jdh

Thank you Kid Coulson for going fishing with me today. We fished near the sliders in 100-140 fow and ended up 6-6 with 3 kings from about 8 to 14 lbs, 2 lakers and a small steelie. Divers with Flasher/Fly took 3 fish. 300 copper with a blue dolphin took another 2, and the steelie came a 2 color with an orange superslim.

No troll direction was best - took hits going SW, W, NW, SE, NE. There was a strong current pushing my lines around. No troll speed was best - took hits from 2.0 to 3.8 mph.

Marked a decent number of fish. Seems like the water temps / weather pattern has the kings spread out and not interested in biting. Had a good number of follows on the graph on my riggers, but couldn't get them to go. I tried all sorts of lead lengths and different sized/colored spoons.

Found some alewives in one of the kings, and several alewives in one of the lakers.

Thursday - Good fishing! We found some kings in the top 35 ft of water off of Saugatuck. Had action from the ball to the sliders. Best water was 110 to 130. Orange uv stinger sized stinger spoons on free sliders were hot. Ended up overall 12 for 17? Brought home 7 kings in the 6-10 lb range plus 1 lake trout. Let a few other fish go home. North troll worked well.

Saturday - Different story. Set up in the same general area as Thursday and trolled north again. Ended up 1-5 I think? (3 - 7 including shakers!) 3 of the fish we lost were nice angry kings. Then I think we lost a lake trout. Lures were deeper - divers back 130 ft+ with meat rig & FF took hits. Rigger at 99 ft with raspberry dolphin had a nice king who wrapped us into my 300 copper and got off. Ended up with 1 fish (7 lb laker) for the cooler on an orange superslim in 120 fow. Disappointing day for bringing out 2 rookies, but we had fun and stayed out there until 1:30 pm.

I need to review to see what I did wrong, but I have the idea based on current the south troll direction might have been better... Shows I need to adjust based on conditions, not on what worked 2 days prior.

Great job finding some silver! Thanks for the report.

You're just going to have to experiment out on the water. Typically to bottom currents on Lake Michigan travel counterclockwise (Northish near Holland / Grand Haven) but they can vary significantly depending on wind conditions (is the Lake turning over or not?).

One thing to look for is if the downrigger cables are angled to the sides. This will give you the direction of any current you are fishing. Then you have to figure out which way is trolling with the current.

If you are confident in your Fish Hawk speeds and compare them to GPS speed you should be able to determine which direction the current is flowing.

Brett, If you're surface speed is from the Fish Hawk unit you are going to want to calibrate the surface speed to the probe. The way I did this was to wait for a very calm day and proceed as follows:

1. Start trolling at a consistent speed. I did this at about 2.5 mph.

2. Let the probe down only 2-3 ft on the rigger (until you get a reading from the probe to show up)

3. Wait for the numbers to stabilize on the Fish Hawk (both surface & probe).

4. Once stable, are the probe and surface speed the same?

5. If NOT, adjust the surface speed calibration on the Fish Hawk display until they are the same (or close)

6. Once calibrated (or they were the same to begin with) turn around 180 degrees

7. Wait for the numbers to stabilize on the Fish Hawk (both surface & probe).

8. Repeat steps 4 through 7 until you are happy with the results (closely matching speeds).

Now, if the calibration has been done, to read the unit lets go to your scenario:

Surface speed is 2.1 mph & downspeed is 2.5 mph

Now as to where the current is it can be hard to tell without actually being out on the water. There can be several scenarios:

(1) Surface current is pushing your boat in the trolling directing at 0.4 mph, and no current below

(2) There is no surface current, and the current below is traveling towards you at 0.4 mph

(3) Combination of surface current pushing your boat and the current below adding up to a 0.4 mph difference

(4) Both currents are flowing the same direction with different speeds.

Additional Notes:

You can often compare GPS speed to the help you determine the current conditions as well.

If want to get even more complicated you can calibrate the Fish Hawk speed to match GPS speed - but you have to make sure there is NO surface current.

Also remember if the downrigger lines aren't straight behind the boat the probe is not likely tracking straight either.

I didn't write everything down today. It was much of the same though. Ended up 16 for ? - 20 I think. 14 lakers and 2 nice kings.

Thank you Joe & Kelly for coming along! What an awesome day!

North & south trolls best between 50 & 60 fow. Divers and riggers and coppers were all just as good. Standard size divers on 2.5 back 75 to 125 ft with flasher flies and meat rigs. Riggers down 35 to 55 - one with spoons & the other with flasher flies. Best boards were coppers 100, 150 & 200 with standard sized spoons - key was gold colored.

2 kings came on the following spoons:

Nice to hear about some coho in GH.

Thank you Terry for organizing the event. Thank you to Silver Streak for sponsoring. And a big thanks to my dad and his friend Laurence for reeling in a bunch of fish! We set lines in 40 fow and began trolling WSW. Made it to 50 fow and the rods started popping. Overall ended up 14 for 16. Picked up 8 lakers, 2 nice kings, 1 16" king, 1 coho & 2 shakers. Pretty much everything picked up fish. Best troll was WSW at 2.2 - 2.5 mph at the ball between 50 & 70 fow.

What worked best:

2 color with Mini Streak gold Jägerbomb - 2-2 nice king & shaker

Rigger at 40', 50' & 55' with white paddle & bw poofster fly - 3-3 lakers

100 copper with standard Flounder Pounder RV - 2-2 nice king & small king

Standard diver with mag ring back 75 ft on 2.5 with DW 10" SD Hammertime with a NFN meat rig - 1-2 laker and a missed bigger king.

Also lost a decent king while SLOWLY setting a 300 copper with a mag silver streak blue dolphin. I didn't set the hook good.

The lures - 11 different lures took hits.

King Possible is running a little late. See you out there soon!

Always nice to catch a few perch! I suppose the water is still a bit cold?

Couldn't get anything going. I ended up 2-3 picking up another shaker in 40 fow, and then losing a big fish - king? - that spit the hook on a slider before I could reel it down.

I fished in shallow (5-10 fow) for 2 hours or so between 6 and 8 pm with nothing to show for it.

Anyways, it was a beautiful night out there!

Marking a few fish in 40 fow in front of the pier heads. No hits yet.

Marked some fish in 30 fow a bit north. Still no hits. It's annoying to only fish 3 lines!

1-1 shaker king in 30 fow fixed slider at 18 ft white backed red & orange mini streak.

Good luck!

Awesome!

Thanks for posting and good job! The lake does look a little too bumpy for my liking.

Could you add in what lures were working on your next post? Even if you don't post the exact lures (understandable as you are fishing tournaments), posting if you used spoons, body baits, flasher fly etc. would help some people out!

Try posting your fishing reports to

http://www.greatlakesfisherman.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=19

Fished 5 to 15 fow from Holland to Saugatuck with only 1 hit with no one home. Switched it up and put on some more salmonish spoons and fished the mud in Saugatuck for a bit with nothing. Then we headed north switching out to superslims fishing out to 70 fow and back into 30 fow.

Ended up 3-4 with a shaker king, a big king and a lake trout.

What worked:

0-1 ministreak lemonberry uv - 2.5 mph in 9 fow.

1-1 ministreak jäger bomb uv - 2.8 mph in 40 fow N troll

1-1 white BLL name ? - 2.8 mph in 50 fow N troll

1-1 superslim mixed veggie uv in 30 fow NE troll

I've got a group of people that I call to see if they can fish with me, but I'm often looking for 1 or 2 people depending on who's available.

I've got 1 seat currently open for May 2. Go ahead and send me a PM if you are interested in fishing with me.

-JD

Count the King Possible in.

Dave, I need to remember which boat is yours. I thought that was you I parked next too, but I thought you had a double axle trailer.

Chandler - 2 to 2.5 mph feels soooo slow now! It may be surprising but I've not got a fish on an SS going slower than 2.5 mph.

That is my first complete Grand Slam!

Bob, do you have the big boat fishing yet?

That's a brown. Generally steelhead & browns are very easy to tell apart, but there are some browns that will look similar to a steelie.

Made it out this morning with a friend and fished to Saugatuck and back with 4 browns, a coho, and a steelhead to show for it.

Couldn't really get a program going. I tried thinfins, thinfish, jointed rapalas... After our first fish on an orange gold J-9 Rap, we didn't get anything until I started mixing in some mini-streaks. All fish came in about 6 fow and were spread out between Holland and Saugatuck. Pickup up 3 trolling south, and picked up 3 on the way back. Trolling speed between 2 and 2.5 mph.

We were about done, but I suggested that we try 20 minutes on 20-30 fow and we put out a 150 copper with a new plastic spoon (chartreuse with dolphin tape) that I picked up at the GR sportsman show. A king decided to scare the crap out of us be peeling off about 100 feet of line before we even knew what had happened. Unfortunately it came unbuttoned about 100 feet from the back of the boat. I guess that's why my boat's called King "Possible".

Lures:

(1) J9 Gold & Orange Rap - 50 ft back on a mono board - brown

(2) Ministreak Lemonberry - .75 oz snap weight 50 ft back - brown x 2

(3) Lil Thumper spoon - 1.5 oz snap weight 30 back - coho & steelie

It looks like a mini streak spoon blank? Firefrog colors.

(4) Ministreak - .75 oz snap weight 50 back - brown

(5) BW Lexan Spoon - 150 copper - king (missed)

The photo for the Lexan spoon shows it greener than it actually is.

Forgot to say thanks to Joe & John for fishing with me! Without someone to fish with I might have had to drag my kayak down to St. Joe - and I wasn't feeling like exercising yesterday.

Also - photos of the lures & a photo of the fish. Not sure how the fish managed to cover up the king, but she was in there!