INCREDIBLE salmon weekend!!!!!!!!

Hit the big pond this weekend out of Port Washington Thursday through Sunday. Fished 3 mornings, lines in the water by about 3am, fishing until around 10am, or whenever we limited, whichever came first. Fishing was good for us this weekend, and we had an absolute blast getting out after all those big fish. 2 guys in each boat, 2 boats total.

The weather was absolutely perfect for us this weekend. A little breeze, but nothing terrible. We skipped fishing Saturday morning due more to exhaustion than to wind conditions, but I heard it was a little bumpy out there. Good day to take a break…. The days we were on the water provided very calm conditions, no swells, and very near-shore fishing (within 2 miles of shore) – gotta love those west winds they have been having for the last few weeks! Near glass conditions at times.

It was a very spoon-heavy bite. Dodgers/fly only took a couple of fish for us the whole weekend. Mostly glow mag moonshine or pro king spoons were the ticket. Steelies liked bright colors up top off of boards, and even the kings hit a few j-plugs on flatlines/boards. Most fish were 50-55 fow for us, with some coming in 39 fow and some out to 80.

Speeds for us were usually 2.3 gps on a southbound troll, with 1.8-2 mph at the ball. water was COLD, and we even saw some 49 degree temps up top. King heaven!

We ended up boating about 45 salmon and trout this weekend, throwing a few shakers back. We picked up two nice browns, 10 or so steelies (a few over 10 lbs), and some very nice kings. There were many kings over 15 lbs that came into the boat this weekend, but we couldn’t find one to push the scales to 20, although other guys were reporting some nice catches of big fish. Our two boats probably averaged somewhere around (or slightly under when you include the shakers?)10lbs per fish. Doing the math, that leaves us with 400 lbs of fish for the weekend. I would think that roughly half of that weight comes out in the filets, so that leaves us with 150-200 lbs of filets… At $10 per pound…. Well, you can do the math…

The Lions derby was also this weekend, and last I heard the biggest king was about 24 lbs and the biggest brown was 25 lbs – the brown was the new lions derby record for PW.

Amazing weekend to be out. Awesome fishing with a great group of guys. If you have never fished Port Washington, stay away cause its no good… Just kidding, it rocks, and you probably won’t find a nicer group of local guys on the radio that are more than willing to share with info with you on the water which helps you (and them) dial in and really boat some nice fish. If you get down that way, Red Rider and Mojo Risin were especially helpful to us this weekend, so give them shout on channel 7 if you hear them out there. (Great fishermen, they had a 5 guy limit – 25 fish – one morning by 10am.)

Also, we fish out of a 18′ Lund and a 17′ Crestliner… This type of fishing really is NOT out of reach for the average walleye boat… You always have to watch the weather, but is probably more accessable than most guys think. And often the great lakes guys are incredibly generous with information. Its a put and take fishery, and those kings only take 4 years to reach 20+ lbs…

Awesome fishing, great weather, and great comraderie… It just doesn’t get any better than this!!!

Mike

a few more pics….

That’s awesome, congrats on the great fishing. I wish we could have had the same luck. It’s amazing what 30 miles of shoreline north can do to a fishing report.

Very true… sounded like the weather was a little different, too..?? Also heard of some other guys only getting one or two a day out of PW, so maybe we just got lucky…

Either way, it was a BLAST!

Mike

Wow!!!! nice work! I hope to be out there in the next couple of weeks. I can’t wait

Awesome!

When should I stop by for my salmon fillet?

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Awesome!

When should I stop by for my salmon fillet?

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Feel free to stop by about 6:30 yesterday… (They were EXCELLENT on the grill..)

Might try to smoke some of it… Anyone know of any meat shops in the EC area that smoke fish? Otherwise, anyone have any recommendations on a good smoker brand/model to buy? I’m thinking propane for ease of heat control….

Mike

Mike, you make me really miss living on the pond… Sounds like you all had a great time. If you have never tried it, canning some of those filets in pint jars with a couple table spoons of shrimp sauce and a litttle Blacken will really make some awesom trays come holiday time!

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Mike, you make me really miss living on the pond… Sounds like you all had a great time. If you have never tried it, canning some of those filets in pint jars with a couple table spoons of shrimp sauce and a litttle Blacken will really make some awesom trays come holiday time!

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mmmm…. Hold the phone, this sounds worth trying!!! By “trays”, do you mean a cracker dip sort of food tray?

Ok, details on this one? Cooked? smoked? raw? Just pack the jars with salmon/sauce/blackened seasoning mixture and boil/pressure can? Anything else?

How full should the jars be? details????

Looks like you had them dialed in Mike!Salmon recipes are everywhere .I will give you one from an Alaskan camp I fish if you would like.
Tom

Thanks, Tom.. I’ll always take a good salmon recipe!

That canned salmon with cocktail sauce really piquied my interest though.

I’ve made some darn good jalepeno cream sauce and cucumber sauces that went very well on poached salmon filets.

Anyway, yup, we had them dialed about right, but we had help from other regulars at the port, which was nice.

Incredibly fun weekend, thats for sure! Even golfed 20 holes (18 plus a 2 hole tie-breaker that didn’t end up breaking any ties)… Golf is quite fun when you don’t give a rip how good or bad you do.. Once you start taking it seriously, its time to sell the clubs. In that sense, I had a REALLY fun round this weekend.

Mike

Mike – haven’t had a chance to look up my old canning receipe for it. I’ll post it when i can. I cut the filiets into small strips about 1-1/2 wide and fill a pint jar about 3/4 full. 1/4 jar of water, couple table spoons of my home made shrip sauce, heavy dash of blacken, seal lid and drop in the canning kettle. Just don’t remember for how long. Excelent to eat out of the jar or on crackers

Sounds excellent… I’ll have to unthaw a few filets and give that a shot…

Silver Springs (Largest horseradish supplier in the world, and local EC company) makes a killer shrimp cocktail sauce. I’ll give it a shot with that.

Thanks!

Mike

I fish Algoma quite a bit. Usually can most of our fish. We were out there a couple weeks ago. Caught 14 salmon one morning, canned them that afternoon. 83 pints of salmon out of 14 fish.

This is the best recipe I’ve used for canned salmon. Give it a try.

In clean 1 pint wide mouth canning jars add:

– 1 tsp salt
– 1 tsp black pepper
– 1 tsp garlic salt
– 1 Tbsp White Vinegar
– 1 Tbsp Oil
– 3 Tbsp Ketchup (cheapest you can find. Ketchup makes it, so don’t be shy)
– 1 Tab Butter
– 3 Dried Chilie Peppers (1 – 2 for mild, 4 to 5 for hot)
– Cubed salmon. Fill to just under top of jar. Don’t cram it in but try to get most of air out. Don’t worry about bones, they go away when cooked.
– Wipe lid of jar clean and place new lid on and screw ring retainer on tight. Jar lid and lip must be clean to initiate good seal.
– Place in pressure cooker. Cook for 90 minutes at 10 psi. 90 minutes once you reach pressure.
– Remove and let cool. Don’t worry if some of juice is boiled out, the lids usually seal. Once lid seals it will be sucked down tight. If the lids seal, the shelf life is several years at room temp. If a lid doesn’t seal, place in fridge and eat within a week or 2.

Ways to eat:
– Open jar, dump half of juice out, mix all together and eat with crackers.
– Dump all juice out, mix with mayo, onion, pickle, egg, or however you make Tuna. Great on toast or sandwich.
– Dump all juice out, add an egg and bread crumbs and mix together. Form into a burger shape and fry in pan. Salmon burgers are awesome.

Anyway, try this recipe and you will start canning all your salmon. I’ve been doing it for 20 years and have not changed recipies.

Awesome.. Thanks for the recipe!!!

My buddy has smoker, but forgot to bring it along this year. Next year, I can see us smoking (fish) and canning up a storm – so long as the fish cooperate, I guess. That and a case of Kokanee sounds like a great way to spend an afternoon after catching a pile of salmon.

Mike

Switchback –

Thanks again for the post, and welcome to the site!

Mike