Olcott-Wilson May 4, 5, and 6th.

[Gator]

After the threat of severe weather on Friday, we were ecstatic to be greeted by gentle breezes and partial sun Game on!

With four riggers (35-120), two wire divers (120-300), and two copper rigs off the boards (125 and 150 +/- divebombs), we started in shallow and worked our way out to 170 fow. Capt. Vince was following us the whole way out, so we knew we were on the right track

We probably should have stopped inside, but we were seduced by our first nice king, which came down 110', and we sort of ignored the mid-depths in the water column and ran a high-low spread. Still, we boated some decent fish and finished the day around 14-for-17 or so. A couple of small fish kept us out of the game for longer than they should have while we gave them a free ride around the lake. The nice weather (and <4 hrs of sleep) made us groggy, I guess. Even so, the afternoon bite was almost non-existent, and this was a trend that continued throughout the weekend. Maybe the "super moon" effect? Anyway, we threw in the towel around 5 pm and went to grab some grub.

Saturday we found a better class of fish. With the East wind, we went further West than we had on Friday. Around halfway to the bar, it turned into Lakerville, so we pounded back into the waves for awhile til it started to calm down. We concentrated our efforts in 70-100 fow and had a 2:1 mix of spoons over Spin Docs. Green in any flavor was good for us, but no real patterns emerged, other than the "40 down and 40 back" that we heard repeatedly. While we had a good day, there seemed to be a few boats in the area that really had it dialed in, and every time we looked over they were fighting fish. I'd like to say they were laker fishing, but some of the fish looked really bright and were tearing it up behind the boat. Tough to watch when you haven't had a hit in awhile and you just keep changing things up to no effect. That fishing, though. Oh, and the boat traffic was unbelievable on Saturday. I had no desire to join the pack in 90-110 fow, so we stayed inside for the most part.

Sunday we decided to be on the water early, and we wished we'd been even earlier. With the moon so bright and the lake calm, we could have fished all night. Considering the blood-bath the first hour brought, we should have. All kings, all in the mid to upper teens, with one over twenty, same depth and lure selection as the day prior, with the wire out 120' being best. And at 7:30 am when the moon went down, 3 hours of mayhem ended and it was back to reality. We picked at them for a few more hours, but it was really anti-climatic, so we pushed off by 10 am and let my buddy head back on his way to Boston.

We didn't weigh in any fish (except a "steelhead" that turned out to be a coho...yeah, rookie mistake, but it was a very strange looking fish, it had some identifying characteristics of a steelie, and at 13.2 it would have been the top of the board), still it was a great weekend. It would have been really great if the fishing from the first few hours had continued throughout the day, but we were lucky to have nice weather all three days and no problems with the boat. Here's a couple of fish...the one picture has my buddy holding one with me fighting another in the background.

[Fishtails]

Nice Report !!

[Tim Bromund]

you got a picture of the steelie/coho? 13 lb 'ho this time of year is a heck of a fish.

Tim

[Gator]

Yeah, I agree. I don't have a photo; Keith might. The guys at Fish Doctors weigh-in were certain that it was a coho, even though the caudal fin rays were smooth, there were spots on both the upper and lower part of the tail, and there were 12 anal ray fins. They looked at the mouth and the scales coming off the fish, plus something else that I didn't catch, and concluded instantly that it was a coho. Since they're much more experienced that I am, I didn't question the ID. Honestly, we were uncertain what it was from the minute it came on board. It was a long and lean fish, and the tail was torn up like it had been spawning recently...lots of conflicting cues. Regardless, the fish ended up in one of the guys smokers, so it didn't go completely to waste.