TOPIC:

Hi Everyone,

I’m curious to see how people develop their fishing strategy before they fish. I generally read the forums and look at a couple websites (on the weather section of the site) to find water temps I like. Temp transects link doesn’t appear to work anymore. Michigan City bouy I generally use in the spring time. If you wouldn’t mind sharing your research tools and strategies, I would love to compare.Thanks in advance.

 

Reports, water temp buoys just like you said. I also like to visualize what my spread looks like so when going off shore i sometimes draw mine out haha. Weird I know but works for me. 

 

Tmik34 wrote:

Reports, water temp buoys just like you said. I also like to visualize what my spread looks like so when going off shore i sometimes draw mine out haha. Weird I know but works for me. 

 


You know i do the same thing,  I also like showing the people that I'm fishing with for that day the diagram too. 90% of the time I'm setting the lines by myself but on the off chance I'm not, it gives a good visual for the other guy setting his side.  Also if you have success with a certain spread you have a good reference written down. 
 

I go the Thesouthend.org and get all the latest intel LOL.   I pretty much do what you said and see what info I can find from recent posts.  I used to belong to Captains reports that local charters post info on (king seeker, Slez, Capt Ralph along with a few others) that was a great resource until I started to mainly fish Michigan water for Salmon.  
Sort of like TMik I have a spreadsheet that has all of my tackle in it and I put together a initial setup sheet that I have everything entered and saved on.   I generally have all my rods set to go before I leave the garage so I don't have to mess around out on the water.   Then I keep track of what I catch on what rigs and that gets saved in the spreadsheet.   If I change out lures/setups, I try to update the spreadsheet so I can update on what worked.   I keep track of how many feet out I have the lines and try to record speed and other data as well (got to love google Docs so I can update from anywhere).   I am not great at remembering to update when I change out rigs or recording when I catch fish on a setup, but I am getting better.  I also keep a notebook in the boat so if its too crazy I can write down what we are doing and update the spreadsheet another day.   The logs are not great but I am trying to get in the habit, so I have some actual data to refer back to each year (specially as I get older and can't remember anything from day  to day).

here is a screen shot of the spreadsheet.   In the notes is where I would mark things like how far back the lines were, what setting the Dipsies were on.  If I caught any fish, etc.    I have a macro that saves the initial setup sheet with date and time so I have a record of it.  If you look at the bottom I have circled a couple of the saved sheets.   Its still a work in progress but I have it so it works pretty well.  The initial setup page is all drop down menus where I select the proper tackle.  I have an inventory page that I have all the tackle listed.  this also works well to know what I lost so I can replace it.  

 

It’s crazy. I basically do or try to do everything that everyone mentioned here. I have my google sheet created but fail to update it. I wanted to make a catalog of my lures to keep stats, but never got around to it. Thanks everyone for the info. 

Thechild wrote:

It’s crazy. I basically do or try to do everything that everyone mentioned here. I have my google sheet created but fail to update it. I wanted to make a catalog of my lures to keep stats, but never got around to it. Thanks everyone for the info. 



 

Yes the updating the inventory is the hard part.   I want even further and have another sheet with all my lures with pictures so I can see what they are and what the names are, so if I forget and need to find something similar, I can find it.    Its a sickness but gives me something to do in the winters lol.

 

I think a detailed approach is important, especially while learning, but after a while, you figure out that some critical basics are more important and overthinking things can cause you heartache.

1)  If your not around fish, your not going to catch fish.  Worst thing you can do is change baits, what you need to do is move and find fish.
2)  This green lure vs. that green lure.  Bunch of crap.  Yes some things will outperform others, that changes day to day, hour to hour,  and even boat to boat.  Figure out if something is definitely working and run more of that.  
3)  With number two being said, start your day with variety, partially focussing  on what your confident in and some variability worked in.  If your catching fish, but only on certain things, make changes to other rods to incorporate what is working.
4)  Never leave fish to find fish!
5)  If there is a thermocline, be above, in it, and slightly below early.  Move deeper as the day goes on.
6)  Use the proper colors vs. depths to your advantage as a basic "general rule"

While I would not consider myself an expert by any means, I have fished alot, and talked to many that I would consider the best around and have learned some simple but important things.  First and foremost you have to find the fish - they are not just "everywhere".  They move - some days your on top of the world, and others you feel like you have no idea what your are doing.  If your not a charter, your throwing darts, and thats what we all do hoping to find the fish as weekend warriors.     Thats the tough part about LM.  If you have a wide variety of baits out, and are not marking anything, its time to move.   If your marking fish and not catching, then you need to change presentation and / or speed.    Also remember like any fishing, some days are just damn tough!

I build my strategy based on what’s available to catch at a the time.  I would love to catch kings all year but out of South Haven and most other southern ports that means lake trout and more lake trout from now until mid July until a few kings start trickling back it.  I start where I can get baits into 50 degree water or less and keep moving out till I catch fish. If I start catching, I mark the spot and work it. I am more concerned with water temp and speed than than lures so I always adjust my speed a few times before I start changing lures. I also try to fish around as few boats as possible- I rarely find that running toward the pack of boats that seem congregate in the front of most ports in  the morning works out as most of those people just ran there because they saw others there not because they have any knowledge of fish actually being there.  Overall, you just can’t get too frustrated if your strategy doesn’t work because some days there are simply very few fish around to catch.

 Very well said. Same approach I take. 

Wait...you guys use strategy?  Here is mine:

1) Wake up with intentions of catching at least 5 fish over 30lbs
2) Load the cooler with fried chicken and beer (strategy fined tuned in the Keys that seems to work on LM too)
3) Convince myself that all the fish in lake are not being caught while I motor up the ditch for what seems like 2 hours
4) Motor out to the exact spot where step 1 is about to happen
5) Completely ignore any of the plans I had for setting lines the night before by setting lures completely differently
6) Retrieve the deepest rigger realizing I forgot to attach the Fishhawk probe
7) Bring up the second deepest rigger, twice, after reeling down on the release to hard in my hurry to get the 3rd set
Put out the copper knowing full well it will go off the most with fewest if any fish landed
9) Tell the crew no beers until the first fish is in the boat
10) A few hours later tell the crew to change our luck everyone has to have a beer (first sip goes overboard as offering to the Fish God)
11)  Change lures to ones that look like they should catch every fish in the lake even though none of them have actually caught a fish
12) Try to understand why a rod goes off only when no one is looking and wondering how long its been standing straight up
13) End of the day hopefully with a few fish that needed to removed from the gene pool anyway if they hit one of my spreads

Rinse, repeat.