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Fishing with Ken and Casey Simonich 6/2/16
Well, like I thought, it was a very busy holiday weekend. I hope everyone had a safe and fun weekend too!
Unfortunately, there were 3 trips that didn't get blogged about, but their pictures are up in the photo gallery (pg18). So, at least that's something...I know, I know...I'm slacking....deep sigh.
Anyway, let's start with the first trip of June/2016....We have Ken Simonich, Jr. and his son, Casey. I picked them up at their hotel at 5am, and we stopped off at Big Bopper's for a quick breakfast, before heading to Mazurik's to put in.
The sun was just coming up, when we set our first lines out over to the east of Mouse Island, and headed our troll up the west side of Scott Point Shoal.
We ran Bandits high in the morning, from 25-55 back...speed was 1.9-2.0mph. I haven't had to change bait colors for quite some time now, because each day is still a sunny day, and the fish seem to really like the chrome baits on sunny days. IB Frozen, Green Clown, Blue/Chrome, Black Gold Chrome, Fire Tiger, Khaki, and a new color from Dream Catcher Bait and Tackle called "Sucker Punch". Each of these colors caught fish today, with the IB Frozen, Green Clown, and Blue Chrome being the hottest of them all.
While we were starting our troll Ken asked, "So, what does it look like when a fish is on? Should we be watching the boards or the rods?" I said, "You watch the boards. If it's a big fish, there will be no doubt in your mind that a fish is on. That Off Shore board is going to go flying back, and out of line from the rest of them". I added, "It's the small fish that are a little more tricky to see, especially, since I have my Tattle Flags set a little tighter right now."
We didn't go more than 10 minutes after that little conversation, and a board pulled hard out of line. Ken said, "I see what you mean! That's definitely a fish on!" He let Casey reel in the first fish of the day...and, what a nice fish it was. Casey's first Lake Erie walleye turned out to be a 28 inch "Fish Ohio" walleye! That was a nice way to start the morning. :)
We made a couple of passes through that area, and only picked up one more big fish, and two shorts, before deciding to move to another area of the lake between the SE corner of Kelly's and the Marblehead lighthouse. There are a lot of fish on the move right now, and part of their migration takes them right through that area.
The Helix was showing a lot of good marks on the screen, so we fired up the baby ETEC to scoot us along, an dropped the Ulterra to steer us with.
Seriously, it's like having another captain in the boat driving us around, while I tend to the little details of fishing with customers new to planer board trolling. I couldn't imagine someone taking those tools away from me now, and saying, "Go do your job"....I would pout for days if that happened...lol Anyway, I digress....
We ran the Bandits anywhere from 45-65 back, and started picking up fish here and there. 50 and 55 back was the most popular with the biting fish.
Around 9:00 the bite slowed down. I told the guys, "I think, since the sun is much higher in the sky now, we should try dropping one side down a little deeper. And, if those start to go, then we'll drop the other side too. But, I would like to keep all our bases covered at this point." So, we did just that. We dropped the port side down to 55 back, 65 back, 75 back.
Then, I couldn't stand the non action and brought the inside board from the starboard side up and put it out 30/30 with a 2 oz snap weight.
We would end up catching quite a few on the 30/30 set up and the 65 back. Long story shortened....we caught a total of 11 keepers with 4 big fish. We had one piggy walleye come off not far from the boat, and had a handful of short fish to throw back. All in all it was a fun morning, and Ken and Casey really enjoyed the experience.
They want to come back again next spring...and, that makes me happy.
Tomorrow's weather is going to be excellent again, so get out an enjoy it!
Good luck fishing, and I'll see you out there. Don't look for the red Ranger and Red G2 though...I'll be in a Pro Line tomorrow. We'll be on channel 79...;)
Stay tuned....
Capt Juls
