In Boat Trolling Competitions

Not sure where or when this actually started but there has always been two types of contests on my boats when trolling crankbaits. The first is what we refer to as "Tackle Trolling". The work "Tackle" in this instance does not have anything to do with fishing tackle but more so the art of football tackling. The second is a color competition of the starboard side vs. the port side.

First lets discuss tackle trolling. You see when fishing is good and you are among good friends, it is more important to catch more than they do, rather than support the cause of the overall boat productiveness. Once all rods are set out and placed in their holders, when one goes off, it is a full out competition to be the first to the rod with the fish on. As you can imagine, things can get dicey. We have never had anyone go overboard, but have come close. Multiple people can add to fun on this as a couple may be blocking each other and a person that didn't even notice the rod will get the catch. There are also a lot of fake maneuvers to distract your competitor when trying to get a rod. You can point to the rod of the right when it is really the one on the left that is going off, you can fake consistently to the point where they do not pay attention to you anymore and then you can pounce on the real deal. Of course, there is also some sort of wager placed on this for the end of the trip often dealing in cleaning fish, buying dinner, or cleaning up the boat. The best maneuver to date was the pushing of a large cooler into the path of the competitor prohibiting him from getting anywhere near the back of the boat.

The second competition that is popular on my trips is a side vs side lure color competition. Again, this is usually done when the bite is hot and a limit is inevitable or you are just releasing what you catch. It works by each angler setting out their favorite colors on their designated rods. Once you catch a fish on a certain color, you must then switch to a new color. The person with the most fish caught on the most different colors wins. Once a color catches a fish, it cannot be used by your competitor any longer. You would be amazed at some of the colors that fish will bite when you think you have no colors left to catch anything on. There have been days on Lake Erie where walleye numbers have surpassed all colors on the boat and we are talking over 100 color options!

I guess the overall intention of this is to have fun and to not take fishing too seriously. In today's World, we need to be reminded of the good times as much as possible.

Kevin

Detroit River Walleye

The Detroit River fishing for walleye is just heating up. From all the way up at st. Clair, to all the way down to Erie, people are catching limits FAST. This is because millions of walleye come through the river to spawn, then they head back out to the big lakes. It starts out with big females about this time, and then transitions into mostly smaller, better eating size males as the later spring gets. The fishing is tough right now, but you can still get a limit of FAT females. We used

3/4 oz. jigs with a plastic ”Wyandotte worm“ and tipped with a stinger hook and minnow. This combination seems to be pretty much what all verticle-jigging fisherman are using on the river. Fishing by the candle stick and just south of fighting island are very productive right now. Target waters from 28+ feet to about 14ish, starting a drift in 30’ and working the drift into 12‘ seems to be great, or drifting consistently in about 23’. That’s it, but don’t forget to call ahead to bait shops in Detroit to get news on the latest walleye. Good luck if you go!

Hunting for Pre Spawn Pigs

We started out looking for some bass along the banks and fished pretty hard for about 2 hours without bite. My Dad said let’s go explore and look for some new structure. We wanted to see if we could figure out the route they where taking to the spawning beds. So we started by trying to find some warmer water and some shallow spots leading to deeper water and hope some were holding if we found it. After graphing in the new area we found a killer Honey Hole. A nice shallow rocky area the was about 1-2 foot deep and ran from the bank about 15 yards to a drop off to about 12’ of water. Sunny and windy with water temps of around 50. We floated this ledge for about 100 yards down the bank and where able to #gethooked on some piggies using my custom painted 1.5” Squarebills and 3” pumplin seed grubs I poured. Got around a dozen bass, a few snot rockets and a slab crappie in the boat between me and my Dad. The pre spawn bite is on for us here at our local lakes and we are off the a great start!

#gethooked #louslures