LCI Derby Weekend Saturday and Sunday

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keithm87
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LCI Derby Weekend Saturday and Sunday

Post by keithm87 »

I had no plans of fishing this weekend, until 5:15 friday evening when I got a call asking if I wanted to fish the derby. With work today I knew we would have to put in some time to make it worth it. Met up Saturday morning and launched from shelburne at 5:15. Headed out into the bay, I always stop just before the yacht buoy to check for fish before heading out of the bay. When we stopped we immediately marked a huge bait cloud. Decided where there’s bait there’s fish, and started setting gear. Riggers at 35 and 25 slide diver out 50 with dive kit and 4 color lead. Cheaters on the riggers. After setting the 2 riggers while working on the Leadcore we had a release. grabbed the rod and set the hook. reeled in a 19.5 chunky Brown, my first brown ever on champlain. we made a pass from the buoy to the wood posts on the east shore of the bay, and made the turn back. on the turn another release. This fish shook free and I got to resetting it, I let out 15 ft of line and was working on attaching it to the chamberlain when I saw something next to the lure under water (glad I finally bought polarized glasses last month), I saw it dart at the lure, and before I even felt the bite I set the hook. I had the line in my hand and the rod on the floor. I hollered to Roger that we had a salmon on, as a big salmon went airborne 10 ft behind the boat. I grabbed the rod while holding the line, and got my hand on the reel, let the line go and cranked in the slack. Roger grabbed the Ego Slider Net and in under 30 seconds from hook set we had the fish in the boat. We weighed it and it said 4.75. As last years derby had nothing under 6 on the board we tossed it in the cooler to keep (later in the day with the board sparse we took it to weigh and dead sitting for 11hrs it weighed in at 4.52 putting me on the board for day one. We trolled around that same area for another 40 minutes, catching a small laker on the lead core, and one other release, then they seemed to go quiet.
We pulled gear and headed out of the bay. On the ridge north of the bay we set back up and trolled landing several small lakers. With a goal of big fish we moved south, trolling past dunder and south along the ridge line. We hooked a few more fish through there, and then had a salmon come flying out of the water. A little 19 incher. We kept heading south but it was slowing down and we were not seeing any size. We pulled gear and headed for the brothers hoping the NY side would be better for big fish. We set gear south of the brothers before the ridge over 170 trolling toward the ridge that comes up to 70 and with 2 lines in had a release. Another small laker. Trolled the horseshoe area with a lot of marks, and finally hooked into a nice laker, got it to the boat and in the net, and as I pulled the net to the boat I let it dip in the water, and the laker hopped out and swam off. Trolled that area for a while with limited additional success, and headed back across the lake and set on the hump north of juniper. Landed a few smalls there but not the monster we needed. Called it a day at 5:30 12 hours on the water, and one fish on the board, and almost 20 landed (I think the number was 18, but I may have miscounted). It was a long sunny day with some exhaustion, but the fish were biting and we were happy with our results.
Headed back out Sunday on the water for 5:30. Headed right to the buoy and found bait stacked all over and the cormorants and gulls were feasting. Trolled for an hour with no hits and decided to leave the bay.
We set up on the ridge north of the bay, and trolled across it with no hits. By now we are at 8am with nothing in the boat and the mood is failing due to exhaustion of getting up at 3am 2 days in a row without a decent nights sleep. On Saturday my trusty spin n glo had not caught a fish, and was retired mid day. It has been off all spring for me and really had me confused. Frustrated with the slow start, I went back to the basics on it, and reread some forums, and discovered that my lead from dodger to spin n glo had grown over time. Due to just grabbing line without measuring when retying. I set it back up with the proper separation, and turned the boat back across the ledge, and 3 minutes later it fired. That was the first of what would be too many to count fish landed.
The first laker of the day was a small one, only about 24 inches, but the numbers were great. Before I had that reset we had another rod fire, as I fought that fish we had another rod fire, and we were hooked with doubles. Boated both of those, similar size, reset one rod, and it fired immediately, but no one home. We trolled that area all day. Around 11am, we had a release and it felt like a nice fish, when we got it to the boat it was a 29 inch laker, biggest of the weekend weighing in at just over 9lb. We kept at it, and around noon another release, Roger told me it was bigger than anything he had caught so far, after a few tense minutes and a couple of spirited runs (and some attempts at a new move that we are seeing this year where the bigger lakers try to go for the propeller) We got the fish in the net. A quick lift on the scales and we thought we were in business, the big laker had clearly been gorging as it spit a smelt on the surface as we netted it. The non-digital bogo scale I have put it at 12.75, which at the time would have been 6th or 7th on the board (same scale that we used the day before on the salmon that was off by less than .25 on that fish. Headed to the shipyard and weighed the fish in. On the official scaled it only weighed in at 10.32, and just shy of 32 inches. A disappointment, but we headed back out and got back on them.
By 2 pm we were crossing the close to the 20 fish marker. We had a slowdown in the bite for a little bit, but checked gear and found a small laker dragging. Once we had reset all the gear we started getting hits again. We found a few odd things that helped our success, like our middle rigger would only fire if at 55 down on the fishhawk. If I put it at 52, or 57 it wouldn’t fire, but at 55 it was FIRE. There was one spot on the ledge that every time we crossed it we would have a release, multiple times we had 2 releases in that spot. We kept on them, and around 5 decided to make one last pass before heading out. We wanted to get one last fish, as we crossed the ridge we had a release on the spot that had been firing everytime. Roger was up and started fighting the fish, as soon as he had it to the surface back about 60ft, another rod fired, I grabbed that and we were on doubles. I started reeling that, and another rod fired, with a rod in my left hand I grabbed the other rod and set the hook, and set it back in the rod holder hoping it would stay on. At that point roger had his fish a mid 20’s laker by the boat, and he set that rod down to try to get the other one up, after about 10 seconds it came loose, but we still had two barrel rolling lakers at the back of the boat, with some net work we got them both in the same net and ended the day with landing 2/3 on a triple release. For the weekend we were close to 50 fish landed, with a nice salmon and a couple of nice lakers, but no winners.
We fished a lot of small Michigan stingers in Ultra UV patterns with success, but there was not lure that was better than the others. Everything was working at 1.8-2.1 and it was a weekend to remember for sure. I will try to get some pics posted.
Trackertroller
Posts: 470
Joined: Thu Sep 01, 2011 6:53 pm
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Re: LCI Derby Weekend Saturday and Sunday

Post by Trackertroller »

Great job Keith and roger.

Your report is great and well deserved. You put a lot of time in on those fish.

Best part is nothing broke and no body fell in :lol: :lol:
JEREMY
1987 24' Chaparral
"Plenty of Fish"
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MWM
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Re: LCI Derby Weekend Saturday and Sunday

Post by MWM »

Unexpected adventures are the best. Sound like you worked hard and were rewarded. Great write up!
Matt
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keithm87
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Re: LCI Derby Weekend Saturday and Sunday

Post by keithm87 »

Trackertroller wrote:Great job Keith and roger.

Your report is great and well deserved. You put a lot of time in on those fish.

Best part is nothing broke and no body fell in :lol: :lol:
I think we may have seen you out there I recognize the boat name. I think we crossed paths on the north end of shelburne and chatted as we passed. It was a good weekend. The nothing breaking was not for a lack of trying on my part that’s for sure, I ran my riggers into the booms no less than 10 times over the weekend, and went into 35fow with 3 riggers and a slide Dover all down 50-70ft, and somehow didn’t hang anything up
Trackertroller
Posts: 470
Joined: Thu Sep 01, 2011 6:53 pm
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Re: LCI Derby Weekend Saturday and Sunday

Post by Trackertroller »

I thought that was you.

We had 0 releases on Sunday

Feel like I lost my fishing mojo on LC.

We did catch some small Lakers off of Thompson’s Friday and Saturday and lost a big silver Saturday afternoon.

Decided to try shelburne on Sunday. Don’t know the area that well, but the structure outside the bay is amazing.
JEREMY
1987 24' Chaparral
"Plenty of Fish"
Butcher
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Re: LCI Derby Weekend Saturday and Sunday

Post by Butcher »

Awesome read!

Sounds like a great weekend!!!
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fishy1
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Re: LCI Derby Weekend Saturday and Sunday

Post by fishy1 »

great job to both of you and sounds like you were kept busy. i like the fact that you checked out the buoy area ist to see what was happening down below.
Gecha (Gerry)
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Re: LCI Derby Weekend Saturday and Sunday

Post by Gecha (Gerry) »

Great read Keith. No breakage, lots of tight lines, and wonderful weather... that's a weekend to remember.
Gecha (Gerry North of the Border)
The River Rat
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Re: LCI Derby Weekend Saturday and Sunday

Post by The River Rat »

Good stuff right there Keith. It was great to see a familiar face at such a busy launch! Glad to hear you were marking good bait also.
A White
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keithm87
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Re: LCI Derby Weekend Saturday and Sunday

Post by keithm87 »

How did you guys end up doing out there? Were u chasing salmon or walleye when we saw you in the shallows north of the bay?
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tamiron
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Re: LCI Derby Weekend Saturday and Sunday

Post by tamiron »

Keith:

Great report ! Thanks for sharing
Lures designed by fishermen for fishermen
The River Rat
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Re: LCI Derby Weekend Saturday and Sunday

Post by The River Rat »

We wanted some action Keith, after covering a lot of water Friday and not really see or catching what we wanted, we figured we'd just try and put fish in the boat! Lakers!!! (Apoligize for the delay)
A White
The River Rat
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Joined: Thu Apr 06, 2017 1:57 pm
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Re: LCI Derby Weekend Saturday and Sunday

Post by The River Rat »

Got that one pretty salmon out there tho.... glad to hear that you were on em in the bay. Also see that others were getting in to em as well. I believe 1 made top ten out of the shipyard area.
A White
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