Yankee's Port Dalhousie - King of the Lake Tourney

[Yankee Troller]

Well, it was game on this past weekend! The first tourney of the season, which is what we call the “kick off†of Salmon season as Lake Ontario knows it. Each Spring the King of the Lake starts their series in Port Dalhousie around the end of April. We have taken part in this tourney for the last few years, but we could never ever put two solid days together when mother nature allows us to fish the whole tourney.

April 29th (Practice/Big Fish Friday) - We started from the Wilson Boatyard a little later than expected all because the team needed a Box of Joe from Dunkin! Let’s just say that even though $15k was on the line this weekend we still go out there just to have a good time with friends and family during tournaments.

We dropped in a mile or two East of the Welland Canal and began our practice. We ran a simple 3 rigger, 2 slide diver, 2 short core program pulling all spoons. The water temps were OK, but the water was dirty. We trolled the Welland area for most of the morning, but all we could manage was a few small Lakers, a small Rainbow, a small Atlantic, and a barley legal Chinook. We had some fish under us, but we just couldn’t get a solid King bite going in there.

Previous knowledge, and the cold Spring, made our decision around 11am to run West very easy. Oh yeah, and the fact we weren’t doing anything off the Welland helped too. We set down a mile or two West of Port Dalhousie and began trolling West once again. The water was really stained still, but we had a little better temperature. We also had some fish on the screen. We ended up pulling out some Mag Stingers and down went a Gin and Tonic and a Glow Mixed Veggies on the riggers. Shortly there after we were hooked into our first real King! We ended up boxing three good Kings that afternoon and we were back at the dock around 5pm. A long day on the water, but the roominess of our new Trojan made it all that much better!

April 30th (Day 1) - We had no other option than to head over to our waypoints from the afternoon before. We blast off and make the short run along with a few other boats. We were happy to see the fleet head East. When we pulled into our area there was about a dozen boats with us. We set lines with the same program and waited. We let that program soak for 30 minutes and then it was time to start switching lures out. One of our team members pulled out a Stinger Black Widow in a Stingray size and put that down on the rigger. It wasn’t long and we were tied into our first King of the morning. We would go on to box out by 8:30 and then pick up one more after that to upgrade us just a little. That Stinger Black Widow went down on another rigger along with our Stinger Sea Sick Waddler and all three riggers would take fish. Our 5 color cores and our slide divers were just dead. It was all riggers for us with the exception of one wire diver bite at the end of the morning bite.

We were team number nine so we weighed in fairly quickly and watched as 46 other teams weighed in behind us. At the end of the day we were sitting in 4th place, but I knew it was going to be tough to stay up there. With the top boxes coming from our area, and a screen that wasn’t as good in the afternoon as it was in the morning, I had a funny feeling…….

May 1st (Day 1) - My premonition was spot on as we blasted off to the West so did about 2/3’s of the rest of the boats. We settled in on what looked to be combat fishing in front of the Salmon River and began our troll. Before we could get fully set up our wire diver took a shot and we were tied into our first king. This diver had a Stinger Black/Silver w/ a glow cup. We put the first fish in the box and we were pumped. With so much boat traffic, and waypoints from the previous day a little further West we just kept trolling. Bad decision! We should have turned on that fish and worked the area. Well, we would wait almost 2 hours before our next bite, and it would be on that same set-up. After that we went dead for the rest of the day.

At the end of the day the early bite in that area was key for boxing out, and we just flat out missed it, and trolled right through it on our way to some waypoints. We weighed in a measly two Chinooks, and fell to 23rd place overall.

So, the first tourney is under our belt. We learned a little bit about the new Trojan, and we also did pretty darn good considering we have never “King†fished her before. She ran GREAT all weekend without even a hiccup. We couldn’t be more happy with our decision on this boat, and I am sure there will be many more GREAT days had on her. With that being said we have some great fishing ahead of us. The Kings this year look to be healthy, and boy did a few of them fight like maniacs this weekend. The largest Salmon taken at the tourney was 26 pounds and change, but there were also a lot in the 16-20 pound range as well. Given this cold Winter/Spring you may have to wait a little longer for them to get to the bar, but they will be there soon in great numbers.

[GLF]

Nice job Richard. decissions, decissions, decissions...Its hard to say where the fish might be from day to day.

[Yankee Troller]

Yup.......Oh well......More tourneys to come!