Fishing with David, Fred, and Craig....6/1/2025

[Capt Juls]

My crew today, are friends with the Jay Prater group, from last week, and were supposed to go tomorrow, but the wind forecast for today was more favorable, and they were able to move it, so it all worked out.

I left the house at 4:30, but didn't need to pick my crew up, since they were meeting me at Mazurik's at 5:15. I stopped to get ice on the way to the ramp. I wanted to get there early, so I could get things ready before they showed up. But, Jay must have told them I like to be early, because they showed up at 5 AM.


It was still dark out, so I took my time. While it's possible to drive in the dark out there...I do not like it, because I can't see if there are floating logs, or perch nets, and it kind of freaks me out. Those nets are always moving....so, I'd rather be safe than sorry.


The sky was partly cloudy, the wind was less than 10 mph out of the south, and the air temp was a chilly 51 degrees. It's the beginning of June, and I'm still wearing my BlackFish Gear out there, (it has a fuzzy fleece liner in both the jacket and the pants). This spring has been the worst I've ever experienced in my 62 years on this planet....deep sigh. On the bright side, though, it looks like it's going to get hot by mid-week.


We left the dock at 5:25 and headed north to the line, near Gull Island Shoal, and set up on the west side of it. The Vexus was pointed to the east, with the Ulterra and baby Merc moving us along at 2.1-2.2 mph (FishHawk speed).


The water temp was 60 degrees.


The port side ran Bandits behind the Off Shore boards, and the starboard side ran the "Livingston" EBS Walleye Minnow 111s, with the same leads I used the last time out. 97 (outside boards), 80, 75, and 57 (inside boards). Eventually, the Bandit at 97 was set to 120 back, and started taking fish. That's the "SlimShady" Custom, that I can't remember the name of, and can't find it on his site, but it's a fade of blue and green with an orange belly.


Other Bandit colors that took fish were..."Domka Outdoors" Buck Fever at 80 back, and Red Headed Wonder Bread at 67 back. Sunspot didn't catch this morning, and neither did an orange and sliver one, that I can't remember the name of, either.


The Walleye Minnow colors that took fish were the LimeLight at 97 back, and Sherbert at 80 and 67 back.


Most fish came on the dipsies using BadMo Arrow Spoons and Yeck Spoons.
Two dipsies off each corner ran with the zero and three settings. The zero setting was changed often and settled on 40 and 54 back, while the three settings were catching at 65 and 71 back. We did catch one fish with a black and gold Ripplin RedFin off the three setting at 71 back, but that was it for that one, so we swapped it out for another BadMo spoon. Colors didn't seem to matter....we had the whole spectrum, out there.


David, Fred, and Craig were on a learning trip, to up their skills in their boat, when they are here, so after a little training, (and, me chirping in their ears for hours) they practiced setting lines all morning, and did a great job. I have no doubt they will be able to take what they learned and apply it...giving them the confidence to duplicate what we did today.


We fished the Canadian line, and were mostly all alone, except for an occasional boat here and there, but it wasn't a crowd, and made it a very nice morning. The south wind stayed below 10 mph, and the waves up on the line were 2 foot or less.


The crew all said that they had a good time, and learned a ton, and that makes me happy. David and Jay have scheduled to come back in October, to fish together, so I'm really looking forward to that.


My next trip is Wednesday, with John Ackerman. The forecast looks bumpy, but fishable. Hopefully, the winds do not get any stronger in that forecast. Right now, it's showing 17-20 out of the SSW.


Stay tuned....


Capt Juls

[itsbob]

When we fished with Capt. Sam a few weeks ago, he said the same thing about this lousy weather. He said this has been the worst spring weather since he started chartering 8yrs ago. These constant fronts coming through and not much stable weather.A lot of north and East wind mixing up water and blowing the colder east water in has kept water temps down too. Let's hope June has more nice days. Thanks for the post Juls.

[PatSea]

Thanks for the detailed report once again captain. I'm getting excited as I'm heading up to the lake tomorrow morning with my two grandsons to go fishing for 3 days. Took them last year and they wanted to go back again!
Hope you don't mind my question, but how do you keep track of all the details like colors, feet back, inside board vs outside board, dipsie depth etc. I have trouble when out trolling keeping track of my 4 offshore boards and what they're running. Last time up I brought a small whiteboard for the cockpit to keep track but that needs more work.
Thanks for any insight you can provide.

[Capt Juls]

Hope you don't mind my question, but how do you keep track of all the details like colors, feet back, inside board vs outside board, dipsie depth etc.
Thanks for any insight you can provide.

I'm a woman....we remember ****.

I don't know...I guess if you do it often enough, it comes easy.

(Except names, for some reason...you can tell me your name as I shake your hand, and I can forget it by the time I let go of it). lol

[itsbob]

I take masking tape and write leads of the rods and tape it to the Styrofoam of the rod.Make sure you take the tape off after you use them that day or they are hard to get off.