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Was fishing in the maumee river this week and caught two 20 inch walleye. Didn’t expect that as everyone else was catching catfish. How common is it ?

I just purchased a 2015 Ranger 621 and the previous owner said that the trailer requires a thin walled socket. Does anyone know what size it is or a cheap set on Amazon that would work?

I thought I would check on here before I start buying all sorts of different brands.

Most trailers are usually close to a 13/16″ or 3/4″……

Thanks in advance…

FF

I’ve seen questions about where reefs and buoys are at on Lake Erie from time to time. If you go to the NOAA website, search for chart 14830. This chart is zoom able and shows the western basin very well. It starts at Maumee Bay and goes all the way to Lorain.

Sorry for the lack of reports the past couple few weeks but, those that follow me on Facebook already know that I was having some electronics issues, a sprained ankle, and a couple of cancellations during that time, so my time on the water has been limited this month.

My electronics are working fine again, my ankle is healed, and I have a handful of trips scheduled for the rest of the month. In other words, I have some openings. 🙂


With that said….let’s get on to today’s report.


Yesterday, I prefished with some old friends, for this morning’s trip, and where we ended yesterday, is where I was going to start this morning.


The alarm went off at 2AM, and, as usual, I grabbed a cup of coffee and headed out to the back deck with the dogs. The air was calm, crisp, and clear. The temperature was 61 degrees, and the full moon that lit up the backyard with a dull light, was waning.


I picked up Steve and Debbie from The Whitecaps Motel at 5AM. We drove through town, to the gas station. After gassing up the truck, I grabbed some ice for the fish cooler, and some for the boat cooler, too. It was only 5:15 when we got to Mazurik’s, so we waited until it was light enough to launch. With the commercial nets moving from area to area this time of year, I prefer to wait and launch when I can see the little flag markers on the nets.


We were headed to the area between Cedar Point and Huron. When we got close to where me and my friends were fishing yesterday, the Vexus came off plane and the Helix lit up with good marks…I felt confident we would have a good morning of fishing, and catching.


Once the FishHawk was sent down to its designated depth of 20 feet, the Terrova and the Baby Merc were synchronized to acquire a speed of 2.3-2.5mph…then, directed to the east.


Water temp was 76 degrees


(4) Baby Spros (85s) were riding behind Off Shore boards with 2 oz Guppie weights hitting the 21-26 foot range in the water column.


(2) Chrome Perch, Blue Chrome, and I think, a Purple Tiger (?) (It’s purple tigerish on the back, and has a white belly).


The cranks caught the bigger fish, this morning… but, they sometimes dragged itty-bitties around until we checked them, too. But, the dipsies caught the most fish.


The dipsies kept busy with Scorpion spoons, Yeck spoons (D-11s), and a Yaleye Mooneye Minnow.
The inside dipsies ran on the zero setting anywhere from 40 to 54 back.
The outside port dipsey was on the three setting, and bounced back and forth from 70 to 85 back.
The outside starboard dipsey was on the two setting at was set at 65 all morning.


I’m often asked what rods and reels I use for my dipsies:
The inside rods are 6′ Med Ugly Stiks, and the outside rods are 8’6″ Okuma Classic Pro GLTs “Downrigger” rods.
I’m using the old style Shimano Tekota 500 reels, that were used on my board rods, until I bought new Tekotas for the board rods, and moved the old ones to the dipsies, to replace the older Diawa Sealine 27s.
The reels are spooled up with 30# Power Pro in yellow, so it can be seen in the water, and a visual of a line angle change easily noted.
I run the size 1 dipsies with the ring, and use an 8″ snubber, from Amish Outfitters, (I just like their snubbers best), behind the dipsey.
The leader length is whatever my arm spread is. I’m tall, so they are probably around 6 footers.


Everything caught fish….We all kept busy reeling in fish, and talked about how the future of the fishery looks strong, and in about 4 years, the fishing is going to be awesome. All these little fish will be really nice reproducers, and good sized fish that anyone would be happy to catch in the future. 🙂


The smallest walleye caught was around 5 inches, and the biggest was a nice chubby 26 incher. Debbie was thrilled to be the one that caught that one, because it is the biggest walleye she has ever caught to date. Woot! Woot!


They had a good time, and did great! Their positive attitude, and energy to just have fun, whether we caught fish, or not, was just super cool, and relaxing. But, we did manage our 3 person limit, so it’s safe to say, it was an awesome morning of fishing and catching with the Jones’s. 🙂


Right now, I don’t have anything scheduled until next Saturday, so unless I pick up a trip, I’ll be entertaining the dogs, cleaning the house, working in the yard and gardens, and cleaning the boat, this week.


Stay tuned….


Capt Juls

Attached Images

John and I fished Friday. Forecast called for winds out of the NE overnight and through the morning. I told John we would be running right into NE rollers on the run out. But he bet me the “usual” $1 bet we would have a smooth run out to fish. Unfortunately, I won the bet and had 3′ rollers on the run out to where we fished the past two weekends. That area is just north of Old C can around 4 miles east of Kellis Island Shoal. The sonar showed poor marks so headed east along the line until found better marks another 4 miles east. Set out gear and hooked and lost one good fish then nothing for another 30 min. We picked up and ran east to weather buoy. Set up gear and was catching after adjusting dipsies for the deeper water. Caught our 12/33lbs in a couple hours with several 24″ fish and a little sorting. One short and one sheep. Speed 2. 7mph.Only fished 4 dipseys cuss was in Canadian waters. Had one green spoon harness and 3 double willow worm harness out. The 3@ 90 and 1@75 did the catching. John had another friend join him Saturday, without me.Went to same area and gear and caught 5 fish, but one was a F/O 28″ beauty.FYI, they have commercial nets between Kellis and South Bass that we had to navigate around in the morning.

Mix of golden and emerald shiners. Spreaders. no bling. A can. 10 – 20 boats in the area.
We got 31 by 11am. Much better quality than by the islands Friday. Several 10s and 11s today. Seemed to light up in 25.5 fow and stop in 26.5 fow. Golden #4 hooks did twice as good as red ones.

3 of us casting Crib this morning with harnesses and weight forwards. Just us and one other boat most of the morning. Left the Portage about 7a. Bite was solid early, but then had to work for them. Fished until about 12:30 or so. Ended with 11 good ones with 3 around 24”, about 12-15 shorts, 4 cats, and 8-10 sheep. There wasn’t much wind, but when the little we had died, so did the bite. There was a pack of boats at D can with most anchored up perching. It didn’t look like the perch were on fire either. BEAUTIFUL day on the lake!

Tight lines all!

Went out early today thinking it would be busy with the nice forecast. No emerald shinners made a slow start and it showed the perch didn’t care for them. No wind per say either didn’t help the bite. Walleye guys were trolling all over the place. DNR guy at the ramp says walleye catches were good but Perch bite was really slow unless you had good minnows. I only kept 6 nice ones, 9 plus to 11″ plus, gues it will be perch sandwiches tonite.

We used spreaders with no bling. Snelled #4 gold hooks. Mix of emerald and non-emerald(?) shiners. 1 oz weights.

Thursday evening, the waves held our small boat to 15 fow, about half way out to B can. We got 1 cat, 1 white perch, 1 tasty drum, 0 perch.

Friday morning, we started on the SE side of G can in 23 fow. 1 cat, 1 white perch, 1 tasty drum, 6 perch. About a dozen boats joined us there but most left quickly.

Headed north and marked some fish near F can. So we stopped there all by our lonesome. Bugs ran us out. No fish.

Around 10:30 or so we approached the swarm of 75 – 100 boats that were south of Green Is. We started a ways further to the south and west than the crowd. It was about 28 fow as I recall. I got a big double right away. 1 more cat, a couple tasty drum. I marked a ton of fish on the Helix that looked like walleye to me. Sure enough the 6-year-old landed a 14.5″ walleye on his spreader. I figured the walleye were chasing the perch away. We only got 5 perch here. So we used the Minn Kota to “drift” into the crowd at 0.3 mph, which is slow enough that our lines stayed practically vertical. We saw some nearby boats catching but nothing there for us so we went to lunch.

At 3pm we stopped to the SE of Rattlesnake Is. in 31 fow and “drifted” our way toward the 25′ zone. Before we lost any depth we got a couple more tasty drum and 7 perch in about 30 minutes. This was the best bite of the day by far. However, they soon stopped biting. Again we marked walleye all over, probably the 14″ variety. We tried the east side of Rattlesnake and back to the SE again but never got another bite.

Called it a day around 5:30pm with 18 perch. Most were 8″ but we had four 9’s and one 10″.

Full moon tonight…

Got started around 8:30 Wednesday morning 1 scoop of emeralds. Wind was out of the NE at around 10 knots wasn’t to buggy but a little more breeze would have helped out. Homemade Lindy rig did the job 13 pound’s at the cleaners no farm animals and 1 throw back walleye.