Big Chinook, coho, steelhead and lake trout out of Saugatuck

Finally, some good consistent fishing though the whole week with catches consisting of a mixed bag of 12 to 22 fish per trip. The catches consisted of Chinook salmon in the mid to high teens, lake trout, a few coho and some steelhead. The salmon, both Chinook and coho are averaging a couple of pounds heavier than in past years. We started fishing in 110 to 120 foot of water early in the week and by Sunday we were in 60 to 80 foot of water. Reports on the perch are still good with good catches in 60 foot of water off of Port Sheldon and some spotty success off of Saugatuck in 40 foot of water.

If you are going out into the Big Lake, fish the downriggers from 50 foot to the bottom and 75 copper, 200 copper and 300 copper behind the boards. Our best success during the week was magnum stingers and stingray lures on all copper and downriggers in green/glow, green/blue and green/black combinations. Slide divers 100 and 120 foot out with pro chip and hot chip flashers (green/glow, white/glow and silver) with green hypnotist rapture tolling flies produced some nice fish.

Fishing in the Kalamazoo River is still slow for steelhead, however there are a few walleye being caught by drifting from the bridge into Kalamazoo Lake and by trolling between the piers.

It looks like our spring fishing is here to stay and it should only get better as more bait shows up. For information on the fishing or to make charter reservations, contact me at captron@chartermichigan.com.