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For the past few years, a group of friends and family gather to walleye fish Lake Erie. Both my grandfathers were avid walleye fisherman so fishing is in our blood. My father takes our family out on the Thompson (La Cory II,) whilst I ferry a group of friends on the Baha (Buck-Eye.) In my short 33 years, few things are as satisfying as seeing a rod explode and the fire drill that ensues on my parents boat in passing aboard the Buck-Eye. My week went as follows…
Attachment 3200Saturday May 23rd
Attachment 3185
We made it to the lake! Everyone was hoping to make an evening trolling run but some of the necessities of life caused some of the group to come staggering in late. There was talk in the beginning of the week about trying our hand at night fishing. As the last of the group came rolling in, the decision was made that it was too late to make a trolling run and that we were going to bolt to the shallow flats off the NE of Gull Island Shoal. Dark set and we started casting our stick baits. Soon after we set up, Ryan netted a nice walleye. Two other strikes were missed as the wind began to pick up. The waves were building and the combination of being that far out at night and the likelihood of fish holding in the shallows in rougher conditions was driving my mindset to head in. Just then, my phone rang and I received a tip that fish were being pounded off the lakeside pier. I don’t pier fish much at all and I have really never heard of walleye being caught in quantity off the docks this time of year. Not having a starting point for the week’s activity, I figured there must a good amount of fish in the area for such activities. I buzzed down to the lakeside pier and made a single drift casting past the pier (We didn’t catch anything) but marked a crazy amount of fish. This is where we would start the week trolling in the morning!
Attachment 3186Attachment 3187Sunday May 24th
After rousing everyone out of bed and hitting the local marathon for ice and subway sandwiches, we hit the lake. I set up about ¼ mile off shore in line with the yellow building off of lakeside marina. I pulled the boards parallel with the mainland all the way down to the Marblehead light house. The fishing was on fire as we pulled a ton of fish on our first pull down. The fish at this point seemed to be concentrated between the lakeside pier and the loading dock off the Marblehead quarry. We made the turn at the light house and were pulling back towards lakeside when I was looking back from the Captains seat to see a silver bullet break the water directly behind the boat. I thought the thing was going to rip the pole holder off the gunwale! The steelhead broke the water 3 times before spitting the hook. I’m used to seeing this while fishing on Ontario, not on Erie! I have seen a few steelhead caught by local boats but never have caught one myself in the western basin.
Continuing on with the walleye, we trolled back and forth from the yellow building off lakeside to Marblehead catching our 5 man limit that went 96lbs at the cleaners. Standard 40 jets with shallow leads 40-50 back pulling Michigan stinger spoons did the damage.
Memorial Day, May 25th
The alarm went off and as I was trying to roll myself out of bed, I could see the tree tops tattering. After checking the weather on the WBSA’s weather information page (http://www.wbsa.us/index.php?page=denied), I made the decision that even though the wind was approaching 20mph that we could attempt to fish the south passage in a south west wind. I set up once again at the yellow lakeside building. Man was it sporty out! Instead of trying to pull in a similar fashion to the day previous, I decided to ride with the waves diagonally across the south passage towards the SE corner of Kelly’s. We nailed 15 fish on our first pull. Instead of turning in the troughs then beating the crew going back into the face of the waves trolling, I had the crew pull the boards and we jogged back to the original starting point. Halfway into the 3rd pull repeating this process we had our 36 fish that went 108 lbs at the cleaners. Traditional 40 jets again with the stingers 40-50 back.
Attachment 3194Tuesday May 26th
We lost some of our crew this morning. So the remaining four of us slept in a bit and hit the docks around 8. I had noticed the day previous, that we had marked a decent amount of fish in the middle of the south passage. I set up further to the off shore from the yellow building off lakeside this time and trolled through the middle of the south passage. We made a few passes and had our 24 fish that went 99 lbs at the cleaner. Same setup took the fish as the days previous.
To this point, we have had the whole south passage virtually to ourselves. Late in the morning, some of the notable charter boats came rolling in. It was only a matter of time before the traffic was going to build in the south passage.
Attachment 3192Attachment 3191Wed May 27th
The same crew was out with me from the day previous. Same setup, same location same results. 24 fish that went 87 lbs at the cleaner. The fishing pressure was starting to build as there were many more boats in the south passage compared to days previous.
Early that afternoon, my uncle and a friend of his came rolling into bass haven. They wanted to get in on the action so as the rest of my crew from the morning’s adventure napped, I took some of the family out on the Buck-Eye. They netted 8 fish (30 lbs) before a storm blew us off the lake. The best part about it was watching my uncle land his first fish Ohio walleye since the 70’s.
Attachment 3196
Attachment 3195
Thursday May 28th
We lost a crew member but picked up two more friends in his absence. We left Bass Haven steamed to our original starting spot. The south passage was as congested as a Los Angeles freeway. It was a much slower pick today. At about 11, most of the marks that had been hanging out in the middle of the water column seemed to dive deeper towards the bottom and the bite slowed. We lengthened out leads on the 40’s to 60-75’ back after 11am. We started picking again and finished our trip with 30 fish going 90lbs.
Attachment 3198Friday May 29th
We started off the morning again in the middle of the south passage. On starboard side of the boat I ran a deeper setting with the 40 jets running 50-70 back. Port side, we ran 30-50 back. We SLOWLY picked 8 fish with the fish coming on all leads before the boat traffic became more than I could stand. I got a call from a friend up on American Eagle Shoal. We packed up and made the short run off of carpenters point. It wasn’t long until we were in the fish again. We fished the shallower waters along the shoal so our leads were shortened to 30-50 back with 40 and 50 doing most of the damage. It was a longer day as it took us to 3:30 to finish off our 36 man limit that went 108.5lbs at the cleaners.
Attachment 3197
Saturday May 30th
Most of our crew had returned home. Only 3 of us remained. We returned to an area that I had picked good portion of my fish about 300 yards SW of the red can off of American Eagle. We made 3 circles over this area and had our 18 fish going 54 lbs.
Odd Ends-
We trolled all week at speeds of 1.6-2.2mph. The closer to 1.7-1.8 mph I could get seemed to be what worked best for us. Top producing spoons were- Barney’s STD, Kevorkian, Water Mellon UV, and Jager Bomb UV. The top 2 spoons that produced the majority of fish were Pooh Bear Purple and Green Jeans UV.
Many of the fish cleaners bumped the price of their cleaning services from 0.50 cents per pound to 0.75 cents per pound. One of the cleaners also charged us an additional 10$ to harvest the cheek meat. Marblehead fish cleaning company (on Rt 269) we found still charges 0.50 cents per pound and only asks for a tip in return for cheek meat. They typically do not open until 1 hence the reason I used other cleaners that were more expensive. It wasn’t until later in the week that I discovered that they do have a number for drop off or pick up in advance (419-734-4777.)
Parting thoughts-
1. At first glance, the future of the lake looks bright! I have never handled so many short fish under 15 inches in all my years fishing this past week!
2. There is nothing better than fishing with family and friends!
Excellent recap of your week! You are a lucky man to have so many family members and friends to share such a great week of fishing. Life long memories for sure! Thanks for sharing it with all of us!
Thanks for your reports it sounds like an amazing week with friends and family they will always remember that trip
Nice photo Jeff. it was good to meet you and some of your crew. From what I saw you all should be eating good this winter! Geary
Great post! Thanks
Excellent recap! Great detail and sounds like you guys were very successful! Thanks for sharing!
Geary,Quote:
Originally Posted by Bggeary
It was good to meet both you and your son this past week!
I just love it when a plan comes together as well as yours did. Nice report and great catch of some very nice eyes.