This past week has produced some very consistent fishing with chinook salmon weighing in at 17 pounds being caught. Most of the catch occurred in 85 to 130 foot of water, however there appears to be another batch of salmon in the 190 to 225 foot depth. The main problem with fishing the shallower water was the large concentration of supine water flea that coated your your lines and had to removed every 15 to 20 minutes. If they were not removed your monofiliment looked like a 1 inch line dragging through the water, which is definitely a determent to catching fish. As you moved to deeper water, the water flea problem decreased but did not end.
The best method toward the end of the week was flashers and flies. Slide divers run at 200 and 100 foot of wire with Hot Chip flashers (green/glow and mountain dew) and the Rapture Wild Fern and Last Supper fly produced very well. We also caught a few salmon on Stingray Mixed Veggie and Fruit Cocktail on the downrigger at 55 and 65 foot, however the best was the tin can flasher and wild fern fly on the "shoot" down 70 to 100 foot. Early in the week we took many salmon on 200 and 300 foot of copper with the Natural Born Killer and Green Wiggle producing very well, however latter in the week the copper produced very few fish.
The further south we fished the better the results this past week, so maybe the fish are beginning to move to the north and if that is true the fishing should continue to improve. Check back next week and see what is happening out of Saugatuck. For information or charter reservations, email me at captron@chartermichigan.com.