Chuck Smth

The big question always is, "How rough is it out on the lake?" Good news is that you can get real time wind and wave information from your computer or phone. I put this quick tutorial together to show you how. You old-timers can add in any other tips on how to use them. You can also get historical data which is what I used to do the 2020/2021 wind comparison. Hope this is helpful for those who don't already use this data. Chuck

Yeah, right on. The buoys are a great resource to use. Maybe I'll do a video of how to access them with your phone and get pictures of the seas, wind and wave data with graphs and all kinds of useful data. The data is aligned with my journal too. We didn't have to make those long runs out to 300' like we did last year. Fishing was a lot more "old school" this year.

Just realized I can attach the data. Here it is if anyone else wants to play with it. 2020 data.txt AUG2021.txt JUL2021.txt JUN2021.txt SEPT2021.txt

I've seen some interesting musings regarding how fishing was different this year because of the wind. Being a hopeless nerd engineer I decided to investigate. I downloaded the data from NOAA buoy 45012 which is located slightly NE of Rochester pretty much in the middle of the lake. I parsed the data to have similar sets for 2021 and 2020, from late June to the end of September. There are about 13,000 data points for each year (total about 26,000) For the overall results: Year Avg Direction Avg Speed 2020 229.3 12.9 mph 2021 192.3 10.7 mph So the data shows that 2021 was slightly less windy during the prime season and a little more southerly, SSW for 2021 vs SW for 2020. Overall, I'd say the winds weren't significantly different between the two years. The slightly more southerly winds would tend to keep the lake flatter and bring the temps up shallower which should have helped the smaller boats too. If anyone wants the data I have it in EXCEL format or text format. Chuck

Since I'm a pretty nerdy engineer I keep a detailed diary of every trip. Conditions, winds, location, temps., speeds, what produced, what didn't, etc. If I compare this year to last they are remarkably similar. The only thing the data I've got shows is that we didn't get as many doubles/triples as last year and that pretty much accounts for the lower total number of kings boated. As I noted earlier, the plus side is that steelhead and cohos were more plentiful this year for us. So when you add that into the number of kings we caught, we had a decent year. Not off-the-charts and a few days we really had to grind, but a good year. Another thing was we had a little more south wind this year so we didn't have to run as far offshore to find temps. BTW, I really encourage keeping a notebook. It helps me a lot.

Interesting comment on the right-of-way, I see that one a lot. "Right of Way" is a lot more complicated then "two points abaft the starboard beam." You also need to take into account "A vessel restricted in it's ability to maneuver." If you're in a small boat ( assuming so since it has the rubber-style plug and not a Garboard drain style) and a 10 meter boat is coming from your left with a full spread of boards, copper and lead, then they may have the right of way. Most charter boats are less than 12 meters so they aren't required to use lights or shapes to show their maneuverability status. Up current vs down current, overtaking, towing, etc., all need to be considered in the right-of-way determination. Best advice I can give is to assume the other boat doesn't see you and take action yourself regardless of who has the right of way. You never know when there might be an emergency situation onboard or mechanical malfunction on the other boat. Common courtesy also comes into play. The charter guys are out there with paying customers, trying to scratch out a little profit and we need to be mindful of that and give them a break. It's a really big lake and there's plenty of room for everyone. My $.02, IMHO and YMMV. Chuck

Great Lakes trolling without an autopilot sure takes a lot more work. Combine no autopilot with a bad driver and it's going to be a LOOONNNNG day on the water, lol! I'm sure others may feel differently, but for me a good autopilot will put more fish in the boat than any other piece of equipment since it frees everyone up to be fishing instead of driving, and makes netting fish a breeze. IMHO, YMMV and that's cool.

Out of Rochester we never had the insane triples and quads like the last couple of years but we had a pretty consistent bite. One thing we noticed is that the fish were noticeably bigger this year and the bait more plentiful than in recent years. We did some of the biggest kings I've seen since the early 80's this year. That's fine with me. I'd rather catch one really nice fish than a bunch of teenagers. We had to use the electronics more in 2021, usually if you found bait you found kings. Drop a waypoint and then work the heck out of it and the fish generally cooperated. On the plus side - steelhead and cohos were plentiful and eager biters if you went offshore. Downriggers probably only accounted for about a third of our fish this year. Most were on lead and dipseys. Downriggers weren't really catching kings for us until late summer when we started pulling meat, but even then maybe only half the bites came off downriggers. Dipsey/Spinny was probably our best producer all year. One trip this year we were having a tough bite so just to get the skunk off we pulled into 100', dropped the balls to the bottom and within minutes had a laker on. I think that bite is as good as ever. We didn't target browns so I can't personally speak to that fishery, but I've heard it was pretty tough sledding this year.

When you hook up the last thing you want to do is to stop trolling. You're on fish! Keep the troll going. You can't get a double if you stop fishing . We've had as many as four on at once. Just keep the boat going straight and all will be fine. And real important - if if you have one, when you stop your autopilot doesn't work. As for kings being line-shy? Nah. Think about it. Wire/Dispey/snubber/Spinny/twinkie rig combo and they still smash it. The only reason I like Flouro leaders is because they're tough. Leaders take a lot of abuse because we use nets. Others my have different opinions on that and that's cool, but in my experience (almost 40 years) the fish don't care. Kings are eating machines. A four year old king can weigh two times more than a 25 year old walleye. For me, boards are more about being able to run more lines without tangles than anything else. We generally run the lead off the boards, dipseys inside them and then downriggers. Once you get your spread set stop never stop fishing. Truth be told, slowing or stopping makes it a lot harder to keep the fish under control. If you keep moving forward it keeps the fish behind the boat and all the lines straight. As long as you take your time and don't bring in a big one too green it will an easy net job. Anyway, it works for me, others have their way of doing things, try different things and see what works best for you. It's more fun to lose one than to be sitting on the couch. Chuck

Just wondering if anybody wants any specific How-To videos. Topics, techniques, rigging, boat maintenance, whatever. If you have any requests let me know and we'll see what we can do over on our YouTube channel. Additionally if you have something you'd like to present, or would like have a video of your charter operation made let me know and we're happy to accommodate you. All for free. We do this to promote fishing, not to make money! Chuck

David, you can navigate to the "Fishing Videos" section or just click the link below. Chuck https://www.lakeontariounited.com/fishing-hunting/forum/36-fishing-videos/

Had some fun at Braddock's. Scored a decent largemouth out on the lake. Sometimes folks forget about the world-class bass fishery we have here. Fish are just what you expect, roam in the wee hours and tight to cover in the afternoon. Left a little 5 minute video over in the video section if you're so inclined. Chuck

Salmon bite being so slow and the wind blowing offshore, we decided to change it up a bit. Here's a quick video. Chuck

bigted, on a conventional reel there is no problem reeling against the drag. On a spinning rod, yes, it causes line twist and should be avoided, but on a conventional no problem. You can set your drag with a scale but as the line peels off the spool the drag force increases, so by always reeling you can monitor how the drag is set. As you lose or gain back line you'll need to readjust. On the small reels used for salmon it's not too big a deal but as you probably know, if you fight a bigger fish on say, a 30 or 50 sized reel you need to stay on top of it. So, conventional reel yes, spinning no. The other thing is that about half the time mature salmon will make one last dash as they get near the boat. I usually back off the drag and use thumb pressure for the last 30 or so feet on a mature salmon so when they take off I can let them go but still keep the rod bent. That will result in some "dead reeling" too. Regardless of your drag technique, you always want the rod bent and putting pressure on the fish! Always be watching the rod tip. Thanks, Chuck

Saw a couple porpoise on Sunday.

Had a good day, I think we ended up 9 or 10 with two others we missed.

Whew, that was a beauty! I'll bet we had winds over 50. Saw a waterspout and we may have been hit by one too. Lost a rod over the side but we go really lucky and recovered it. Did everyone make it back to port OK?

Whew, that was a beauty! I'll bet we had winds over 50. Saw a waterspout and we may have been hit by one too. Lost a rod over the side but we go really lucky and recovered it. Did everyone make it back to port OK?

Did another late-afternoon/sunset trip. After fishing temp and trying for matures switched over to the high marks to play with steelies. Riggers and lead were both working, had two doubles, They seemed to be hitting everything. Nice fish too. I'm really impressed with the steelhead this year. 10 colors or 50'-60' on the riggers. Took the spinny/fly off and that seemed to trigger the bite. Pretty easy, trust your electronics and keep the speed right and they'll bite. Had problems with the camera battery but I'll check the video tonight. Pretty sure I got vid with two fish airborne at once. Chuck