, so you can get to lookin at the pics! We took 84fish in 5 trips. Friday Morning, Sunday(Morning?) Tuesday evening, and 2 trips on Wednesday(AM only being 3 hours dock to dock) Water anywhere from 110-180 produced fish everyday. Our hottest baits. Short coppers: (100,150,200,250) Were really slow for us until we switched to plugs on wednesday. 3in Ghost was dynamite. Riggers: Moonshines down anywhere from 55-110. 8in green paddles were also very effective. Divers:11in paddles in any color seemed to work for us later in the week back 250. Over the weekend, divers back 140 with SS Mini's in mixed veggies seemed to really produce. Deep Coppers: (300,450) Were on fire with 11in paddles. Our best was an 11in black with the uv tape. Green also worked. Unfortunately, had a bid of a knee issue and had to come home today, but will be back,HOPEFULLY, next weekend sometime.

Great job!

There won't be a problem at all! It's a beautiful marina!

Whoopssss SOLD!

Whoooops SOLD

Still for sale! Will also consider trades involving $$ and an 18-20' "walleye" boat!

Great deal

Nice job!

This will be my last post on this topic. This is considered a helpful and informative forum, not an argue and bash forum. I do not, however, believe people should be given incorrect information. I would like to point out alewife ARE NOT predatory fish. They are distinctly classified as a "baitfish." Classifying them as a predatory fish would be like classifying grass as a predator because it absorbs nutrients from the ground. Yes alewife do feed on larva. But their MAIN forage is that of plankton. Secondly, white perch are a feeder fish for walleye and lake trout. Hence the take off of the two species. White perch have also been prevalent since the 1960's during the peak of the alewife boom. Thirdly, Asian carp have no natural predators in north america. Period. Trying to eradicate them by introducing another species is just not an option. Our native fish WILL NOT handle the issue. These fish reproduce much too fast, and grow MUCH too fast. They will achieve adult hood much too fast for any of our species of fish in the Great Lakes to feed on them. Big heads alone can grow up to 12 pounds per year!!!! Again, our native species have NO CHANCE at controlling asian carp. Currently there is only one proposed solution to eradicating the species if they do establish in our lakes, and this is trying to impede access to their spawning grounds. All species of asian carp are very particular about their spawning rituals. But if they become establish, that could turn into an extremely long cycle. As far as turning towards browns and steelhead as a sustainable sport fishery, that is NOT an option without alewives. This is clearly pointed out with the crash of Lake Huron. Both species depend heavily on the alewife population in lake michigan(as they did in lake huron). Currently there has been a slight uptick in the numbers of both species in lake huron, but this is largly due to the large increase in the smelt population, which MAY be able to sustain a decent population of both species. That is yet to be seen. I will again state that i believe that the alewife issue, and the invasion of asian carp are separate issues. Right now trying to sustain our alewife population is number one in keeping a strong salmon fishery. This of course is short term in the big picture. For the longevity of our fishery, and ALL fisheries asian carp HAVE to be stopped from establishing within the great lakes. Again i strongly support the cuts of salmon plants in upcoming years. In 2006 we received cuts in lake michigan. This may have been absolutely perfect timing. 2008 was an extremely bad year for adult kings, but numbers and size have since rebounded. Most around the lake, i believe, will agree. I truly wish this type of effort, research, and thought was put into Lake Huron before the crash!

Sorry Mike, I shouldn't have put your name in the direct heading. Nor directed the response towards you. The post was more as a general information post. I've spent a lot of time both in college as well as with local fishery biologist learning, and studying as much as I possibly could. Unfortunately I was much apart of the suffrage that went along with the crash in Lake Huron. It's terrifying to me personally that the extinction of our salmon fishery as we know it, is a very real possibility. Again i apologize.

Are you suggesting introducing a predatory fish that will help control the population of an invasive species that grow up to 20+lbs and regularly reach the 10lb mark? Again, I totally support the fact that the invasion of "asian carp" will totally extinguish the entire great lakes fishery. These fish do not only feed on plankton, they also feed on dead plant matter. If they are not prevented from entering and establishing within the great lakes it will be detrimental to ALL fisheries. Not just our beloved salmon. In my personal opinion, as well as hope: The carp are such efficient at what they do, they could end out eating themselves out of house and home. Again in my personal opinion the reason these fish are migrating north is because that phase is already starting to take place in southern areas. Whether it's sheer numbers and over population that has pushed them up river, or lack of food.(one species of asian carp is known to eat up to 3times it's body weight PER DAY) This could be an extremely long cycle. 10years? 20years? Your guess is as good as mine. But merely giving up on preventing entrance is by far the wrong answer. And yes, overpopulating of salmon WILL totally diminish the alewife population. It's already happened. For those who haven't totally seen the effect of it I encourage you to take a trip to the Salmon capital of Michigan. We have a few member's from the town of Roger's City who I think could chime in on what has happened to their town because of the crash. I believe that most would agree, Lake Michigan has safely rebounded from the crash they suffered in relation to the kidney disease, which totally crippled king and coho fishing in the late 80's into the early 90's. Reducing the number of plants is about risk reduction. Not everything can totally be controlled, and there will ALWAYS be new threats to our fishery. These two issues have to be dealt with. Although they greatly rely on each other, they MUST both be addressed as separate issues. In summary: "Asian carp" MUST BE prevented from establishing in our great lakes(and tributaries). I urge everyone to support, and express opinions on what should be, and could be done. The alewife population MUST BE CONTROLLED to sustain a productive salmon fishery. On a positive note: We're coming up on 10 years since the crash, and we're just getting into a slight rebound. Our secondary fishery is really starting to take off. IE:Walleye, Lake Trout(which has been phenomenal because of the abundance of golbies) Steel Head, and Atlantics. Our smelt numbers have increased exponentially in the last 5 years. Several local areas are dipping limits of smelt for the first time in ages! Numbers in the DNR and Nation Fish and Wildlife survey nets show an extremely positive outlook on our fishery.

Mike, That isn't the issue. The issue is what the carp would do to our forage base. These asian carp feed on plankton. They feed at an astronomical rate compared to our common carp that are already plentiful in our lakes. We already are fighting a battle with quagga and zebra muscles, which essentially do the same thing. The quagga muscles is what destroyed Lake Huron. They filtered the lake so efficiently that they totally wiped out the forage base to our alewives. Adding another filter feeder to Lake Michigan could totally wipe out the forage base of alewives, essentially wiping out our salmon. Another issue with the "asian carp" is their reproductive cycle. These fish will spawn up to 3 times per year!!! The main goal of cutting the salmon plants is to increase the number of alewives. With the phenomenal natural reproduction they're seeing for kings, they could become over populated. ((Which is one cause of Huron's crash)The number of natural reproducing kings were severely underestimated causing an unexpected amount of adult salmon in years leading to the crash) Lake Michigan has been lucky enough to avoid the catastrophic crash by the way of quaggq muscles because of the lack of rock structure throughout the lake as compared to Lake Huron. The issue with our alewives right now is not sheer numbers. But the numbers of adult alewives. Alewives have a 7year life cycle, but are not considered adult(reproducing) until the age of 4. Once these fish grow to the size they are, around the 4 year mark, they are the PERFECT target for our kings. Having an over abundance of kings can severely impact the number of reproducing alewives by over feeding, which will in-turn cause low spawning numbers. It turns into a vicious cycle. Unfortunately, carp and alewives are completely different issues, but could essentially be detrimental to our fishery. Both of these issues have to be looked at, but on a separate basis. Prevention of the carp entering the great lakes is by far the most important step. The next step is sustaining a forage base for our kings. If there aren't alewives there aren't salmon. It's as simple as that.

Go with the bullet style! Pancakes have a terrible issue when fishing deep with any type of current around.

Not correct at all. I really wish they would have down this on our side of the state before something catastrophic happened. Unfortunately i beleive not everyone really clearly understand what happened to Lake Huron, and how it has destroyed more than just fishing. It's destroyed towns, communities, businesses, and people's way of life. Being that the west side of michigan is the much more populated side of the state, i believe taking these steps to conserve and protect the fishery is what has to be done! If what happened in Lake Huron, happens in Lake Michigan, it could totally cripple the entire state of michigan

Just sign up on the sign up threads when they become available. Rules

If the date is changed to may 5th, looks like i should be able to fish it. If not, We'll be in St Joe for the tournament on the 11th-12th

Here in my home port(Alpena). Goby are our main forage. Everyone knows of the salmon crash of 04. Gobies took over as a main forage species for our fish, which really made our Lake Trout and walleye fishery take off. Gobies are found in our area in depths as great as 150fow. As far as imitating a goby, that is tough. they're made to blend in with the bottom of the lake. Browns, golds, etc are all great baits if your looking to imitate. Thankfully we've seen a significant increase in the number of smelt in the last 3 years, so much so smelt dipping is really taking off in certain areas around here. Things are definitely looking up!

Good job buddy!

The Bert's are absolutely awesome. Big Jon also makes a heavy duty rod holder that's awesome too.

Good fishin there

Most of all BIG kings come after 9. Numbers always seem to come before!

Good deal man! Season off to a great start!!

I really wish they would have cut our stocking much sooner than they did.... On the bright side, this winter was great for our baitfish

If you can get some of the old school fire tigers, before they changed the paint scheme... those are even more productive!

Just curious on if you made it out or not. Theres been quite a few browns taken at the warm water discharge inside of the lafarge channel. Bobber fishing minnows.