Mega Byte

Some guys were getting fish. The 3 guys I talked to were 4-4, 2-2 and 1-1. (Kings) Just nothing working for us. We ran a meat heavy spread. But, my captain also decided to make a couple pretty tight turns. You know...the ones where your outside port board is on the starboard side of the boat. So we had some tangles to deal with. We were also in way too shallow at dark. We were way inside the other boats. I wanted to be around 120 fow and we were at 75. The fish we lost was a nice king that found his way into the tangle that we were working on and he got off. He hit on a green paddle and fly down 70 on a rigger...the only fly I was running. So a lot of tonight was on us. We are going out in the am. I will run a more diverse spread and I am driving tomorrow so we'll see what happens. Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G870A using Great Lakes Fisherman Mobile App

I will be in Manistee this weekend and will provide updates.

That happened in 2010. Details are here and attached. commerical-nets-kill.pdf

I brought GPS/markers/lights up with the DNR a year or two ago. Here is the response: Mr. Bays, Thanks for your email. The department receives one or two requests to post the locations of commercial trap nets on our website each year due to safety concerns. Most Great Lake jurisdictions employ some form of commercial netting on the lakes and I am not aware of any (Wisconsin, Minnesota, Ohio, Ontario, etc.) that is currently requiring the mandatory posting of their commercial fisheries net coordinates online. I am sure that each jurisdiction has their reasons for not requiring or posting this data, but the common rationale most likely includes a combination that such a requirement would be unpopular with the commercial industry and liability concerns with posting inaccurate or outdated coordinates. Many commercial fishers strongly believe that broadcasting their net locations to the general public over the internet will lead to increased vandalism on their nets and buoys. Vandalism is a real concern for the industry and when acts of vandalism do occur, the fishers are not compensated for those losses. As a result fishery representatives are against increasing public access to their nets. Additionally, the state is resistant to unnecessary regulatory action that could be implicated in loses due to vandalism. Another reason often cited by the state-licensed commercial fishers in their opposition is parity with Michigan’s Tribal Commercial Fishery. The tribal fishery in Michigan is 3-4 times larger than the state-licensed fishery and net locations/online postings are not required of their fishery. Current tribal commercial fishing regulations will remain in place until 2020 but will be negotiated in the coming years. I have no doubt that requiring and posting net locations will be a topic discussed between the parties. In the meantime, the state-licensed fishery believes very strongly that regulation above and beyond that of the tribes, places them at a competitive disadvantage with their direct competition. This position has been successfully argued politically in the last decade against the DNR requiring and posting their net coordinates online One last issue is that trap nets are moved throughout the season and there are some liability concerns with the state posting an area free of nets and that in turn not being the case. The error might occur due to delay in updating locations or simply from having the wrong coordinates. I think that all jurisdictions regulating commercial fishing have grappled with this issue of liability. While the DNR recognizes the concerns expressed in your email and agrees that technology is easing the obstacles to posting net locations online it is a more complicated issue than simply unilaterally implementing a regulatory requirement on the state-licensed commercial fishery. There is no avoiding that such a requirement would be unpopular with the commercial fishery for reasons states above. Currently, the DNR is successfully working with several fishers around the state to voluntarily receive and post net coordinates but so far has been unable to secure universal buy in throughout the fishery or at Muskegon specifically. None of this precludes, charter boat associations or fishing clubs from gathering net location data on their own and posting those net locations to localized websites. This type of collaboration by recreational fishers/boaters is encouraged and is currently employed at certain Lake Michigan ports. Commercial net markings have been reviewed several times over the years and last updated in 2005. At the time, additional buoys, staffs, and flags were added to the marking requirements for deep water trap nets. The number of buoys/floats was increased to three and the number of 5-1/2 foot tall staff buoys increased to two (Figure 1). Additional markings beyond these are required for any trap net set with less than 15ft of clearance above the top of the net. Surface lines are required to be weighted in a manner that causes extra line to be submerged vertically below the buoys. In 2005, a requirement was also added for radar reflectors on all trap nets capable of detection from any direction. If you suspect that any commercial fishing net is improperly marked, please contact the Report All Poaching hotline (800-292-7800) and our officers will investigate. Figure 1. State-Licensed Deep Trap Net Markings (NOTE: Tribal nets are marked a little differently). I know much of what I have provided in this email is not what you were looking to hear, but I hope that it did provide some additional information concerning the mandatory posting net locations online as well as markings on state-licensed trap nets. Thanks again for your email. Tom Goniea, Biologist DNR, Fisheries Division 517-284-5825 [email protected]

Thanks for the report. Hopefully something changes...

Another slow day for the few people I talked to out of Pentwater. We were 1 for 1 and it was a throwback king. We fished 55 - 185 fow. We found a good temp break from 51 degrees changing over to 46 degrees around 160 fow and down 70, but we didn't mark many fish. I didn't have any meat aboard so we ran 6 lines of spoons, plugs, and flies. At 10 am I asked on the radio for a fishing report out of Pentwater and I got was Charlie Brown who was 0 - 1. Stopped by the fish cleaning station to talk to a charter boat captain we saw come in from out deep. They said they got 2 kings early in 110 FOW and after nothing going for a while then went out to 240 FOW to get after the lake trout. We marked a few fish in warmer water between 45 ft down and 60 ft down. We had baits in the area, but nothing went. Troll speed at the ball was between 2.2 and 2.9. The one we got was on a UV Blue Dolphin on a free slider on a rigger set at 70' deep.

Monday was a rough morning. First skunk of the year. I didn't check the exact time, but I think we had our 6 lines set around 6:45 and we fished until 2. We started just north of the dunes in 80 FOW and were marking a lot of big arches right away. On the graph, it appeared like the bottom 10 feed was covered in bait with arches all around. No takers though. By the time we had made it just off the dunes, the arches and bait were gone. Very shortly after that, in 97 FOW we took a big rip on a wire diver, Kevin's GF spin doctor and meat rig. It was down 80'. He made a quick run and then gave two big head bangs and he was off. We decided to circle back around and try and run through all those marks of fish that we just came through. On this pass through, they were gone. So we turned south looking for fish and we worked out to deeper water. We spent the next 7 hours looking for fish and changing baits. We worked water all the way out to 185 feet. We were getting some decent marks between 75 and 110 foot down and we had a variety of baits down there. I had heard the fishing was good south of the point, so we headed south, but by the time we got south of the point, it was almost noon. We did find more marks in 160 FOW, down around 100 feet, but no hits. One thing we did on this trip was focus on the king bite, so we didn't have any lines up high in the warmer water. We had 50-degree water 100 feet down. By the end of the day, we had a lot of meat rigs out since that was what I was hearing was working and that was our only hit of the day. Maybe we had bad meat? It smelled fine, but it wasn't freshly purchased. We pulled lines around 2 PM. On the cruise back to port we noticed the surface temp was 2 degrees cooler just north of the dunes. It warmed a bit when we got closer to port. The lake was smooth and the weather was great and I got to spend a lot of time with my father, so despite the lack of fish, it was a good trip.

Nets suck. Nice fish. Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G870A using Great Lakes Fisherman Mobile App

Slow morning for us. 3 for 4, but one barely counted. It was dead when we pulled in the 100 Cu. Landed a 9# steelhead and 17# king. 130 fow was best for us, at the N edge of the dunes. The one we lost fought like a nice king. White paddle and fly down 75' got the king. Blue flounder pounder on a high diver back 130 got the steelhead. Lost the nice fish on a blue ladder back glow plug down 50' on a rigger (SWR - ball at 40'). I talked to a guy cleaning a 22# king and he got him in 185 fow. But he only got that one and a laker. Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G870A using Great Lakes Fisherman Mobile App

Does anyone know what the current is like in the bay? If there is not much of a current, his SOG and speed at the ball will be close enough to not worry about getting a speed probe.

I haven't been out since Jun 2nd. Just curious how the amount of bait in the lake compares to last year couple of years, which were pretty good I think.

Welcome!

Hopefully the kings start showing up soon. Thanks for the great report.

It depends on what you are pulling. Some baits run better slower (2.2) while others do fine around 3.0. I try to keep it around 2.5 - 2.7 mph at the ball. Speed at the ball is often different from SOG (Speed over ground, which is your surface GPS speed). Some days though, they prefer a faster or slower presentation. If you are doing turns, pay attention to if you get hits on your outside lines (which will be moving faster) or your inside lines (which will be moving slower).

Yep. I've got a lure like that with those two little willow blades. It produces fish for me.