Deep Water Producing Big Salmon in Saugatuck

This past week produced some very good fishing with creel numbers fromm 8 to 18 fish per trip consisting of Chinook salmon that pushed 30 pounds in weight. One Chinook was reported to weigh 34 pounds and there was a report of a 39 pounder weighed in. The fish are found from 90 out to 230 foot of water but in the top 50 foot. During the week, the water cooled down due to some strong north winds and the fish scattered. You could catch some nice four year old salmon in the 90 to 100 foot level but the fishing was inconsistent. In the 140 to 170 foot level you could find some 2, 3 and some 4 year old salmon and addition to some lake trout. In the 180 to 230 foot depth we found more coho and steelhead, with some big Chinook salmon mixed in. We found that the deeper depth levels produced the most consistent catches of steelhead, coho, and 3 year old and some 20 + pound 4 year old Chinook salmon.

In the 180 to 230 foot depth we ran 100, 200 and 300 foot copper with spoons (mixed veggie, green jeans, fruit cocktail and orange crush stingers) on the 100 and 200 copper and flashers and flies (live wire and mixed veggie Pro Troll and mirage Rapture flies) on the 300 copper. Wire dipsy divers were run at 200 foot and 100 foot out with flashers (live wire, white silver/glow, silver mixed vcggie and white glow/mountain dew) and Rapture (no see um, illusion, wild fern and hypnotist) flies. The down riggers worked best with stinger lures run on the base bait and on the add-a-lines amt 60 foot, 50 foot and 40 foot down.

I think that in the next week we will find the Chinook salmon will begin to stage in the 90 foot level and if we get some any cold water, they will move toward the piers. For more information and/or charter reservations, email me at captron@chartermichigan.com.