jdh

With a forecast of 15-20 knot south winds and a 2-4 ft sea offshore I'm going to have to sit this one out. JDH ( King Possible)

I only fish from 1 boat and trailer from Grand Rapids. I do have 4 boats right now though - although only the one is currently operational. I bought the others as projects. I keep busy with projects during the winter.

Fished Holland on Saturday. I got out there before the tournament started and immediately had trouble. My the pull start wouldn't turn the motor over. Luckily I bring lots of tools on my boat and after 20 minutes of messing around I got it turning over. Then the carb float got stuck - and I was messing around for another 20 minutes trying to get it started. Finally we started fishing and didn't really do anything for about 2 hours - we went from 70 to 125 fow and finally picked up a lake trout and a coho in 125 fow. After that we ran out to 180 fow and quickly picked up 1 king & 2 more coho. After trolling around for another while without anything we picked up a shaker and then pulled lines and headed in. Final tally 6-6. South haven was a little different story. We started around 7 am in 75 fow after running 7 miles north of port. We were marking a decent amount of bait as well as fish from 20-30 feet down, but they were not biting. After trying for an hour with nothing on those high fish we switched to lake trout fishing. We got our butts kicked by the lakers - we had around 9 fish shake the hook on us, but we managed to put 3 in the box and also picked up a coho. At this point we ran out to 220 fow and trolled back towards port. We went 2-3 out there on coho. What worked in Holland: 300 Copper - Silver Streak Mag Blue Dolphin - Laker & King 3 Color - Dreamweaver Superslim Steelie Dan - Coho Rigger down 90 - BLL Blue Kato - Shaker King Slide Diver on 3.5 out 90 with an orange Stingray spoon - Coho x 2 What worked in South Haven: Rigger on bottom - white spin doctor on bottom with chartreuse 00 spin n glow - 2 Lakers for ??? hits Mag divers on bottom with 00 spin n glows - 1 Laker for ??? hits 150 copper with Dreamweaver normal sized Sea Sick Waddler - Coho 200 copper with Dreamweaver Super Slim Full Nelson (Think Lemon Ice) - Coho 400 copper with Silver Streak Mag Blue Dolphin - Coho

I just had the same problem in South Haven on Sunday. At least it didn't stop working until we were within 1 mile of the piers on our way home.

King Possible is in. -JDH

I got out solo after work and went 4-4. I ran to 210 fow pretty much straight out. The lake was flat, but there was a little chop to the surface. I dropped my rigger & free slider down to 50 ft with stinger spoons. Picked up a 15-inch king in about 1 minute. I reset and picked up a 4 lb coho (my biggest coho this year so far). After that it was a whole lot of washing lures. As I was pulling my riggers in, I picked up another small king on a 200 copper and a BLL Patriot spoon. I ran to the pierheads and decided to troll for some walleye. I pickup up a 30" or so right in front of the piers, and then trolled back into Lake Mac with no more hits and called it a night. The weather was awesome.

I got my 4 fish in about 30 minutes. Two on flasher-fly combo down 70 ft. One on flasher-fly combo on a diver back 225. One on 3-color mini streak miami dolphin. ( I had already caught one in Muskegon in the morning - but that was it up there)

I ploughed through the chop at 4 pm today - it took me about 30 minutes to make it to 160. I found the coho like you said from 210 to 230 fow. They were a little bigger today, and had been eating alewives & mysis.

I'm going to look inshore first. I'll look for the edge of the muddy water. I need to figure out what port first! Also, I'm going to start late morning.

I'm likely #1A moment ago

Thank you Joe & Kelly for fishing with me in the Brown Blast Tournament on Saturday. We started on a north troll fishing around 7:30 am about 5 miles north of the St. Joe pierheads and tried for brown's in 5-20 fow a few hours with nothing. We then slid out into 20-40 fow and went 4-5 on coho over about 2 hours. We then turned around and slid out to 50-70 fow and went 5-8 with another coho & 4 lake trout. We pulled lines around 2:30 so we took the DQ and did not weigh anything in the tournament. On Sunday, Kelly and I fished south haven and worked 50-70 fow in many directions north & south of the pierheads. We ended up 6-6 on Lake Trout and had a huge rip on a 3 color that sank the board but never hooked up. I was hoping to limit out quickly and head out deep, but it took us until the end of our fishing time when we picked up our last laker. What worked Saturday: 3-3 coho on floating Rogue's in silver/blue/orange 80 feet back behind the boards on mono lines. 2-3 coho on firefrog ministreak with a white back on a 3 color lead core 3-5 lakers on silver streak mag blue dolphin & BLL blue kato on riggers down about 45 feet & 20-30 ft leads 1-2 laker on silver streak mag blue dolphin on 200 copper What worked Sunday: 3-3 Silver streak mags blue dolphin, greasy chicken wing, monkey puke -riggers down 45-60 ft 2-2 Trash can dodged & green/chrome spin n glo ticking bottom on a mag dipsy 1-1 spin doctor Kevorkian with a poofster fly on a dipsy out 90 ft. Good luck everyone.

We got a few coho yesterday running Smithwick Rogues clean 80 feet behind the a board. I've also run body baits on a 1 or 2 color when fishing slightly deeper water (more than 20 feet). I picked up a few lakers today on a trash can dodger with a green/chrome spin n glo on a 30" leader. Ticking bottom with a mag diver.

Trolled the beach for a few hours with nothing. Made it back to the pier heads and notice some nice marks near the bottom in 30-40 fow. Went 2-2 with a nice walleye (dr @ 30 ft) and a nice laker (3-color) - on small spoons - 1.7-2.0 mph. Forgot the net, but managed to land them without incident. Great day to start out the year! -JDH