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Nice fish! I sure hope some kings stick around. It’s been a lot of fun catching them this year.

If you had a time machine and went back 4 years ago and told me that a May trip with 6 kings averaging 17 lbs and some 4 lb coho to fill out a 3-man limit would be considered slightly disappointing, I'd have said you're nuts for even considering such a catch was possible, much less that it'd be a letdown to boot! Pretty amazing to see the turnaround of the past several years.

I hope this great fishing continues down here... yo-yo wind directions sure won't help. Sure is a lot of bait around though, would have to imagine some silver fish stick around if the bait does. The amount and size of bait is promising for keeping silvers around...I measured an alewife at 8.25 inches yesterday - biggest I've seen in a long time, if not the biggest.

IMO the DNR's have made the right calls in managing the fishery. Never did I think it could be this good based on what we saw a few years ago.

It has been a quick and vast turn around. A couple years ago I was very happy to catch a King. Last yr was the first yr in a long time where kings were my most caught fish on my boat.

Kudo's to the DNR's. Stay on the side of caution. Stick with the stocking cuts until the surveys reveal a substantial rebound in the alewife population. No Huron repeats...

I know a lot of folks are still pissed about the stocking cuts, but lets make sure this year isn't just a fluke.

Balance is key... By balance, I mean in the ecosystem; not balancing the public's opinion on what should be done versus what expertly collected data / analysis and historical trending indicates should be done.

Changing your own oil doesn't make you a mechanic. So when the transmission starts slipping, let the experts do their job.

scoffer wrote:

Kudo's to the DNR's. Stay on the side of caution. Stick with the stocking cuts until the surveys reveal a substantial rebound in the alewife population. No Huron repeats...

I know a lot of folks are still pissed about the stocking cuts, but lets make sure this year isn't just a fluke.

Balance is key... By balance, I mean in the ecosystem; not balancing the public's opinion on what should be done versus what expertly collected data / analysis and historical trending indicates should be done.

Changing your own oil doesn't make you a mechanic. So when the transmission starts slipping, let the experts do their job.

What is balance?
Anyone fishing for lake trout with all the silver fish? Wisconsin took their laker limit to 5 and the state of Michigan is 3. But the state of Michigan takes almost twice in lakers then the state of Wisconsin.
Lake Huron- Did you know that the state of Michigan is presently stocking more Kings in Lake Huron then they do in Lake Michigan?Huron is crashed right? Did you also know that those Huron Kings are counted as Lake Michigan fish?They return to Huron to spawn. Stomach samples of kings in Huron show that they hardly have any alewife, but have some chubs, smelt and sticklebacks. Not a very good diet for Kings.
Be careful when you talk about balance. Not everyone has the same look at what balance means.
Fishing is good and yes, we are seeing a comeback here. What does the rest o the lake look like? When you shovel snow do you only clean the porch?
There is still alot of work to do. Indiana still has work to do. Bait has been up lake wide for 3 years and now add on to this, this year. with a good alewife spawn will help tons. When was the last good alewife spawn In Indiana waters?
You will know when you have a fishery with true balance when you have a return fishery. If you do not have a return fishery then you do not have balance. Perch is also part of the balance. So yes things are getting better here but do look lake wide when looking for balance, not just where the fish seem to be today. I am very happy to see what I am seeing this year. This is a blessing like you have know idea.The southend of lake Michigan has been a good supplier of alewife. We have in years past been the end with good alewife recruitment. Same as Saginaw Bay on Lake Huron. Better today yes, last year better then the year before? yes! Look lake wide when referring to balance.

Great report!

Ed has a lot of great points... especially that the definition of "balanced" is a personal thing and varies depending on who you ask. Also keep in mind that balancing predator demand and prey available is a ratio. We can be balanced with 10 alewives and 1 king, or 10 billion alewives and 1 billion kings for example. Those are the same ratios and the same balance, but mean very different things in terms of stability and fishing prospects

Even though the fishery has been outstanding recently (btw, highest catch rates of silver fish by Indiana anglers this century happened in 2017 and 2018) we are still at much lower alewife levels than we saw even 10 years ago.

As people start talking about increasing stocking, keep in mind that in order to rebuild lakewide baitfish biomass to the point that it can support 2x or 3x the current silver fish biomass, we'll need to go overboard the other way, to the point where the fishery seems completely unbalanced in terms of having "too much" bait. Otherwise, if we increase stocking without rebuilding that bait to a high level, we'll just go right back to where we were a few years ago

Okay, here's my plan #2. I wrote a plan #1 and deleted it since it was too politically incorrect. Don't want my "tweets" coming back to bite my butt.

#2: Leave the king stockings as they are to let the bait supply rebuild. (Probably won't happen until a mussel toxin is developed to eliminate the clammy little buggers.)
In trade for not boosting king stockings, plant about 4 million more cohos. They don't eat (comparitively) all that many alewives.

My rational comes from looking at last weekend. The cohos were the "meat" the kings were the "desert." Let's say most boats out there caught one or two kings - some caught zero, some caught more. But roughly a 1.649 kings per boat average. How many tickled-pink fishermen came in? Now take away the cohos and how many boat loads of people would have been out there period, even if they were guaranteed they would catch 1.649 king salmon? Not very many.

Stock more cohos - let the kings remain a special treat!

BNature wrote:

Okay, here's my plan #2. I wrote a plan #1 and deleted it since it was too politically incorrect. Don't want my "tweets" coming back to bite my butt.

#2: Leave the king stockings as they are to let the bait supply rebuild. (Probably won't happen until a mussel toxin is developed to eliminate the clammy little buggers.)
In trade for not boosting king stockings, plant about 4 million more cohos. They don't eat (comparitively) all that many alewives.

My rational comes from looking at last weekend. The cohos were the "meat" the kings were the "desert." Let's say most boats out there caught one or two kings - some caught zero, some caught more. But roughly a 1.649 kings per boat average. How many tickled-pink fishermen came in? Now take away the cohos and how many boat loads of people would have been out there period, even if they were guaranteed they would catch 1.649 king salmon? Not very many.

Stock more cohos - let the kings remain a special treat!

I am still waiting for my timing to be right to get the 1.6 King and I will be tickled when I do. lets go #2.5 and split the Coho to Coho and steelhead since Steelhead are a ball to catch and they also do not mainly feed on the alewives. Still new to Salmon/Tout fishing so may be talking out the side of my neck and just an opinion of course.