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zgrinder on Fin Warrior

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Everything posted by zgrinder on Fin Warrior

  1. zgrinder on Fin Warrior
    Fished north of the harbor but not quite up to Fort Sheldon. Finished 9 for 10 from about 6:30 to 11:30am in one of the better trips in some time. The action came in about 150FOW and I ultimately never worked much outside that zone trolling North and South most of the trip. I could not get much of anything to hit early morning under the cloud cover. Once the sun broke and swapping out UV lures for early morning glow and dark spoons, things picked up. The one Spin Doctor / fly did nothing and I pulled it early to go with all spoons. Also, J-plug on SWR had no takers and was pulled early. Blue spoons were dominant for kings but most were in the 5lb range and released. I kept one 10lb king and another that I could not unbutton off the back of the boat. Green UV spoons took the rest other than the Coho (tonight's dinner) that came on Orange Crush. The SH that kept jumping on the SB long line while the Coho was brought in on the Port long line was eventually landed with one barb left in its mouth that about fell out. I will take fish luck when I can it and added my good fortune to the fish box. Inspired by Mega Byte, I did my best to take notes during the trip on my yellow pad and loaded the data in the table below. Dipsey bait depths came off of Smart Troll probes. SWR was +10' on top of the Smart Troll reading. Big marks again between 120' to 150'. I assume these are LT but will have to put a line down there next trip to see what is down there. Hope to build a log sheet over the next few days to improve my reporting.
  2. zgrinder on Fin Warrior
    Way to funny. Same output I posted from Saturday but we pulled lines around 6:30pm and had fewer hook ups. Hope you had fun with all the action.
  3. zgrinder on Fin Warrior
    I know how frustrating it can be to get on some fish and not be able to double back over due to boat traffic. Like you, most often I fish outside the fleet. I am impressed you have enough time to capture all the data when the fish are hitting - thats double the work. Thanks for the report.
  4. zgrinder on Fin Warrior
    Fished mid-day on Saturday with primarily a 4 rod top water set-up, small UV spoons in silver, red, green and blue in search of Coho, one Spin Doctor & aqua fly on a rigger and SW down deep for that King. Set down in 160FOW trolling west, marking fish between 35-50' and a few big marks at 85' all the way down to 150'. Some reports at the dock of fish caught in 220' but we found nothing and flipped around north east to 150' and then turned around again south to south-west. About that time we must of crossed over a school of small kings. Four rods went off in rapid succession. We released them all and retired the 200' copper that was a tangled mess. Somewhere in the rush SW got hit as well but nobody was home and found we had only one line left in the water. Set the spread back down then finally, we got the Coho we were searching for, not very big but we will double up on the veggies to make a full meal. On our last pass, we released another small king and had a solid hit on the 100' copper that broke the surface after a big run. As Janet took the board off, the wire broke just before the Fluoro leader. I retied all the lines not that long ago and must of not seen the damage to the copper-leader union - drats. Fixed it at the dock over a cold one. The most active set-up was 100' copper tipped with a UV green dolphin. Spin Doctor & aqua fly saw no interested and was retired half way through the trip.
  5. zgrinder on Fin Warrior
    Well done!
  6. zgrinder on Fin Warrior
    Nice kings - congrats! Agree completely with your assessment of the wind and waves. It has been hard to trust a forecast within the same day. On the other hand, my lawn is beginning to look really good this year
  7. zgrinder on Fin Warrior
    Fish were all high in the water column. Many thanks for the sharing the details your catch!
  8. zgrinder on Fin Warrior
    First time out in 2022. Set-up about 2:30pm just north of Saugatuck in 60 FOW trolling SW. Spent the first 90 min partially fishing and mainly educating myself on how to best run the new Smart Troll system on riggers and dipseys and comparing speed and temp at the ball to the old Depth Raider. At 100 FOW flipped the boat around on the reverse course. In 75FOW, SW down 51' on the counter took off just after I set it down with a UV blue dolphin like spoon. Landed a 13lb king. As I was setting the rod back down, the Deeper Diver on the opposite side of the boat went off in 55-60FOW. The DD was on a 3 set, down 28' per the Smart Troll and tipped with a small sized silver & red UV spoon. Big runner. Was happy that I had a 10.5' rod and Janet to net the king which came in at 20lbs. No other action for the day and unfortunately, no Coho were interested in the high lines. And much to my delight, nothing added to my Fix It list :).
  9. zgrinder on Fin Warrior
    Great catch and many thanks for the report. Looks like a very calm day on the water.
  10. zgrinder on Fin Warrior
    Well done!
  11. zgrinder on Fin Warrior
    Thanks for the report. Fin Warrior gets wet on Tuesday. Hope to test what is biting around Holland this coming weekend.
  12. zgrinder on Fin Warrior
    Glad you landed at least one. It will be 8 more days before Fin Warrior is in the water. I assume the sand bars you refer to are the ones created a couple of years ago when we had the massive blows.
  13. zgrinder on Fin Warrior
    Happy you found a calm day to get out. Been watching the webcam north of Holland and it has been fairly rocky as of late. Nice catch!
  14. zgrinder on Fin Warrior
    Nice way to spend a Sunday - nice catch!
  15. zgrinder on Fin Warrior
    Likely the last troll for the year. Fished mid-day in 180-240FOW. Found a slick with a number of gulls sitting in the water. Ran up and down that with no luck. Finished the day with a small SH on a full core and a coho that did not trick the SWR down deep. Save it for dinner tonight. Tried fishing up high with long lines for SH or coho and one down deep but found little action. Fishing in shorts with no flies in the middle of October was a gem! Will begin the prep for next season. Fin Warrior
  16. zgrinder on Fin Warrior
    Very nice SH! Tough fishing with all the warm water stacked up again on the eastern shore.
  17. zgrinder on Fin Warrior
    Set lines at 4:30pm in 110FOW half way to Saugatuck trolling south. Found multiple clusters of arcs on the fish finder down 80-100' but could not get any takers. Once I got past Saugatuck, I stopped marking fish. What started as a NE light blow became a 12-16kt steady rip NW that was not in the forecast. I would not have bothered with a trip if that was known. Pulled lines early and came in. There were at least 5 other boats fishing similar water. Talked to one that picked up 3 kings right at dusk but no action prior to that. I would like to try again tonight if I can trust the 10-12kt SE forecast. PS buoy indicates some colder water is coming back in. And no freighter traffic out of port Holland tonight.
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  18. zgrinder on Fin Warrior
    Fished off of Water Dog last night straight out of Holland. Lake was calm till dusk when the wind picked up. Set down in 140FOW and kept heading west as we set lines. Found some decent marks in about 190FOW but not much beyond that. Riggers were set down 110'-115' to find cold water but they did not get bit. 300' copper with a Wonder Bread spoon on the business end took a shaker and a small king that we decided to keep around 190FOW. 250' copper had one on that got off as we were removing the board. High and low dipseys did not get touched. Appeared we were one of 4-5 boats out for the evening. Typical fall fishing between the big blows.
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  19. zgrinder on Fin Warrior
    Nice report. A 15lb king would make my day!
  20. zgrinder on Fin Warrior
    After the other night working to get in around a cargo ship, I worked the internet and came up with a site, marinetraffic.com, that at a no-cost registration will allow tracking of 5 vessels. Just so happens there are 5 cargo ships that operate out of port Holland: Calumet, Cuyahoga, Great Republic, Manitowoc and Saginaw. The site provides for setting up a fleet of 5 vessels to track. Unfortunately, the settings cannot be saved so whatever information that you prefer to view has to be reset each time. Not a big deal. My plan is to check this site for inbound/outbound traffic before piloting out for the night bite. The most active cargo operations are by the Undaunted/Pere Marquette 41 tug/barge platform (see https://boatnerd.com/pictures/fleet/peremarquette41.htm for the amazing story of the history of the two vessels). We saw this cargo operation coming out of the harbor while fishing on the 3rd moving what I believe was scrap iron from Padnos Co. I will be tracking this operation separately. The tug/barge is much smaller, not taking up the entire channel and is in and out much faster. Much easier to maneuver around. Hope this is helpful. Fin Warrior
  21. zgrinder on Fin Warrior
    Pulled out of Holland about 4:30pm and motored down to Saugatuck for the evening bite. Set down in 120FOW trolling south. A few suspended marks on the plotter but most were near the bottom. Took a 5lb king about 6:00pm on a spinny/blue-green fly (old Siggs Rigs) down 80'. About 30min later, same rod went off but lost it about 30' in back of the boat. Guessing it was about the same size. About 7:30pm began moving set-up around for the night bite. Took the flasher off the meat rig and went with just the DW white glow bait head, charged it and put it down 99'. It got bit very quickly. Another 5lb king that somehow also got into two other lines. One was quickly undone, the second not so much. Did not pick up anything else and marks were few. Janet was a little on edge coming in at dark in front of the Great Republic as we had a hard time picking up the bow lights - aft pilot house no problem. We had plenty of safe distance - not something I dare take chances on.
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  22. zgrinder on Fin Warrior
    That is a great story. And great work by your crew to get all the gear up to square up the trolling line and boat the fish. Nice work!
  23. zgrinder on Fin Warrior
    Many thanks for all your posts to the community who fish on the East side of the lake. They are much appreciated by me and the members who post here. I note that my fishing friends in IL prior to my 2008 move to MI are not sharing the same fishing reports as the MI side of the lake. So I am rewarded to have the MI network. Have a great off season and much fish luck in 2022. For what it is worth, at a social event tonight in downtown Holland, I heard there were some large catches in South Haven in 120FOW. The info is sketchy (third hand) but I may run down there tomorrow as anywhere around Holland continues to be for some reason a no-bite zone.
  24. zgrinder on Fin Warrior
    Appreciate the detailed report.
  25. zgrinder on Fin Warrior
    I noticed a fair amount a couple of nights ago. I suspect the thermocline is rebalancing. I downloaded the temp data from the lowest probe on the PS buoy and it is obvious the colder water is coming in. I am hoping that will set up for a good king run in the coming days.
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