"Just in time for our Weekend BBQ"

The fish are still relatively shallow for end of July and still hitting the usual patterns, anywhere from 46 feet to 130 feet of water. Find your school and work them. The larger fish are in 55 feet to 65 feet and also way out in 130 feet. Small Salmon are in the middle. Riggers with spoons down 50 to 60 were working the best.

We saw an incredible sunrise this morning, but by the time I got my camera it was over. There is nothing like watching the sunrise reflecting off the city as it rises. Green and orange colors slowly walk down the buildings as the sun gets higher in the sky.

"Silver Fish"

Our Salmon(Kings and Cohos) and Trout (Browns and Steelhead) are still working the current scoured ridges between 56 and 66 feet of water. When it's calm like today, these humps and ridges become evident by the flat looking water between the ripples, that contains water being pushed to the surface by the underwater currents. This temperature change also is holding insects and bait in areas that appear to look like "slicks". Weeds and "Lake Michigan Jellyfish" (plastic bags) are gathered in these areas, along with other garbage. It's sort of like an eddy in a river that garbage and weeds collect. The fish are much further South than just a few days ago because the lake temperature in Michigan City is 50 on the beach, and they are looking for that edge.

"Skamania Mania"

We have been running into pods of Summer run Steelhead a few times a week and the results are very large (spawned out) fish in the boat. They made their spawning run in Indiana/ Michigan streams in the Southern end of Lake Michigan in Late May (this run is usually in late June to early July) and are feeding voraciously on orange spoons. The Salmon are still in shallow water like in the past few weeks and trolling parallel to the shore along the ridge line presents your baits to more fish than trolling through them. Spoons are taking most of the fish.

Is it July or September?

We just had an upwhelling yesterday (water temperature by shore dropped 13 degrees overnight) All the West and South winds blew our warm surface water to Michigan and sucked in cold water and the SALMON! There are fish where they were in April and May. Great catches of all species is the norm. In 46 feet of water, down 30 feet, the water temperature is 52 degrees.

GOT TROUT?

We decided to attempt catching all five species: Steelhead, King Salmon, Coho Salmon, Brown Trout, so the fishing began deep (100-120 feet) using large dodgers and green flies right on the bottom. Within a half an hour there was a "deer in the headlight look" on deck. " (six fish weighed total of 120 Pounds) I changed everything to spoons and pulled my lines up from 40 feet down to 60 feet and moved at 3.0 knots S.O.G. Instantly we had a double that was Lake Trout! Crazy fish were not acting like Trout. From 75 feet of water to 70 we had both ten core leads screaming out and two down-riggers. In less than half an hour we had 8 real nice Steelhead! We trolled into shallow water (55- 46 feet) trying for Cohos, Kings, and a Brown. Lost several large Kings before time and cooler space were gone.