Thread: Round One

My boat ended up with 2 on Saturday. Me and my dad both caught one 17 and 20 inches long. Measuring my net the one I lost was at least 30 inches - bummer!

Today I caught a dink that I tossed back and my dad lost one at the boat. Ended up losing 4 fish total and landing 3 for the weekend.

I am going to look at my work calendar and take the end of next week off I think.

Good Luck this weekend Rich and Kevin it's gonna be a cold one out there.

Go get em today boys! Good luck!

Day one:
Wake up at 2:45 am. Cleaned 6 inches of snow off the truck. Drove in 4x4 down unplowed roads. Took the long route to 94 just because it was plowed. Just after Chelsea there was no snow.

At launch at 5:10am. Checked in and launched at 5:40. Had three zippo hand warmers going plus a propane heater. Go time was 7:00

Boat 1-12 had a combined hp of 3600, yes 300hp each! The SS minnow (Kev's boat) doesn't.

First drift... nothing. Netted one male on the next drift. Blank for another hour. Moved to a spot I caught 6 in two drifts yesterday. Nothing. Moved out towards the mouth, nothing. Decided to run up to a ridge in front of the DTE coal dock and drift shallow. Thinking ahead, I decided to drift the dredge spot in front of the dock. Boat 13 picked up number 2 in front of marker 13. Next drift, same thing. Had our limit by 1:40. Needed to leave for weigh in by 2:20.

We were in 1st place for a little over 30 minutes with a combined weight of only 10.23 lbs. All males. 1 hour later, we were in 15th. The good news is we were the second best boat jigging. The bad news is that hand line fishing is the only way to fish big females in cold water. I don't have the knowledge or equipment to compete with that.

We stuck with our plan and put 5 fish in the boat and did better than almost every jig fisherman. In tournament fishing, you can't chase a number or follow a boat to do what they do. Tomorrow, we search for big females to try and catch jigging. As for now, we are proud of the bag we put together considering how we fished.

We are currently right in the middle of 117 boats. Onle one boat ahead of us from flight one were jigging. Tommow the field is inverted. We go 13th from the end.

Dropped my truck and boat off at a buddies to charge. Borrowed his truck and are in a hotel now. We needed more than 4 hours of sleep.

I have been doing some investigation in hand lining. One of the guys I work with grew up on the Detroit river and his dad has a ton of knowledge on hand lining. I am going to go over to his house and next time his dad is in town and talk to him about it. It seems like a nice way to fish on windy days.

I, also, do not have any handlining stuff, but do have pole lining tackle. Instead of the spring loaded fixed reels, one just uses a stiff, short rod and, in my case, 50lb line. While I don't know what method he is using, my good friend is in 3rd place. YAY Hope you do well today Rich. bill

Hope you find a pod of 10's for the final day with a 13 thrown in for big fish! I've been down when they were holding a tourney out of Elizabeth and vowed never again. When they unleashed the dogs my 16' aluminum went from perfect drift to circles, figure 8's and I think even a loop-d-loop. They can say their boats don't throw a wake when on plane but I think otherwise. If I remember right that was the day we gave up on walleye and caught a mess of perch and gills at the cross dyke.