jdh

A little different day today.  Kid Coulson & I worked out from 60 fow to 90 fow on a SSW and then back to 60 on a SSE.  We went 1-2 on this pass with 1 coho on silver streak chilly goose 40 down on the rigger and 1 rip on a diver with a uv chrome paddle that said "coho".

We then set up for lake trout in 60 fow and quickly took 1 hit on a trigger with a tin can dodger and a chrome orange spin n glo.  That was it.  We also trolled for browns all the way back from Saugatuck with 0 hits.

I wish we could have fished 180 fow but the swells were too big for me - and growing.

Running the riggers as manuals really makes you work hard for your fish! Nice job!  I wish I had keyed in on the spoon bite of the riggers quicker, but I'll take what we got any day!  I started out running 5 flasher-fly combo's. I did have 4 spoons out on a 200, 250, 300 copper and a 6-color but they never got touched.

I'm going back out in the morning.  I'm going see what I find in 60-100 fow.  A couple kings maybe...

My dad and our friend Rick joined me on the King Possible today for a decent day of fishing.  We ended up 11-12 fishing from about 7:30 am until 2 pm.  We fished in 180 fow from Holland to Saugatuck with 5 coho & 2 kings to show for it.  Then just before the wind whipped up we ran back into 60 fow and dug up 3 lakers and a nice brown.

What worked:  180 fow sse/ssw troll 2.5-3.0 mph at the ball.

1-2 white uv paddle poofster fly on a rigger down 60 & 90 - coho

2-2 kevorkian spinny & poofster fly high diver on 3 back 225 - coho, king

1-1 pro king uv with mirage fly slide diver on 3 back 225 - king

1-1 bll green kato rigger down 40 - coho

2-2 bll patriot rigger down 50 fixed slider at 40 ft - coho, coho

In 60 fow nw/n troll 1.5-1.8 mph

2-2 tin can dodger green spin n glo mag diver on 1 back 115 ticking bottom - laker, laker

1-1 chartreuce green dodger gold spin n glo high diver on 2.5 back 150 ticking bottom - laker

1-1 tin can dodged chrome/orange spin n glo rigger down 65 ft ticking bottom - brown

Some silver:

Good to hear!  It's probably going to be a bit rough out there on Saturday, so I'll have to see if I dare venture out deep.

I'm always looking to experiment with different types of lures, so I added some larger spoons.  Got my order of 6" Tomics spoons as well as a larger plug delivered today and can't wait to catch some big fish with them.

The plan is to run these guys deep 80+ or maybe in the mud.  I'll report back if I get them to work.

The other two spoons are similar to a regular streak or a mini-streak.

Tight Lines.

-JDH

Got Joe & Kelly to ride along again yesterday and after much deliberation we decided to just fish Holland.  (Ok, we got a report from someone on the water)...  We launched a around 11:20 am and were fishing by noon.  We fished until 7:30 and call it a night.  South Troll 2-3 mph.

We ended up 9-14-ish all coho.  In 178-182 fow a out from the sliders.

Best setups:  flasher flies

Divers back 125-165 (size 1 or mag on a 1 setting through a 3 setting) - 8" protrolls chrome & Mylar heavy UV

Riggers down 55-65 - 11" white paddle and poofster fly

Only 1 fish on a spoon.

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.

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.

Thank.  I've loved that style of boat since lived in Seattle for a few months.  Good luck this season.

-JDH

Nice rig!  Do you know what kind of speeds you get with the 200 Honda?

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

Thank you for organizing this Larry. Indeed a great event!

-JDH

Thanks for the pics!  Won't be long now.

There's a new twist to the project now.  I'm getting another Islander hull delivered on Saturday.  This one has a hardtop, but no motor.  I need to figure out if I want to swap the motor to the "new" hull, or swap the hardtop to the old hull.

How's the ice looking at Port Sheldon?  I see 50 degrees in the forecast!

I need to go fishing - on a boat.

-JDH

Terry, it looks like because the WFML page is a group vs. a subforum, the posts are not appearing as new posts on the homepage.

Maybe Chad has some input on how to fix this?  I see posts from the 3+1 showing up?

Well I've started the rebuild, or as I should call it right now - a disaster zone.  I don't have the most recent pictures, but I have the hull - floor/foam/stringers - almost fully cleaned out.  I'll post some more in a few weeks as I keep working on it.  The transom still needs to come out.  Overall, anything wood was a disaster, but the condition of the hull and anything metal is very good.  Motor was running nice before I winterized it.  I have 12 bags of trash I need to work on getting rid of.

Ed, I'll get around to restoring the trailer soon.  Once I pull the motor I'll drop the boat off in it's parking spot and bring the trailer back to the garage.  The trailer needs to be done before I start putting the boat back together.

Thanks for the replies everybody.  I would just have to run the numbers, but I'm leaning towards keeping just the 1 vehicle.

Not sure about slipping the boat, but storing the bigger boat in Holland somewhere might be my best option.  I'll have to finish rebuilding it first though.  It's just a shell & a motor right now.

I'm looking at a couple options for towing my boats around and trying to consider them from a financial point of view.

I have 22 ft Starcraft Islander & a 17 ft Lowe currently.

Right now I have a Nissan Frontier which gets the job done for now.  I'm putting on about 16k miles a year - with about 3.5k miles towing (mostly 80 mile round trips.

The option I was considering was selling the Frontier and buying a used truck for about $5 k and then buying a used sedan for commuting & trips for about $12 k.  I would estimate 5k miles a year would be driven on the truck, and the rest in the car.

Have you done something similar with having 2 vehicles and how has that worked out for you?

I hate putting all the highway miles on the Frontier when I don't need to be driving a truck.

Any other thoughts/suggestions?

1) Diver Setups - I like my Daiwa Accudepth Plus 47LCB reels.  I run both braid and wire off of these.  Reels with smoother drags are important for divers. For rods, I've been using Okuma dipsey rods (the ones that sell for about $35).

2) I like black or clear divers, but will run orange & yellow when fishing up higher up in the water column (diver settings on 3 or 3.5 or the smaller divers)

3) I don't use snubbers unless I'm using mag divers.  I use 20 lb test flouro leader.  Haven't snapped a fish off yet.  The snubbers you say stretch too much have several strands of heavy monofilament inside them - I would doubt you're gonna have anything snap the snubbers themselves.

4) For planer boards I run Okuma Pro GLT trolling rods - the specifically the ones made for copper trolling.  I run both longer leadcore & copper off of these rods.  For short leadcore segments and mono trolling i like the Okuma Pro GLT precision trolling rods in 7'10".

5) I use both copper & leadcore.  They both work.  I like leadcore for getting down to about 5 to 30 feet, whereas copper for 20 through 80 feet.

6) I run rigger rods like you do with 20 lb test mono.  I like the stretch of mono - and have not run braid off the riggers.  If I'm fishing spoons only, I've run down to 12 lb test on lighter rods.

7) I don't run leaders for the downrigger rods.

8) Lakers - 5 to 20 feet.  Steelhead & browns - generally 50+ for spoons.

9) Spoons... I run all sorts of spoons.  My highest used ones are Dreamweaver Super Slims, Silver Streak Mini's, Silver Streak Mags, Moonshine, Stingers.  It's easy to buy too many spoons - and then have trouble deciding what to run.

10) I just run orange & reds shallower,  greens/yellows below the orange, greens/blues below that.  Put out more of whats working if you see a pattern.

11) How would you be using flasher/fly setups?  It can be a little crazy figuring this out.  It really varies by time of year, the fish you're fishing for, what depths the fish are at...

12) Change speeds until something works.  Then replicate.  I fish from 1.8 to 4 mph.

Kevin,  if you send a message to website, they should be able to help you restore your old account.

Nice work Kevin. Unfortunately I came down with the flu this week and didn't make it out today. I'm thinking of starting my 2016 season early than most if this warm weather sticks around. How does a limit of lakers on January 1st sound!?