Author: Admin 1

Yesterday, Tuesday, was supposed to be the first of three days for Ed, Tim, and Rick, who came down from Eau Claire, WI, to fish with me, but Momma Nature said she had other plans for us. She was angry and was blowing out of the NNE.
The forecast was calling for it to lay down as the morning progressed, so I told them I would pick them up at the Whitecaps Motel at 8am instead of 5am. We got to Mazruik’s at 8:30 and sat there in the truck looking at an angry lake. I told them it was a no-go, and I don’t do afternoons because of my regular schedule, and that it was still going to be rough with the NE rollers continuing to roll in from the east end. They were okay with that.

This morning, the wind was going to be light out of the SSW, so I picked them up at 5am, and after getting some ice for the coolers, we went back to Mazurik’s to launch. I pointed the Vexus east once we were out of the breakwall, and off we went.

The plan was to start on the east side of Cedar Point and work our way over to Huron as long as we were marking fish. If not…we would move. Luckily, we were marking fish. All we had to do was figure out what they wanted this morning.

I had gotten a tip to take crawlers, because the kitchen sink had been thrown at them by a friend yesterday, and they didn’t like what was in the sink. So, this morning, before I picked up my crew, I jumped in the boat and re-rigged 6 rods to crawler harnesses (double willow-bladed wire harnesses). We would start with those and two dipsies off each back corner.

After the FishHawk, Ulterra, and baby Merc were set on a course to the east at a speed of 2.5 (FishHawk speed), the dipsies went out first. By running the willow leaf harnesses, I could keep the speed up enough to still use the dipsies.

Dipsies were set on the usual settings of zero and three, and ran all Yeck spoons this time.
The zero settings ran at 30 and 40 back. We had set up over 36′ of water to start, and my aim was to hit the 38 to 40′ of water. Once we got to deeper water, the fish were holding deeper, so we dropped the zero settings to 40 and 54 back. The three settings started at 50 back, but would eventually end up at 72 on both sides.

The crawler harnesses ran behind the Off Shore boards with 2oz inline weights at 20, 25, 30, 35, 40, and 45 back. Nada…not even a nibble. I ran them for half an hour and decided to pull them and put small cranks on.

Bill Lewis PWC Lites would run on the starboard side with 2oz snap weights at 50/50, 50/35, and 50/24. Colors were:
“Black Headed Wonder Bread on White” at 50/50
“Purple Tiger” 50/35
“Green Tiger” 50/24
(For the newbie who might be confused about the 50/#…this is the Precision Trolling Data info used with a 2oz Guppie weight or snap weight. You put the snap weight on at the 50 mark, and the board on after you add the extra number listed. Example: 50/50=100 total line out…put the board on at the 100 feet out mark).

Flicker Minnow 11s replaced the crawlers on the port side. They ran at 125, 115, and 75 back. Colors were:
“FireTail Chrome Candy” Ran two…125 and 115 back
“Slick Sunset” ran at 75 back

Everything took one or two fish this morning. We had our 4-person limit by 10:30, so it wasn’t on fire, but it was steady enough to keep my guys busy and entertained. We did have one triple that made them giddy. They had a lot of fun, and it was nice to see the family get together and spend quality time like this. 🙂

We will be launching out of Huron tomorrow, instead of Mazurik’s, due to the wind forecast for the morning, which is 15-20 out of the SW. It might be raining in the morning, too.

Stay tuned…

Capt Juls

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Partial day trips the last two days out of PiB? Spent decent time on the line between Middle Bass and Kelleys, just west of Gull Reef, where there were reports of limits?. Marked and caught very little. Picked up 2 eyes during a 1 hour troll with a couple sheep mixed in. Picked up lines and ran over North of Kelley?s and marked a lot of fish, but they were mostly glued to bottom and deep in 48-50. Ended up catching 4 on a worm burner behind large dipsy over there, one fish was almost 27? which was a nice bonus.

Caught nothing on the mini dipsy and spoon combo which is normally our go to.. pretty surprising.

I also fish Shallow reefs around Starve early AM and late PM.. usually do very well, but pretty quiet this weekend. The mayfly hatch is off the charts so I am guessing that has slowed things down a bit overall, plus the heavy winds.

Good luck all, be safe and tight lines.

I was having difficulty logging into the site as the system wants to grab my old email which I have tried to replace a couple of years ago. Juls contacted the system administrator and they contacted me thanks to Juls and got me straighted up.
Juls, the local school systems would love to have you for a substitute teacher as so are such a good speaker, your writing is terrific, and you are so organized. I bet you you are good at math and could help all ages with math.
But a big thank you for helping me, and thank you for ALL the reports you give us on how to fish, where to fish, and what to use .
I know everyone on this site is appreciative for all you do for us.
Bruce
Lucky Duck

Day 3 with Steve, Dave, and Doug?6/17/2026

No report today?and was too busy to get fish pics this morning, too?sorry!

We went out of Huron again, and duplicated yesterday?s report, but got done by 8:15 instead of 8:45 this time. 

Tomorrow?s trip is cancelled due to the forecast, and they are headed back to Minnesota and Wyoming with lots of fish!

I have to cut the grass and tend the gardens before this big weather system comes in later this afternoon?

Next trip is scheduled for Saturday?.

Stay tuned?

Capt Juls

Question: When looking at the precision app I?m only seeing inline trolling weights. Does it matter depth wise when running harness off boards if I use snap weights or inline? Guessing not but thought id ask. Also with harnesses are you guys using the 50+2?

Thanks!

Kratz

Same as the last eight days, but it took a little longer to get a limit. Between Middle Bass Island and Kelleys Island, up near the border, drifting or trolling.

I didn’t write a report for Day one of Steve, Dave, and Doug’s trip, because we had a late start, and by the time I got home, I only had time to feed the dogs, go to the bank, and make a quick dinner. For those that know me, you know what time I go to bed…for those that don’t know me, I am going to bed when most normal people are sitting down to dinner. I like to get up at 2am, so by the time I have to meet my customers, I am in a good mood, and I’ve already gotten lots of things done before I leave the house. It’s not for everyone, but it works for me. 😉

Anyway…day one, we caught their 3-person limit and a couple of mine. We fished the SE side of Kelly’s with spoons behind dipsies and Bandits behind the Off Shore boards. The spoons outfished the cranks, but the crank fish were still larger on average.

Day 2:

I got up at 1:30, feeling like I slept very well, and was feeling good. While sitting on the back deck with the dogs and my hot cup of coffee, I remembered telling them I would make them some of my brownies today, so after checking all my weather forecast apps, we went back inside.

I whipped up the brownies, and while they baked in the oven, I jumped in the shower and got ready. When I went outside to put stuff in the boat, I saw it….my electrical cord was on the ground. #%@*/! Ugh….I forgot to plug the charger in when we got back late. I said a few words, knowing I was the only one to blame.

Luckily, I have “Miller Tech” lithium batteries in the boat for the Ulterra. They have an app that lets me check the percentage of usage, and it showed there was still 65% left on all three batteries. Whew! If they were still AGMs, I would have been in a panic, knowing the batteries wouldn’t last for a second trip without a charge.

The forecast was calling for wind out of the SW at 10-18mph.
The air temp was 64 degrees at 4:30, and I could see some stars in the sky, so I figured it was clear to partly cloudy. The high today would only reach the mid 70s.

My guys are staying at Camp Perry, which is 2 miles west of my house, so they met me at my house and jumped in my truck for the ride to the launch.
This morning, I thought it would be a good idea to launch out of Huron, because of the wind direction and the location of the area I wanted to fish. It would be closer and not as rough as launching out of Mazurik’s and fishing the east side of Kelly’s.
These friends are in their mid to late 70’s, so I didn’t want them to take a rough boat ride if I could help it.

After stopping at the Speedway on 250 and Rt2 to get ice, we hit the Huron launch a little after 5am.
**Note: If you’re driving in from the west, you need to get off on Rt6 West and go through town, because 6 East is closed.

I got the boat ready and took the Bandits off the port side and attached Flicker Minnow11s instead. I wanted to try a smaller profile to see if the fish preferred those to a Bandit right now.

We didn’t go far out of the river and headed west until I hit 25′ of water. The fish marks were good, so I shut the big Merc off and deployed the Ulterra. The baby Merc and Fish Hawk were also deployed. The FishHawk usually gets set at 18′ down, because that’s far enough to get a good reading of opposite currents.

The target speed was 2.5mph, and the course was set in the direction of the dump.

The wind was still light when we started and was less than 5mph. By the time we would end, it would be blowing at 15mph(ish), and the lake would go from calm to 1-3s a mile out, 2-3s two miles out, and 2-4s on the north side of the dump.

Dipsies ran off the two back corners, as usual. Two on each side. The zero setting started out at 25 and 30 back, and the three settings were initially set to 50 and 60 back. They would be let out as we got over deeper water to what has been working the past two weeks.
The zero settings at 35 and 54, and the three settings at 64 and 72 back.
The Yeck spoons, DJ Custom Eye Lures, paints the bellies blue for me were consistently catching fish. I don’t know the name of the other Yeck color, but it has a pink belly and orange/chart/and pink on the back. It did well, too.

The Off Shore boards on the starboard side pulled Bandits at 100, 90, 80, and 63 back. (I run the long leads on the outside and shorter leads on the inside…it works for me).
Colors were:
“Sunspot” (stock color) 100 back
“Blue Shiner” (stock color) 90 back
“Halographic Natural Shiner” (Slim Shady Custom) 80 back
“Fruit Dots” (stock color) 63 back

The port side ran Flicker Minnow 11s (unassisted) at 115, 90, 80, and 63 back.
Colors were all stock colors:
“Firetail Chrome Candy” (115)
“Firetail Hot Perch” (90)
“Flashy Chartreuse” (80)
“Racy Shad” (63)

All but the Fruit Dots caught one or more fish this morning. Slim Shady’s “Halographic Nat. Shiner” caught the most of all the cranks, though. I need to order another 3 or 4 of those. I only have one in my box, and I really like that one. 🙂

Thankfully, my crew had a day of training before we had the kind of bite we had. And, they knew more about what to do. Dave was helping set dipsies, but they left the board setting to me. They helped net each other’s fish while I was busy resetting lines.

The first pass was from inside to the north side of the dump. We picked everything up and made a run back to the start, so we could make another pass. The first pass had produced 12 keepers and several throwbacks. The second pass gave us the other 12, along with more Sheephead Dave wanted to keep for his traps back home. He called them “Bobcat Bait”.

They caught their 3-person limit, and I reeled in mine, too. We had our 24 by 8:45 this morning, which made my guys very happy. Steve said, “This is the kind of experience we always read about, when people talk about Lake Erie…thanks, Juls”. I smiled, and nodded, and that made me happy! 🙂

They have two more days scheduled with me, and it looks like tomorrow will be the last day, because Thursday’s forecast looks nasty!

We’ll be headed back to Huron in the morning…

Stay tuned….

Capt Juls

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had a great day by west sister yesterday. One of my walleyes had a lamprey eel on it. Never saw that before – anyone else seen this?

Also for the readers from Toledo and West who don’t want to pull all the way over to Mazuriks to fish “the western basin” we went out of the Turtle creek area – Magee East ramp $5. Just west and north of West Sister is the duck bill and anvil formations. First eye on before 2nd rod set. Using fluorescent orange Flatfish and 2 oz Bass Pro shop 2 ounce snaps 50/2 and 20. also running blue fox vibra spin inline spiiners off a tru-trip 30 with a 2″ pinch of night crawler – 90 to 115 let back. These 2 accounted for most fish – bandits nothing, spoons brought in sheeps

Same as last few days. Boats limiting out and back at dock by 10am. Same place – between South Bass / Middle Bass and Kelleys Islands, from the center point up to the Canadian line. Drifting or trolling. Fish are often up high due to Mayfly hatch.