Great Lakes Lure Maker

First off, nice job and nice looking fish! 4-4 in a couple hrs is a good day any day, and fishing with your Dad just makes it that much better. As for the species of the fish in question, I am gonna have to say Landlock. It looks to me like the jawbone is missing and it closely resembles either, but looks to me to be a landlock. Less spotting below the lateral line, and the shape of the the fish from head to back. Browns are almost "hump backed" and landlocks are almost flat along the back. Landlocks tend to shed scales much easier also. Like Nick said, those 2 get confused quite regularly, and the jawbone is about the surest way to settle it. Looks like the jawbone rested just short of the back of the eye to me. If so, that also says landlock. As mentioned, nice fish either way, and a good trip all around.

Put your video on Youtube and post the link here. Iv'e never done it, but thats what I see everyone doing. Hope that helps you.

Looks like someone is harvesting Ginseng. (Picture under the glass behind the SD) I've been out, but no luck yet.

Well, the discussion on selling trout (Keuka lake post) kinda came about because Theresa suggested getting a refrigerated van to bring lobster and other sea food back from the coast. She has family there as well and made the trip a few times and brought back lobster. Her thinking is that there is really no place to buy seafood around here besides Tops, and they only have lobster on occasion and not really much of a selection otherwise. She thinks a Seafood store here would be a great business idea, and honestly I think she's right. The lobster Linda brought back were $4.00 a lb! Tops sells lobster for $12-$13 a lb. Hmmm... Gonna have to think about that one! If I go to Mass, Wanna drive half the way? Then we can "field test" all the seafood you can eat! When we got back from Owasco, we had to wait at the County building for about 45 mins until Linda arrived. During that time, Theresa suggested that a lot of people would probably be willing to wait at a "rendezvous" for a load of fresh seafood from the coast, as we were. I think she has a good idea, and the last few nights, we kicked the idea around. Never know, we have been known to do things at the spur of the moment. Keep you posted on that one!

My girlfriend's boss was in mass to visit family. She brought back 3 coolers full of live lobsters, and 10 lbs of scallops. She had asked us for fish on several occasions, and called us on her way back to see if we wanted any lobsters. When we told her we had a cooler full of trout, she made us a deal we couldn't refuse. Probably once in a lifetime deal, but those lobster sure were good! Bacon wrapped scallops the last 2 nights weren't bad either. Sent from my C771 using Lake Ontario United mobile app

Thanks everyone! We really had a great time on Owasco. I can't say enough how proud I am with Theresa's progress and her determination to learn and stick it out even when it's rough and rainy. She has been a reel inspiration to me, and keeps me motivated even when things go wrong. Can't ask for a better fishing partner or life partner! As for Scout, He got upset when I went down to clean and organize the boat. I could hear him barking and whining, so I had to go get him. All he wanted to do was get back in the boat! Geesh, if I could teach him how to fish!! Imagine that! Thanks Mike. I finally got her to leave the hand lotion at home... Took me this long to convince her that was the reason it was slipping out of her hands. I don't care if her hands are rough.... I kinda like that.

Thanks Alex, we traded our box of trout for 5 live lobster's and a lb of wild scallops, but Theresa was proud of her bow and was reluctant to give it up. (I thought it was a fair trade off, no fish to clean) Sorry you missed Owasco Walt. Hope to see you and June at the meeting the 10th. Your welcome John. About the lures, I owe you a few more. You left too much money, so I will get you a few of the blk/ppl lures we ran this wknd. 2 of the fish in our box came on that new color scheme. I almost gave up on the color till yesterday, but it earned another chance. Sent from my C771 using Lake Ontario United mobile app

Nice fishing Mike! Owasco was an impressive trip this time around. Plenty of nice fish weighed in, and some nice silvers as well. Couldn't ask for a better day on the water! I just went thru the points for the year, taking into consideration dropping 2, your tied with Russ for first (if my math was correct). Congratulation on a great season so far! Jason

Great Lakes Lure Fishing Team arrived at Owasco Sat morning. This trip it was just my girlfriend(Theresa) our dog Scout and myself. Theresa is new to trolling this year, and this would be our first tourny as a Duo. I have over 50 trips in this year with Theresa, Teaching her as much as I can and i'm confident she will be able to step up to this task. I am always excited about Owasco Lake, it always puts up some impressive fishing! We launched around 630 Sat am for our pre fish. Our plan was (2) 5 leader rigs, not our usual 20 spoon spread. We first fished the entire lake, catching fish only on the south end. We had some nice fish, and by 11 am we went 6 out of 8, losing 2 very nice fish. After a brief rest and some early supper, we went back at it for the evening. This time focusing on Seward point area, where we seemed to mark the most fish and did the best action. From 530-800pm we went 9-11, losing 1 really nice fish that broke off on a 15lb test leader. Ended the day 15 out of 19 and we were impressed with the bite and looking forward to tomorrow. Sunday morning we hit the water about 600 am. As soon as we hit the drop off on the south end, (4) 5 leader rigs in the water, all 50 ft of top line. No sooner did we get set up, 3 out of 4 rigs were hooked up. From that moment, untill we pulled our gear it was non stop action all day. (1) double and (2) tripples on 5 leader rigs. We went 15 out of 17, losing 2 really nice fish. One laker that was all of 10-12 lbs spit the hook right at the back of the boat. It was so close, I considered jumping for it, but tried to get to the shifter in time to go into reverse. No luck, fish went down before I could get to the shifter. (had a 5 leader rig still in my hand) At one point we had the boat in auto pilot and both of us were pulling rigs and clearing and culling fish. By 1130 we were limited out and pulled our gear to head in. I was so wore out by 1100, I was ready to pull our gear and quit, but decided to limit out. This was a good decision as our last fish was a rainbow, almost a lb bigger than the one we had, and another 24" laker to add to the weigh in box. We finished 4th, and were pretty impressed with our efforts. The fish on Owasco were agressive, to say the least, and none of them were easy fish to boat, hand lining 5 leader rigs. I am really impressed with Theresa. She has come a long way since the begining of our season, and she has now proven she has what it takes to become a very good rig fisherWoman! Pulling rigs, driving the boat, netting fish, Docking the boat, She has it all down! As for lures, we caught most of our fish on either Firetiger KW Ratt-o-Lures, and all White KW Ratt-o-lures. The 2 Rainbows were caught on blk/purple KW Ratt-o-Lure and red back KW heavy troll. All Great Lakes Lures. Congratulations to Russ McDowell for an impressive 36 + lb box! He was limited out and done fishing by 930 am! Thank you, Jason

Oh, I wouldn't doubt that. I looked thru what I thought was all of them, but I didn't see them. Im sure it was right under my nose and i missed it. But i got the catalog now, just in case. Sent from my C771 using Lake Ontario United mobile app

I'm glad to hear that. Strangely enough, my Dad asked me today if I had heard from you, and I was able to tell him that I had. Glad to hear your doing good with our lures. Allways nice to hear that! We also enjoyed having you at the shop, and looking forward to seeing you again. Thank you, Jason

Update 8/29: Picked up the KW's and the GL#4's today. The blanks are perfect! I had a lot to do today, but I managed to form and polish (1) GL4 and it came out just as expected, Beautiful. With the exception of the New Silver Soldier, we now have all the blanks we need to begin making lures. Now we need to finish inventory of packaging, tape, paint, hooks, swivels, etc, so we can get this process rolling. As far as the Silver Soldier die: I was expecting my Dad to handle it worse than he did. I have been making lures with my Dad and fishing with him for over 35 yrs now, and I was expecting him to tell me that the die left the shop working, and it will come back working, figure it out. The fact the die was brand new, and we might have run a 100 lure's with it before allowing another company to use it to blank lures for us, I was expecting him to tell me it was their fault, and they owe us a new one. I was so sure that would be his position about this, I waited till I got back in town to tell him about it personally, rather than over the phone. Well, as it turns out, he handled it quite well. I suggested we go look at the die and see what went wrong with it, before we pass any blame, or come to any other conclusions. When we arrived at the tool shop, we were pleasently supprised it was being run by a guy who used to work for us part time making lures. He also was a tool and die maker and had done some tooling for us in the past. This eased the whole situation, and made this process painless. Upon inspection, It was very obvious that the die was not put together properly, and some welding that was done to it caused it to warp and this was the reason that it failed. So, the conclusion was to have a new one made and finish running the lures we ordered. We will have a new die in 2-3 wks. The price for completion was quoted as $4,000, we negotiated it to $2,500 complete. We already have spent a lot of money on this lures form die, and the new logo die, which will "coin" the lure with the name, and since it originally had a gill plate and fins stamped into it, we also had them added to it as well. It will resemble the original version, first introduced in 1854, exactly, except for the form, which has been changed so that it will run well at todays speeds. This is the first of a line of new lures we will re-introduce in the near future. All said and done, today was a good day for us, and looking forward to gettting this under way. Thank you, Jason

Yes I did. Been in Rochester last 2 wks building a pole barn. I think the best thing to do is just meet up at the shop. I got some new colors were trying, and you seem to like white, as I do, so lets talk, and I will get you what you want. Jason. Sent from my C771 using Lake Ontario United mobile app