FBD

I have one, don't run.it much. Let's talk.

Lake flips closer to shore long before the temp comes up on the buoy.

Last year she lost her mojo - actually it went to another crew member of ours that hit on three of his five tickets compared to one of our 28. This year she had it back going 3/30. Did you know I'm not even allowed to touch the tickets anymore? The middle daughter would rather dunk worms than troll but my little boo kept opening the cooler and looking at the fish. Hopefully a good sign.

Remembered how much I love the Four Winns and will find the $ ( $$$$$$$$$ I'm afraid) to get her fixed. Until then, back to the 14'.

Had the mechanic get the boat running and against his advice took it out, even though I and the crew knew full well the coupler was trashed. Boat fired up and ran great, did not over heat, managed to avoid the weed bombs all over the lake. Got to the end of the pier motored up and it spun. We could make 5 mph and Wild at Heart was kind enough to offer a tow if needed so we decided to chug out. 40 minutes later we got to where wecwsnted to be. One of the crew is a sailor and I'm an engineer so we reckoned a plan that would put us at the dock on time. Fish finder also decided to puke only to slowly come to life at about 10 am, so we set up at the buoy. First hot a huge 4# king in the white spinny green fly, huge as it did not trip the diver. Then a miss in the glow green dolphin on the other wire. Good hook up on the white spinny again, fought like a big laker, 19.4# king. Then a 2# brown on the Michigan berry on the full core. Turned at 8:15 on time and headed back south. Big rip on the glow wonderbread on the 300 copper. And then it happened. 200 copper with the bloody nose got ripped so hard we soon lost sight of the board. Pulled the junk lines and circled it, ruining our timing. Got it to the leader, this fish was HUUGE! and then it was gone. Bummer. Ended up at the pier right at the poker run. That was cool. At 4.5 mph. Had a heck of a time at the dock with the boat handling, thanks to the guys in the Sea Ray and Holiday that gave me room and let me cut in line. Same as last year we had the fish to win but didn't get them all. Congrats to Coralee on another high finish.

How far out is 25-35' of water in that area? Releasing 20" walleye. That's awesome.

Fish half night crawlers on the bottom in the channel to lake Michigan. If you can put up with the gobies you will get channel cats, so small, some not.

Ramp? 14', Jeep, 4 low. I launch at places kayakers shy away from and there's never a line. We had the windows down this morning and drove by someone with poorly aimed sprinklers just down from the launch. That will wake you up.

7/12. Went 2/4 at the channel early then it got too busy, trolled to halfway creek and back in 8'. Would have done better but we had a fish break off a board and I turned too sharply to chase it and wrapped three short cores into a nightmare that's still lying on the floor. Ended up with four steel at 6, 7, 8, and 11#, browns at 2&5 pounds and a five pound coho. Let the smallest brown and steel go and wanted to let the 11# go but he was hooked funny. Lost two double digit steel, one probably pushing 14# that pulled the board rod down so fast that it cut the rigger rod's line off when they hit.

Trolling the beach not another boat within a mile of us. Targeting browns in 47 degree water. Is it April?

1% is right from the Indiana d n r publication on changes they are making to their steelhead stocking program. Granted this was for fall planted summer run fingerlings in the Joe, which are planted way up in Indiana and must run a gauntlet of predators and through a dam. The returns are also fish observed returning at the dam, not to the piers, or any tribs that may be before that. They are replacing most fall fingerling summer runs in the Joe with fall coho and then spring summer run yearlings, as the yearlings while more expensive yield better bang for the buck as not as many fish eat 9" trout as 5". Google Indiana steelhead planting to review the document, it's 6 pages and full of info. What it did not list was the returns at Trail Creek, which is their brood stock source. I bet when all steel get c w t we will see the myth of all pier steel at each flip being summer run debunked. I must have caught a summer run brown Wednesday. And I've caught summer run Lakers before. And summer run walleye. Lake flips bait moves into plumes to avoid thermal shock predators follow. Some steel run, most don't.

Michigan plants 30k in Manisyee that the get from Indiana. Indiana plants 250k well upstream in the St. Joe with dismal returns ( 1% ). They plant other rivers as well. So they are all strays, but I'm not convinced they are all summer run fish. We had all kinds of different fin clips on them.

Does not take much cottonwood fluff or sea fleas to gum up even the best swivels. Not sure if you have that in your area but we've been blessed lately.

Despite the best efforts of water owning charters that don't have to turn, reel in boards, and can put you into the piers if they like, we managed to limit on steel with a bonus brown last night. Or maybe because of them, as we went up the beach to settle down for s while and found a school of steel without another boat around. We went from 1/3 in the first hour to 7/10 in the next hour, shaking off a ten # that hit while pulling lines. Hit while I was reeling in the lure. Tried a couple things but in the end six thin fish out, three of them red black squiggle. Nine hits on those. One on silver orange back, one on gold red herring bone. Tuned the lures and trolled about 4 mph. Several ten pound fish made a nice heft to the cooler.

106 kids, I think 74 weighed a fish, 4 kings, about 10 steel, 1 brown, and the rest Lakers. Or pretty much normal June fishing. Steelheaders tournament in May was a laker and coho fest. Three years ago on that day we got our 15 in the morning grabbed a new crew and got them their 10 in the afternoon, all at the piers. Amazing how fast that changed, as 18 of those were double digit kings.

Almost daily reports from the Holland area. Not bad for June with no kings around. One of the charters we talked to in Saugatuck Saturday am had 19 Lakers by ten am; they got one pulling lines with a six man limit. My nephew caught four steel surf fishing Saturday morning and missed at least that many more. Most times you need 8# to break to top 25 at the Kids and Kings tournament, this year you needed almost 10#.

Caught a break for this tournament with the Four Winns down that there were still a few steel in the 64 degree water at the pier, and no boats in there. And it was calm enough for my 14'. We watched all the charters motor up, not sure where they found fish but two were back before 11. Andrea and I got our six boards out in 4 minutes then she promptly fell asleep on the floor. 15 minutes in we had a big rip that didn't stick. Then she fought a determined fight on a two color with what turned out to be a large sheep. How can a kid that takes 15 minutes to wake up for school sit up, put on her glasses, and select the correct board rod from the trees in three seconds just by yelling "FISH!"? At this point the voices told me to switch every rod out to a thin fish. We went 3/4 in the next hour. Started with a nice 7.38# then a six we let go, then a swing and miss, followed by a cute three pounder that went every where and came in dragging half the spread. Andrea landed that one on a two color even though it hit a flat line yellow bird. And then it died. Too warm? Fish gone. Nope. My nephew who had one from the surf rattled off three between 10-11 including one just under and one just over ten. We went into 4' and could see fish, but no hits. And no shrimp. If we didn't have the fish we'd invited him and his rods and even his bag of nasty shrimp onto the boat. 7.38# didn't hold up well against a bunch of decent Lakers. Taking your daughter out in a 14' boat where even the charters didn't want to fish and grinding out her limit of steel, well that's pretty cool.

Back in the days of heavy king runs in Huron, most pier fisherman threw plugs. Barimundi Mailers, Ping a Tees , and deep thundersticks or J13 rapalas were choice in glow or fire tiger. I interned in the thumb in 1997 and caught many a pier king on the above baits, took that technique back to da west siiiide and it worked over here too.