I can’t tell you all how much I love fishing salmon on Lake Michigan. My wife and I headed out last Thursday for a long weekend of chasing these magnificant fish. We dumped the boat in at 4amand made the run out to 80′ of water. With some new lights I rigged on the Skeeter to light up the back deck we had the rods set in short order. No more wearing headlamps. We had our first fish at 5am, but it came unglued. So did the 2nd and 3rd. Finally the 4th fish made it to the boat, a nice 3 year old fish. Our early bites Friday came on green/glow spoons on the down riggers 50-80′ down over 140-180′ of water. The key was finding the cooler water. The Sub Troll allowed us to do just that. We found an area of water that was between 48-52 degrees and that is where all our fish came from. As the sun rose the fish switched to the dipseys and pumphandles but were still hitting the same spoons.
Saturday morning my dad flew his boss Mel and coworker Bob in for a day of fishing. I picked them up at the airport at 6:30am and had rods in the water by 7:30am. It took 4 minutes for Mel to hook up with the first fish, a nice 4 year old that hit a pumphandle with a white dodger and a Blue Boy fly near the bottom. It took Mel about 15 minutes to get this fish in, and once he did he was ready to let someone else have the next one. The rest of our fish this day came on J-plugs plowing bottom of the down riggers. The fishing was slower, but we knew that since we missed the early bite. We fished until 1pm and came in, cleaned fish, ate and then I dropped the guys off at the airport again. Not to bad of a gig for them, 1.5 hr flight, morning of fishing, and back at home 12 hours after leaving. If we can figure out a way to pull the boat behind the plane.
This will probably be my last trip of the year. With each trip I have been able to get the boat rigged a little better and have learned a lot during my first year running my own boat out there and I look forward to learning more next year. This was the first time I had the Lakemaster chip with Lake Michigan on it with me and it helped a ton. It made it very easy to follow the depth the fish were relating to, especially those on the bottom on the plateaus.
Mike,
Nice trip and Report….
Sorry to hear it will be IT for this year. Know Fall is right around the corner.
Jack.
Great report Mike.
I have taken charters out on Lake Michigan and had a blast, but it must be 10 times more exciting to catch them with your own boat and gear. Now that the Skeeter is all rigged, I will be looking forward to more great reports next summer.
Yep great report. I love catching those salmon too. Man they really fight.The only bad thing is the lake is 5.5 hours away.
Steve
Awesome Mike!!!!
Great job! Looks like you got it nailed down now…
If you need someone to split gas next year…
Nice report Mike and congrats on some fine fish!
I also love fishing Lake Michigans Salmonids. Trying to find the time to do it is the hard part.
Boog
Great report Mike.. I really liked the Lakemaster chip for the big lake as well.
Did you get any 25 ‘s or see any at the clean station?
None quite that big Derek, and I’m almost glad. Almost all of our fish were all siver and not starting to turn. I did see a couple of those big old girls and most were caught in shallower water and already getting quite dark.
what port did you go out of? I grew up fishing Salmon and Lakers out of Racine back in the 80s and man what a blast that was. Great report! I’d love to get back out there some day and put the smack down on some Kings
I fish out of Two Rivers, WI 95% of the time.
have you ever fished the Salmon-a-Rama?
Looks like the one picture is by the Vets park cleaning station. Been there done that. Is the other one Manitowoc Marina?
Have not done any derbys yet, next year.
And Sgt., you are right on!
Great report thanx.
I saw Algoma,Kewaunee,Two Harbors,and Manitowoc this week and never had a rod in my hand.
I am however heading over the last weekend of Sept for four days to try em in the rivers.
How many trips before you started catching fish?
We were catching fish the 1st trip out. My dad and I have fished with a friend of my dad many times in that area and had a good idea as far as rods, reels, line and tackle to use. That saved a lot of money buy not buying gear that I didn’t need.