Yankee Troller

Sweet fish!

OK guys......we can't have this! The Kings are in Canada! Get a license and head on over! Those fish weighed in at Youngstown were probably caught in Canada! We can't let this happen! Just 3 days left!

Nice ride!

Some great fish there!

Nice job guys!

Great fish!

Nice fish!

Ray, your a goof ball! LOL But we love it! We know going into the season we aren't going to make money tourney fishing. We just love the competition and the commodore. However, another top 5 finish would be a nice addition to the accomplishments. Especially since at this tourney we can only ever put one solid day together.

Well, it was game on this past weekend! The first tourney of the season, which is what we call the “kick off†of Salmon season as Lake Ontario knows it. Each Spring the King of the Lake starts their series in Port Dalhousie around the end of April. We have taken part in this tourney for the last few years, but we could never ever put two solid days together when mother nature allows us to fish the whole tourney. April 29th (Practice/Big Fish Friday) - We started from the Wilson Boatyard a little later than expected all because the team needed a Box of Joe from Dunkin! Let’s just say that even though $15k was on the line this weekend we still go out there just to have a good time with friends and family during tournaments. We dropped in a mile or two East of the Welland Canal and began our practice. We ran a simple 3 rigger, 2 slide diver, 2 short core program pulling all spoons. The water temps were OK, but the water was dirty. We trolled the Welland area for most of the morning, but all we could manage was a few small Lakers, a small Rainbow, a small Atlantic, and a barley legal Chinook. We had some fish under us, but we just couldn’t get a solid King bite going in there. Previous knowledge, and the cold Spring, made our decision around 11am to run West very easy. Oh yeah, and the fact we weren’t doing anything off the Welland helped too. We set down a mile or two West of Port Dalhousie and began trolling West once again. The water was really stained still, but we had a little better temperature. We also had some fish on the screen. We ended up pulling out some Mag Stingers and down went a Gin and Tonic and a Glow Mixed Veggies on the riggers. Shortly there after we were hooked into our first real King! We ended up boxing three good Kings that afternoon and we were back at the dock around 5pm. A long day on the water, but the roominess of our new Trojan made it all that much better! April 30th (Day 1) - We had no other option than to head over to our waypoints from the afternoon before. We blast off and make the short run along with a few other boats. We were happy to see the fleet head East. When we pulled into our area there was about a dozen boats with us. We set lines with the same program and waited. We let that program soak for 30 minutes and then it was time to start switching lures out. One of our team members pulled out a Stinger Black Widow in a Stingray size and put that down on the rigger. It wasn’t long and we were tied into our first King of the morning. We would go on to box out by 8:30 and then pick up one more after that to upgrade us just a little. That Stinger Black Widow went down on another rigger along with our Stinger Sea Sick Waddler and all three riggers would take fish. Our 5 color cores and our slide divers were just dead. It was all riggers for us with the exception of one wire diver bite at the end of the morning bite. We were team number nine so we weighed in fairly quickly and watched as 46 other teams weighed in behind us. At the end of the day we were sitting in 4th place, but I knew it was going to be tough to stay up there. With the top boxes coming from our area, and a screen that wasn’t as good in the afternoon as it was in the morning, I had a funny feeling……. May 1st (Day 1) - My premonition was spot on as we blasted off to the West so did about 2/3’s of the rest of the boats. We settled in on what looked to be combat fishing in front of the Salmon River and began our troll. Before we could get fully set up our wire diver took a shot and we were tied into our first king. This diver had a Stinger Black/Silver w/ a glow cup. We put the first fish in the box and we were pumped. With so much boat traffic, and waypoints from the previous day a little further West we just kept trolling. Bad decision! We should have turned on that fish and worked the area. Well, we would wait almost 2 hours before our next bite, and it would be on that same set-up. After that we went dead for the rest of the day. At the end of the day the early bite in that area was key for boxing out, and we just flat out missed it, and trolled right through it on our way to some waypoints. We weighed in a measly two Chinooks, and fell to 23rd place overall. So, the first tourney is under our belt. We learned a little bit about the new Trojan, and we also did pretty darn good considering we have never “King†fished her before. She ran GREAT all weekend without even a hiccup. We couldn’t be more happy with our decision on this boat, and I am sure there will be many more GREAT days had on her. With that being said we have some great fishing ahead of us. The Kings this year look to be healthy, and boy did a few of them fight like maniacs this weekend. The largest Salmon taken at the tourney was 26 pounds and change, but there were also a lot in the 16-20 pound range as well. Given this cold Winter/Spring you may have to wait a little longer for them to get to the bar, but they will be there soon in great numbers.

Catching them on the beach is one thing. When they go offshore your the man!

Nice job Matt! I'm gonna have to make one of them Summer Rochester BT trips with you.

Sweet! That Brown Trout fishing has been awesome!

He sure is! Wait till he gets that next phone bill! Data charges while roaming aren't cheap.

LOL....not in this tank!

I wish I could get out there right now. There must be a pod of Kings in there. Good job guys!

I don't remember passing you guys???

Nice job guys! There must be a pod of Kings out of Sandy. We took one on the way down Saturday. Now I wish we would have turned around and fished the area some more!

With the Spring King of the Lake in Dalhousie just a week away I spent my Easter making sure our tackle was in tourney mode. However, before I spent the whole day down at the Wilson Boatyard a few friends jumped on board to do a little fishing. We pulled away from the dock at 7am and headed East out of the chute. We set up a Brown Trout program, and headed down to the red barn in search mode. The water was complete mud for about a quarter mile, and then it gradually got better. It may still have been a little too dirty, but we spent a few hours in there anyway. Even with the extra dirty water we managed some action in there. We took a few Brown Trout and a few Coho on our troll down and back. Our best sticks where white/chartruse, which we have found to be a great color pattern in that dirty water. Rattlin’ Rogues and Rapala’s in the F7 size took most of the fish. The last Coho of the morning was your typical Coho. We had a red Brad’s Thin Fin down the chute 50’ back. This fish was 12-14†long and when he hit the rod slammed down like a 20lb King just whacked it. It was pretty exciting! We would pull offshore about 9 or 10 o’clock so I could get used to running some wire divers in their new positions on the Trojan, because we set this boat up a little different than the Bayliner. When we hit 40 or 50’ of water the screen jut lit up and it was solid marks all the way out to 80’. We were slapping our Humminbird thinking it was broken, because we never moved a rod trolling through that for an hour! That’s all the time we gave it and it was time to head back to the dock. The rest of the day was spent spooling up our downrigger rods with some fresh McCoy Mean Green fishing line and fluorocarbon, putting twilli-tips on the wire diver rods, spooling up some short cores, putting away the Brown Trout stuff, and a list of other things. It’s off to Dalhousie on Thursday. We are super excited to fish our first tournament of the season. Let’s hope the Kings show up to play with all this unstable/cold weather Mother Nature has thrown at us this Spring.

Nice report!

Thanks guys! Ray....I was on pins and needles the whole way!

Nice job bud!

After a short delay on Friday night Saturday morning rolled around and it was time to head up to Wilson. We pulled out of the Genesee river and found out the East wind from Friday pushed the milk chocolate water right down to Braddocks. When we got to Braddock point we began setting up, but it just wasn’t fishable. The South wind was cranking, so we decided to continue our run West. As we got past Watoma shoal we saw the wind wasn’t affecting the short water and pulled in to fish. I was unable to get 8 rods in the water from the get go. The inside board was loaded with brightly colored stickbaits, and the outside board had some natural colors. We never went shallower than 10’, and hung out in the low to mid teens for most of the trek West to Devils Nose where we would call it a day as far as fishing would go. Water temp was 43 degrees right through that stretch, and the water had plenty of color to it. We hit every cold water species with the exception of an Atlantic Salmon. A few ticks East of Sandy we hooked into another mid teens Brown Trout. It took a Rattlin’ Rogue 150’ on the outside board. Lots of great Brown Trout, a Domestic Rainbow, and even a Lake Trout fell victim to our presentations. Finally, as we pulled up on Devil’s Nose the same Rattlin’ Rogue takes off, and this one was pulling some drag. A few short minutes later, and Melanie is holding onto her first ever Chinook Salmon. We estimated it around 13-15 pounds, and put it back to fight another day just like we did with that bruiser Brown Trout. After we got to Devil’s Nose the wind really started whipping again, and we were all hungry, so it was off to the Black North Inn. We finished the day by pulling into the Wilson Boatyard, and putting the YT3 into it’s home for the next month and a half. What a Spring it’s been! Reports of GREAT fishing up and down the South shore are coming in every day. Let’s hope it continues on for the rest of the season. Next week we are off to Port Dalhouse for the first King of the Lake event. A tourney we ALWAYS look forward to.

Guys....I want to confess......during the 2009 Orleans Pro-Am......we went down to Devil's Nose and picked off two big Lakers to start our box each day of the tourney. The fishing was that bad!!!! LOL A good box was 5 or 6 fish. So those Lakers really helped us out. I have been in denial ever since, but I thank you guys for allowing me to share this with you. To top it off Top Gun won the dang tourney just outside us with KINGS!!! LOL Ask me how crappy of a fisherman I thought I was not even knowing those Kings were there!

Melissa is putting the squeeze on your man cave! LOL