Milwaukee Fishing Lake Michigan Salmon Reports 8/19/2008
By Capt. Jim Hirt
Please read the whole report as I have added a lot of extra details, which may help you, catch more fish. We had several days of west wind and fishing has improved with cooler water moving in. As I write this report east wind is forecasted and this may move the action into deeper water again. Surface temperature is 72 with the Temperature break at 90 feet. It is important to check your down temps every trip as wind direction will rapidly change the thermocline and location of active fish. Look for 50 degrees this is a good place to start. Currently the action down is at 65 to 120 feet. We are catching mostly Chinook and Rainbow Trout. The fish are from the 100 to 155 feet of water. The best action is east of the Filtration Plant and north. Church Walleye planer boards with 10 color Cortland Kerplunk leadcore and 300 feet of copper wire are taking Chinooks and Rainbows in 125 feet of water. For all species on sunny days use Reaper Magnum Monkey Puke, Peacock, Fish n Chip and Big Joe Silver spoons. Use all glow spoons early in the morning and overcast days. Spoons in silver/blue, silver/green or silver/chartreuse caught Chinooks consistently. On overcast days and low light try the Reaper Magnum Fish Fry Glow spoons. We are getting good reports of action in the warm water conditions on both sides of Lake Michigan on these glow spoons. This makes sense as most of the fish are coming deep and the glow spoons are most visible for the fish in deep water presentations. For you anglers that have not tried the Reaper and Vulcan form Badger Tackle.com I recommend you give them a try. Most of my fish are on Vulcan's and Reapers everyday. They are offering a buy 4 and get 1 free at this time. The fish ranged in size from 3 to 21 pounds. The 4-year-old Chinook have been active the last several days with many Chins to 21 pounds. I am finding the big guys cruising around in the warm water 65 to 80 down. The smaller Vulcan regular size Dolphin Green Silver spoons are taking most of the Rainbows on 2 color leadcore. Trolling at 1.8 to 2.0 miles per hour on the Depth Raider speed and temp gauge will get more fish. Experiment with speed up to 2.6 MPH. Lately a faster speed has worked for the big Chins. We ran Slide Divers with the big ring they took their share of Rainbows with 40 70 feet of line out set to number one. I used 50-pound Power Pro on all my divers this year and it allowed for better hook sets and deeper running with less problems. The only place you will find Reaper and Vulcan spoons is on the Badger Tackle web site at http://www.badgertackle.com Jim charters out of Milwaukee, WI. With Blue Max Charters He can be reached at 414-828-1094 or visit his web site at http://www.bluemaxcharters.com If you are going out on the lake please call me for an update.
