May 19th and 20th with Larry and Steve From Iowa....
by Capt Juls on 05/20/13Steve Johnson and Larry Schmitz drove over from Iowa on Saturday, and rested up for their two day Lake Erie adventure for walleye and perch. I however, had to work a double at the CIC club on Saturday and didn't get home and in bed till well after 11pm.
Then, that darn alarm clock went off right after I closed my eyes. Or, at least, that's what it felt like. 5am came much too fast. But, when you know it's going to be a nice day out, and you get to go fishing, it's not so hard to get out of bed.
I gave myself 2 hours of wake up time to make sure my coffee did it's job and I got the boat ready. I picked up Steve and Larry at the hotel in town at 7am.
After a couple stops to pick up ice and bait, we headed to the ramp. We would be running crawler harnesses both days.
There are charters catching fish in numbers with spoons, with 40 Tru-Trips 45-50 back with Scorpion spoons. I think I have to go to the store to find these tru-trips I keep hearing about on the radio. I have the old style jets, but they claim these are much more effective, so I'll go take a look see later.
We started our day of fishing trolling between Middle Bass Island and Rattlesnake Island. There was a pack of boats between Green Island and Rattlesnake, but I prefer to stay out of those packs and fish where other boats are not cutting me off all the time. It makes it much more fun for me and my clients.
We didn't fair all that well on Saturday....only 4 eyes in the box when we decided we wanted to go perch fishing for the rest of the time left. We managed to find some, along with some white perch, whitebass, sheephead, and put about a dozen or so yellow ones in the cooler before we headed in.
Even though we didn't catch a lot of walleye, it was a fun day. The weather was gorgeous and the conditions were good.
I took the fellas to the Moose Club for their perch dinner on Saturday night. We talked about the day over a couple of beers and were looking forward to Sunday's trip.
Once I was home I received a text from Mike Knippenberg, a tournament pro and charter captain friend of mine, who was out Saturday too. He had done well up by West Reef, and shared his info with me. That spot was just a hop skip and a jump from where I started in the morning, but instead of going north after we left our first spot, I went west......sigh. That's the problem with such a big lake. It's hard to cover that much ground and you can only hope the decision you make is the right one.
Anyhoooo....to make a long story short. We used Mike's info and headed to W. Reef. Sunday morning.
The program was the same as what we were using the day before. We arrived at the numbers Mike gave me and set up a trolling pass.
We were running 1 oz inline sinkers 35' back and 2 oz Tadpoles 28' back (Tadpoles are an Off Shore Tackle inline diving weight). The colors working were all over the board....from pinks and purples to oranges, coppers, and chartreuse. The fish were hungry and didn't discriminate.
It wasn't more than 15 minutes after we set up when we got the first one in the boat with another biter directly behind that one. In the first hour we had a one man limit in the boat and started work on the second limit.
The icing on the cake was hitting a triple header of "Fish Ohio's" (fish over 28 inches) to finish the morning off right.
By 11:45 we had their two limits and two fish out of my limit, for a total of 14 walleye. The best 5 fish went 42.5 pounds and all 14 went 80 pounds.
Then, we decided to go perching for a little while before we would head in and get their fish cleaned for the trip back to Iowa.
This was the Lake Erie experience they were looking for, and they got it. They couldn't have been happier. And, I was happy I got to experience it with them.
Getting the fish cleaned..........:(
I don't usually talk badly about any business in this area, but I feel I need to warn anyone that plans to use the fish cleaner at Drawbridge Marina in town.
We took our fish there to be cleaned and I was disappointed to see this new cutter using electric knives to fillet the fish.
Had I known that I would have used another business.
While I know that some skilled fish cleaners can use an electric fillet knife, and not waste any meat, the same cannot be said for this business.
I watched him cut a 10 pound fish and missed a good 1/2 inch of meat off the back on each side, and that adds up to a lot of meat. When I said something about it he just grumbled and turned his back to me, so I told my clients what I saw and told them I was sorry I brought them there.
I will not be taking anyone else there this season either.
You can check out the days catch in the photo album on page four. It was one of those days we all dream about. The fishing was great...the company was great...and the fish cooperated. It was a perfect day in my mind.
I'd like to share an email I received long after I went to bed last night from Steve Johnson...it said:
Juls,
Thanks for a great trip. We had a great time. The fishing was great and you were an outstanding host. I would have said guide, but you did a lot more than that and it made the trip even better.
This is not trip that I will forget. I will now go to work to get Janice (wife) and Erica (daughter) to make with me. Logistically, that may not be possible until 2015, but it would be worth the wait. It would be a major event, as I suspect we would need two days to drive each way with my granddaughter.
I missed the discussion about the sloppy work on the part of the cutters. I have now seen all of the fillets and would agree that they had too much waste. I am slow but would have produced larger fillets. We can't hold that against you, and don't. It won't do anything to diminish the great time we had. I would encourage you to find somone else for the future.
Again, thanks for a great time.
Steve
This coming weekend is a busy one at the club where I work, because it basically is the start of the season and it's a holiday weekend. So, I didn't schedule any charters for next Saturday or Sunday.
I thought I was going to have to work Monday on Memorial Day, but I have off, so that day is now open for a charter if anyone is looking for a day on the water. :)
Thanks for reading my blog, and I hope you have a wonderful day!
Capt. Juls
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