New To Whitehall Area

[chazgreen]

I am new to this site and to Whitehall area; plan to go out the channel & fish the big lake April 19-21st. 6 of us had fished out of Manistee/Portage Lake Channel for browns for some 20 years, but the bites got fewer & we washed a lot of lures. Is there any shoreline structure where we might look for ( troll north or south?), or should we just troll body baits until we hit Muskegon? Appreciate any advice. Thanx/Chuck

[Kara_B_N]

When you come out of the channel to the north you will see a couple of dunes on the shore line known as the "Dolly's". Streight out from the northern most dune in 65 feet of water there is a shipwreck. This ship wreck is a popular site for diving and it may be too early for it to be marked with a bouy. This shipwreck also catches rouge commercial nets that have broken free.

Other than that there is not much structure. The channel depth is about 8 feet at the Lake Michigan end and about 17 feet at the White Lake end.

[Nailer]

That time of the year, I would go South. The area in front of Duck Lake is always good.

[mriversinco]

Welcome. It's pretty much a big bowl from whithall south, so no structure. Watch out for the nets.

[chazgreen]

Thanks for the responses. I did spot several creeks that seem to drain into the big lake, both north & south of the White Lake channel. Will watch out for the shipwreck/nets. When we fished out of Onekama, we would turn north & set lines at the first of the "3 Sisters", a set of 3 small dunes about 1 mile north of the channel. We would troll body baits north to "The Slide", which is a very tall dune, then turn around at Pierport and do it again, and again, etc. Some days we would run the planner boards almost on the beach. Most fish were caught on the inside board out to about 20 FOW. Back 100 feet. Guess we will try this when we get to Montague/Chaz

[kiltman]

Ditto....Nailer