During the week most of the best fishing was in the 150 to 200 foot of water with good numbers of fish, but many of the fish were small. On our run out on Sunday we saw bait in 65 and 70 foot of water so we set lines in 90 foot of water with the intent of trolling on out to the 200 foot depth, however we started getting hits in 100 foot of water and took our first salmon in 120 foot depth and another in 130 foot so we decided to turn back and try this 100 to 120 foot depth. In past years, this 100 foot depth has been the depth that the salmon tend to stage in and they usually stage just outside the bait. We were 10 for 20 or 25 (we also lost 3 fish at the net) with 5 salmon and 5 lake trout and the largest salmon weighed in at 20 pounds and another at 13 pounds. Boats did fairly well in the deeper water, however from the radio traffic, the fish ran a little smaller than those we had inside.
Our best methods were:
100 copper with craigs christmas stinger that had 3 hits
200 copper with a glow wonderbread stingray went 2 times.
200 copper with mixed veggie stingray went 3 times
300 copper with a blue/silver prochip flasher and blue hypnotist fly produced one nice lake trout.
The downriggers produced fish with metal flashers and flies run on the bottom.
The high dipsy (120 foot out) and (low dipsy 80 foot out) both produced hits with flashers and flies on the low dipsys and magnum stingers (green dolphin and carmel dolphin ) on the high dipsies.
If we hold the bait in the 70 foot depth, we should continue to find the fish in the 100 foot depth. For more information or for charter reservations, email me at captron@chartermichigan.com.
