Lake Erie Fishing Report May 23rd

Fishing Report 5/23/17,

This trip was the first trolling trip of the season for us.  After feverishly working on every day off for the last two weeks to make this happen, we were able to get set up quickly, but took a while to figure out a program for the day.  We started our day mixed in with a large pack that had already developed at Scott Point Shoal.  After weaving in and out of the pack we made a choice to stay on the outside edge for the rest of our day.  The pack grew larger as the morning began to give way to what would be a beautiful day to troll for Walleye on Lake Erie.  This charter was only a two person charter that included a father in law and his son in law.  It was easy to tell that these guys enjoyed just being out on the lake together.

We set up the big boards and ran four lines off each side, all with bandits in mixed colors at leads of 35-75 back.  It was determined that the shallow running side was unproductive and that the fish wanted the deeper leads.  We managed to take a nice Lake Erie Walleye on a Blue Chrome Bandit at 65 back at a speed of 2.5 mph.  A quick adjustment to the opposite side and some minor adjustments we set all our leads to 55-75 back and maintained the speed.  It was a slow pick until around 11 am.  Most of our fish came from the Blue Chrome, but a few were taken on Pink Lemonade Bandits.  The fish we managed to get strikes from seemed to only be able to take in one small area and only headed into the wind.

After the bite slowed way down, we switched a side to spoons and harnesses.  These were set with 40 Tru-Trip jets at 65-75 back and we maintained the speed.  The fish that were taken on the spoons were all short fish that didn’t make the 15 inch minimum slot length.  After we were five hours into the trip the crew seemed interested in casting for the remainder of their time.  We pulled the gear in, stowed it and made a short run to the north and fished around the Bass Islands where we were able to find enough wind to create a nice drift.

We started casting gold weapons with 3/4 ounce sinkers on the deep water drop-offs that can be found around the islands.  The casting weather wasn’t ideal but we managed to start catching a few Walleye but the small undersized fish didn’t make the grade to add to our total of 5 fish in the box.  It was a great time and easy to fish with a crew that didn’t need any instruction on how to catch fish while casting.  We caught several junk fish that seem to be moving quickly into the area and have been creating constant action while drift fishing.

The fishing close to home has been a nice change of pace from earlier in the season when long runs to find fish was the norm.  We are excited for the start of summer and for our phone to be ringing off the hook and booking trips for new and repeat clients.

Good luck fishing and we hope to see you out there.

Captain Jerod