TOPIC:

Something we have not done here is do a seasonal type report for your fishing on this end. I would hope that others will also chime in.

We had a good season, Was alittle concerned  with the size of the Coho this year, especially the early season.. Bait was there .but showed up late again.  We caught a few kings but not that many and size was down on those fish also. Bait was huge with no smaller bait mixed in. Our Off shore Steelhead fishing was poor. A few times they were there and then gone. A lot of warm water this season and can't remember another season when it hurt us as this season.  Inshore Skamania season was slow for us. Caught Coho this season 100ft. down with dodger/fly that was a first. Perch fishing this summer wasn't there for us.
Please share your season.

I had a chance yesterday to sit and listen to the Michigan Advisory Committee  reports. Fishermen from the U. P. and down the Michigan shore, .all the way to St. Joe. Report were very similar only difference is from Manistee north they had very good king fishing this season but size was way down. Coho that returned were small.
It was reported that size of bait was huge with one fishermen snagging a Alewife that was nearly 11 inches in length.
 

I would say we had a good season as well. February saw some nice perch days off Gary with Coho starting with our first limit on March, 19. Caught a few extra Browns this season over by East Chicago. This was by far our best king year since the mid to late 2000s talking about numbers of kings landed. We had a couple BIG kings on that we didn't into the boat. So, from our perspective, King size was about average to the last few years. We've managed at least one or 2 low 20's the last few years. Too much North wind this year shut off our nearshore Steelhead fishing along with no early-mid summer perch fishing because of it. Our offshore fishing pretty well came to a close mid July. Again, too much North wind. Tried the returning King trolling bite around East Chicago because the Kings should have been back with only a few smallies and a catfish to show for it. Again, too much North wind and warm water. Our season is far from over for us as we will be hitting the nearshore lake trout bite and soon after Cal Harbor perch until freeze up. Keep checking our Youtube channel for videos. Thanks, guys. 

Good topic Ed, not sure how many others do this but I keep a log book year by year. 

This year we landed 3.32 fish/ trip more than 2022. 

Kings: 

2022: 3
2023: 10 (18lbs largest)

Overall it was a spotty beginning of the year in April, but May - Mid July was real good. Mid July - end of season was real bad. 
Offshore from End of May - Mid July was hard to beat, but the north winds had us going deeper on average than I normally do. We spent a lot of time in the 95-120 fow range. Offshore steelhead has been slow for me the past couple years but this year we caught 1 or 2 each trip which was good to see. 

No summer Skam run and no fall return was depressing. Feels like our fishery is becoming more and more constricted to only a a couple good months you can count on. North winds this year were relentless and didn't help anything. 

I primarily fish out of Northpoint. Coho fishing was good April - June. Size was way down from previous years. Kings seemed pretty good from June - August but again smaller fish (10-18lb). Did managed a few 20lbers. Fall run to river mouth/harbors was rather disappointing. North and East winds seemed to stack warm water on our side and made it tough. 

I enjoy the DNRs increased stocking however I'd rather have a shot at 25 - 30lb kings. 

The thing that stands out about this season for my boat was the February Coho bite.  We made several trips in February that everyone limited out.  These fish were caught right on the beach and were not large.  At this same time the guys were doing very well on the perch.
I'm not sure if this unique, or just a result of no ice over the winter and unusually warm temperatures in February that allowed us to get out earlier.  
The rest of the season was a wash, but this is mainly due to a decline of days on the water.
 
Appreciate the input.

Feb-March - Coho bite was pretty good at Gary light casting jigs with rubber.  Perch was hot when it was hot.

April - Cal Harbor turned into ground zero for the coho this year and the fishing was pretty quality.  Lots of deeper bites than usual for the spring.  Caught a 10 lb Atlantic so that was cool.

May - Fishing was really good out in the 30-60 range but unfortunately the coho were small.  Caught our one and only staging steelhead of the year in front of the ditch in May, otherwise it was lots of small coho chasing bait on the beach by the donut.  Biggest coho was over 10 lbs.  Some kings mixed in too up to 17 lbs.

June - Fishing offshore was pretty quality when the weather was good.  It got as hot as can be around late June to July in the 120 range with offshore steelhead in the mix up high.  Just had to make the long run out deep.  Still waiting for that steelhead bonanza out front.

July - Fishing remained really good up until about the middle of the month.  North winds kept cold water off pretty much for the rest of the season and the silver bite completely fell off for us after that.  Any hope for the steelhead run was fleeting by the end of the month.

August - Pretty much stopped trolling around here- don't think I caught any salmon when I tried.  I was also tired of getting beat up on the lake all summer long in a 16 fter.

September - Trolling bite all but gone.  Landed 1 staging king.  After labor day it had to be from shore if you wanted a shot.  My trips in the harbors were fairly unproductive. 

Overall the weather sucked even when we could get out but I think overall it was a great year to chase silver.  Really never felt like trout were on the menu from April to July which is pretty rare most years.  Amazing that both the steelhead and king runs fell apart for the trollers in one year.  I haven't been trolling since labor day but the jury is still out on October in the harbors.  Never touched the creeks.

10lb Atlantic paddling I don't remember hearing that but that's awesome! Have a pic by chance?

I made the posting in April asking for ID help.  I heard convincing things from a charter boat captain that lined up to an Atlantic salmon, the biggest giveaway being an indentation at the base of the tail.

Good topic, I think the biggest thing I am taking away from this season is that I needed to do a better job logging every fish we caught, and posting reports.  I used to have a little notebook on the boat and would capture it all, but havent the last several years.  

We got the boat in a little later than planned towards the end of April, but once in the water had a great spring.  Lots of coho and a couple steelhead off of the beach, as a three person family we had our first limits in the new boat in May.   Coho were all over the board for size, ranging from skinny 14" up to nice fat 6lb fish.  Looking back at photos, looks like May 21st was our best day in front of the beach.   Daughter got her first mostly solo coho that weekend.

Started pushing offshore the next weekend, and started finding some trout the 28th mixed with the silver.  As June progressed, seemed like we were having to work much harder and was ready to just start throwing darts at a dartboard.  Port V Port was a great example, went right back to where the fish were thick barely 10 hours prior, and they had already moved.  Overall though, never had a bad day, some just slower than others.  

Family went of vacation and we lost two weekends on the lake, last of June and first of July.  Looked like they were great fishing weekends unfortunately,  but that continued into the. following weekend.  July 9th was my last hot and heavy day, taking a 2 man limit in just a couple hours, all on southeast trolls, hitting everything we put in the water.   All coho, all nice size.  Buddy had a blast as he had only ever caught bluegill and perch prior to that day.  

At that point it shut off for us.  We still went out and gave it honest attempts, but didn't have squat to show for it, but also never pushed out to 150fow either.  Disapointed we never had much of a summer perch run, or skamania, or king return, byt as others have already said, the north winds made finding cold water very difficult.  

Pulled the boat yesterday, have some work to do to it this off season to get ready for next year, but hopefully we don't get killed wirh the north blow like we did this July-September.



 

Joez, I solved the fishing log note book issue by using Voice Memo on my phone. I made a check list of important info I wanted, click on Voice Memo and just record things like: Fish Type, Fish Weight, Bait used, Depth Down, Distance behind the boat, etc. When I get back home I just transcribe to my log sheet. No more trying to write info while the boat is bouncing around or you drop the pencil and can't find it!