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2008 NOW WE ARE FISHING!!!! May 16
Couldn’t have picked a better day to start our 2007 charter season. We left the dock at 6 am sharp, Rodney, Eric, Mike, Cody and the other guy. We motored out to about 90 fow just west of port and began setting lines. The first fish of the day hit a Moonshine worm before the second downrigger was in the water and the fire drill started. For the next hour I busily set lines while the guys grabbed popping rods, netted, boxed and released fish. I finally got the planer boards out and we began a turn to head back through the fish.
On the turn the port outside rod began to bend toward the water as a large fish ripped 100’ of line off in no time then something went wrong. I noticed that no more line was coming off the spool so I checked the drag then looked at the spool and immediately recognized the problem. We had just filled the line with powerpro line and because we did not spool it under load the line “cut” down to the spool and locked it up. I told Tracy to turn hard port and franticly began reeling in the planer board. As luck would have it the line found it’s way into the eye of the planer board, but true to form the powerpro held strong and I was able to get the line out and we ran down the fish, a very nice 12 pound steelhead that ate a silver orange NK C5 behind a jet diver.
The catching continued until around 11 am. By that time we had boxed or released a total of 22 fish, including the big rainbow and a 18 pound spring Salmon!! With the fishing slowed we took pictures and cleaned the limit of 15 fish in the box. By the time we got the mess cleaned up we boated and released another 4 making our total for the day 26 fish boated.
Hot Lures Moonshine Worm 40’ down Moonshine Carbon 14 (mupped over vampire at 75’) Vampire 75’ down NK C5 silver orange 100’ jet diver Moonshine lemon seed 33’ down Orange crush slider
May 17, 2008
Repeating the success of the previous day would be a tall order, but we set out to do just that. We left the dock at 5:30 am because the weatherman predicted increasing wind to 30+ mph and we wanted to get as many fish as we could early in case we got blown off the lake.
We started at the same depth and with the same lures as the day before, but nothing happened. Before I knew it I had all 9 lines in the water and nothing in the box. I noticed that the starboard rigger was drifting under the boat and immediately identified a problem with our speed and direction of troll. I had Jeff turn the boat to the south west and changed the starboard lures to lighter flutter spoons. Our luck changed as fast as the turn of the boat beginning with a nice king that took the Moonshine Carbon 14 off the middle rigger’s muprig. We trolled into 100 fow and then turned east. Our east troll produced a flurry of hits the first fish to hit took a black and silver spoon off the middle rigger, came to the surface, jumped and swam straight for the boat. Rodney did a good job keeping up with the fish and throwing the spool into free spool and thumbing the reel so that the fish did not break off in a tangle as it ran at the prop and around the downriggers. He was rewarded with a very nice 16 pound king. We were not so luck with the other fish that hit on that pass, some ended up in the boat others tangled and broke off, but it was hot action for an hour or so. By 9am we were half way to the limit with a heavier box then the day before, but the wind was rising.
At 10 am the wind began gusting and I instructed Capt. Jeff to pull in some of our lines because most of the problems we had holding on to the fish had to do with the wind and controlling the fish around all the lines in the water. We dropped our set to only 4 lines and turned the boat into the driving wind and 2-3’ waves. The fishing settled into a pick as we found fish in pockets. The largest fish was boated by Ray during this time, Ray an accomplished fisherman back in PA had trouble with the larger rods we use here in NY and complained of hand cramping and sore shoulders, until finally we slipped the net under his 17 pound king and he was able to sit back in his seat and rest again.
We ended the day boating 16 fish, keeping 11 of them.
Hot lures
Moonshine Carbon 14 (mupped over 75’) Moonshine Beef 42’ down NBK Silver orange f3 Evil Eye slider
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