1 skam in 85fow on rigger slidder about 35 down - moonshine blue spoon

1 king in 64fow copper150 mixed vegie type spoon don't know name

1 king in 61fow rigger green flounder 45 down

3 steelhead

1 laker

8 kings

Technically we fished more off of Saugatuck

Mainly south troll at least early on and then later north troll

Lots of current made PUG have to get creative with ground speed to get it em to chow

Night bite was a bit of a disappointment but we did get a triple early on after sunset and lost one on the dipey after 10pm in the pitch black

Anyways, got 2 of the steelhead early on in that 115-120fow and later another in 90fow – copper150-jplug, copper250-moonshine orange spoon, 5color-orange spoon.

The other fish all came mainly in that 70-80fow

High-diver meat out 220 went

High-diver mag flounder pounder moonshine went numerous times

Copp250 moonshine orange and white went numerous times

Copper300 went for laker

Rigger went just once and that was about 45 down on a slider

Spindocters were quiet

Pretty slow until 8:30pm and then it was game on. Here is what worked 

2.7-3.1 at the ball south is troll though we did catch a couple when we did about face to come home. We fished straight out and trolled past Saugatuck.  Half way to Saugatuck was when things switched on.

High dipseys had flasher flies early and took four rips but did not stay on. Had a free slider rip we lost as well.

Switched everything to spoons. Both high dipseys went multiple times after 8pm with Stanglehold "bloody knuckles" "Raspberry Carbon" OG and Dreamweaver "Bloody Nose RV". 120-130 out on setting 3. Never had a hit on inside/deep diver anywhere from 70-140out. Ran meat, white 11" paddle fly and eventually spoons

Riggers 50 and 60 down with free sliders produced. Blue flounder pounder, Happy Meal, Dancing Anchovy and many other spoons went swimming tonight. 

275 copper, 250 copper 225 copper rods all took fish. It was a great night. 

Once again, speed was the key. The fish were out of temp and we were taking fish between 30 and 60 feet down. 60' down was 49 degree water. 35-40' 54-55 degree water.

Put lines down in around 80 FOW. Didn't mark much, so we slid out to 90. At 5:30 we took one on an ESE troll as we slid out. Nothing to write home about, but at least we weren't skunked. We weren't happy with what we were marking. We zigged and zagged through 80-100 both North and South, not marking anything, so we decided to turn in and try shallower water.

We ended up in 70FOW heading S and started marking fish and bait. From 7am-8am we landed 5 fish, one on UV Mag Green Jeans, the other four on a Double Glow Silver Horde Cut Plug on a 275cu. We could hardly keep that thing in the water before another fish would hook up on it. By the time we were done we were almost in front of Saugatuck. 

At 8:30 the bit was off, maybe they slid out, we weren't sure. We pulled lines and headed back to Holland, happy that we had a 100% landing ratio!

On the way back, visibility had degraded significantly. If you're heading out tonight take it easy, and tight lines!

I am going to go out tomorrow morning. Any idea how the fishing will be with all this smoke and smog rolling in?

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Tried 100-110fow at first south troll. Not much happening. 7pm hit a pod of fish and had a triple and landed 2. 8-9:30pm was pretty fun with something happening most of the time.

What worked...

Happy meal 3× on 275 copper

Blue Flounder pounder on high dipsey and rigger

Flasher fly early worked white paddle dragon slayer twice on high dipsey back 120 setting 3. Did not land either

Other high dipsey out 160 setting 3 uv salmon candy green paddle with Docs custom tackle green glow fly. Great hit did not land it.

Riggers with sliders did damage. One set at 50 the other set at 60 took multiple fish both fixed and slider. Green flounder pounder rv. Bad Toad rv. Bloody knuckles spoon

300 copper with happy meal and dancing anchovy took fish. 

Speed was the key. 2.7-3.1 at the ball. Depending on direction of troll we were 2.6-3.4 sog.

Best depth was 78-90fow. On south seast troll. North troll was easier but did not produce much action.

IMG_20260715_005712.heic

Eventually had a hit almost at 9 pm.  Then another at 9:30.  Another at 10 pm.  And the fourth, which stuck hit at 10:25 pm.  All fish felt nice sized and the one we got was maybe 12 lbs.

Meat rig on a mag diver back 90 took two hits, 250 copper with mag moonshine jackal took one hit, and our last hit came on the downrigger down 20 feet with a mag moonshine double trouble.

Might try again tomorrow night.

SE troll 2.7-3.1 sog was good and East troll 67fow-58 fow is where we caught all of them  down riggers set 40 down and 45-55 depending on marks .

green spoons with glow standard and mag seemed to work best for us downriggers were on fire all great fighting fish they did not want to get in the boat , several strong runs ! It was an excellent night 

5:45 am:  5 lb king, high diver back 100 ft, mag bloody nose. 

6:00 am ish:   as soon as I put the diver back down it got hit again and so did rigger with ms green jeans, and so did fullcore with mag Shelly Snack.  Tripled up running solo.  Managed to land all three in spite of the fact I buried the lure on the first one in the net and getting tangled with another line. Chaos.  Un snapped the lure and landed the other two with the lure still in the net. Four in the boat by 6:30(5,6,7,9 lb kings).  
 

7:00 am: miss on diver again back 100 with bloody nose  

8:15 am:  in search of the 5th for my limit since 6:30 am. Finally gave and up pulled lines, and of course there was a shaker(released) on the leadcore.  Go figure.  

We had lines in at about 5 and got blown off the lake around 8. We must've missed something based on recent reports because we started at 70 and couldn't buy a mark or a hit. We eventually migrated out to 95 ft with no luck then went back to 70. On the way back in we took a hit on a 5 color lead that shook off. Back at 70 we got stuck inside a line of boats so we spent some time in there and picked off an 8 lb king on a downrigger 55 down. After awhile we found a gap and went back out and took a 7 lb coho on a 200 copper and missed a hit on the same downrigger as soon as we got the coho in. Shortly after that the wall wind hit. Maybe we jumped the gun but we didn't like how fast it went from glass to white caps, and our 18 foot open bow doesn't handle waves well so we bailed. It definitely felt like a whiffed outing considering the fact we were off the lake at 8 with only two fish. Here's what took the hits:

1 - salmon candy UV fruit pebbles standard spoon on 5 color lead

1 - moonshine lucky flounder standard spoon on 200 copper

2 - warrior psycho perch standard spoon on a downrigger 55 down

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Fish were all still heavily concentrated in that 75-90fow.  Started eating right away on the set where we had a triple.  Went on like this pretty much all night although fish did take a 45min break at 8pm which was strange but allowed pug to relax and take a much needed nap.  After dark is when it got super wonko and bites were coming in non-stop.  For example, we had 15 bites between 9.30PM-10.15PM.  PUG's ratio was crap but we went at it “guts and glory” as usual and ran a lot of stuff risking and experiencing tangles but brought the cavalry with us so we could max out rod count.  What a hoot! One of these times they are gonna stay hooked and PUG is gonna score his desired 6 man limit!

South and Southeast troll was good but we had to have a 3.1-3.4mph ground speed to get them to eat.  North troll and Northeast troll also produced magically well but again the groundspeed had to be between 2.9-3.4mph.  That was the sole determining factor for us getting hits last night... we had to be running so fast that the dipseys were leaking a little on both sides.

Copp150 – green ladder jplug (went 3 or 4 times)

Copp200 – moonshine blue spoon (went 6 or 7 times)

Copp250 – moonshine blue spoon (went 5 or 6 times)

Copp300 – ratchet jaw moonshine spoon (went twice)

Copp350 – moonshine spoon (went 2 or 3 times)

Deep Diver out 115 – moonshine flounder pounder (went 3 times and one time actually broke the hook on a pitch black screamer)

High Diver out 200 – yellow meat rig (went once)

High Diver out 200 – white and blue 8” paddle (went 4 times)

Riggers with sliders down 42-57 – moonshine spoons (pretty much took all the rest of the bites – “dancing anchovy” was best for sure)

Every rod took fish except for the port side Copp150 running mag moonshine jackal which left PUG in disbelief because that thing had been hit a dozen times already in the 4 trips prior.

HIGHLIGHT: trolling next to our original Parker year 2011 off the sliders - so cool that Matt was out there and absolutely crushing em on that legendary vessel with his kids!  If the guys who manufacturer these boats in the outer banks of Carolina could have been out there with a drone they could have really enhanced their marketing campaign

Thanks to @2MD for the previous nights report.  Used that to generally help us figure out where to set up.

So what was our program? 75-90 fow with SSW/SSE trolls - SSW had more bites, but both trolls picked up fish.  SOG around 2.8 when I checked.  Speed at the ball was 2.3-2.6 most of the night.  All depths and almost all of our lures got fish.

Rods were:

• 150 copper - standard size moonshine RV Happee Meal (3 hits)
• 250 copper - mag moonshine rv raspberry carbon (3 hits)
• standard diver back 85 to 115 - pro king 8" paddle chrome UV and yellow ladder back and fly (3 hits)
• rigger @ 40 - mag moonshine slider / standard moonshine main - both RV Flounder pounder (NO HITS ALL NIGHT)
• rigger @ 60 - pro king 8" paddle white dragon slayer with fly (4 hits)
• mag diver back 85 to 115 - 10" spin doctor doctor chrome dragon slayer and meat rig (ballyhoo strips) (4 hits)
• 300 copper - mag moonshine rv double trouble (2 hits)
• 200 copper - mag moonshine rv jackal (2 hits)
• 100 copper - stingray size orange tuxedo gold (2 hits)

I'll post  picture of the lineup below.

Looking back on missed opportunities, I think the RV/UV lures that were high in the water column was the wrong way to go.  After changing to non-reflective spoons, we go interest.  Green or blue orSalmon Candy UV flies on a 8" spin doctor, 24" or 30" leader, rigger or dipsey was not a salmon favorite tonight.  My purple Stinger high on a dipsey did not get hit after sunset.  This presentation is usually money.  Bloody nose likely would have been a better choice.   Currents were strong and heading north was easier than south to control speed.  Heading south, SOG varied from 4.0mph to 3.2.  Trolling valves were engaged and disengaged many times to try to manage the speed changes.  Troll direction was a better manager of speed.

We went 3 for 7.  6 solid hook ups but couldn't get them all in the boat. What worked...

Inside dipsey went twice with meatrig (green set up). Landed one. High dipsey with salmon candy flasher and money shot fly went twice landed one. 300copper had a nice fish and fought for about 10 minutes. Lost it when it charger boat and slack in the line. Shelly Snack mag rv. 225 copper went once with moonshine bad toad rv. Hit hard jumped a few times and gone. Late in the evening rigger with stacked spoons. Mongolian beef mag 59 feet down on bottom spoon. Biggest fish of the night. 

Fished 75-90fow. 2.3-2.7 at ball. Fish were on screen most of the evening 35-65 feet down. South troll had to run two bags to control speed. No bags coming back to the north. I never found a good angle. 

Talked to a couple guys after fishing. Both had really nice boxes. They were in 80-90fow and only ran spoons and plugs. 200-250 coppers high divers and riggers were there hot lines. 2.7-3.3 sog was what worked for them. Flounder pounder and blue stuff.

What took hits:

Mag Bloody Booger Moonshine

Mag UV Agent Orange Moonshine (this took the most hits)

Mag UV Green Jeans

Mag Burnt Toast

Froggy meat rig on Froggy SD

Fish weighed in at 17.92lbs (New PB ), 15.1lbs, and 14.8lbs

pug fished mainly off Geneva again 

5for9 was the final count I think

pug aspired for better but it was good enough and a beautiful night out there

first 4 bites come in that 83-87fow zig zagging and switching between east and west troll - copp200 went and also rigger down 60 - later dipsey meat went but came off - copp300 went a few times with rachet jaw spoon too

after sunset got one on rigger slider again and maybe one on dipsey pug cant remember - lost 2 huge ones that were just screaming... the first was high dipsey out 155 in 65fow mag moonshine flounder pounder original and the second was a copp150 silver horde green glow jplug again in 65fow

captain Rilee from GH gave us a helpful tip right coming into sunset and that was to troll north at 3.1 to get them to eat and indeed that worked better

90-100fow seemed to be best for me.

downriggers and spoons early morning 30-50 down

200-300 coppers after the sun came up with flashers and flies. Colors did not seem to matter for me. Glows in the morning and flash white, greens, and blues after the sun came up. Blues took coho, whites and greens took steelhead and kings.
low divers were great too, 90-130 back.

The big king was 17#
second biggest was 15#

Went two for five today. One big king broke our 30lb leader, one steelhead shook the hook right at the back of the boat. One fish was on but shook off half way, must have been a light bite.

North and south trolls, 2.3-2.5 mph. 100-110FOW had lots of bait and lots of marks.

Mag Bloody Booger, Mag Burnt Bread, Mag Green Jeans, SD and a green glow fly were what took hits.

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green jeans

Mongolian beef

meat rig ( picked sunshine )

Most fish hit in 120-130 fow.  Combination of 3 flasher fly bites with down 40 to 70 feet with divers and riggers.  1 meat bite down about 65 feet.  250 Copper went once with a mag moonshine blue jackal, and downrigger with a flounder pounder went once down 40 feet.

Was hoping for a few big fish, but didn't get any big fish hits.