Big Lake Fishing Tournament

Bryan: I was in my first Big Lake Fishing Tournament this past Saturday (9/10/11). My luck with fishing has been less than exceptional this year on the big lake. As a matter of fact, up until the last couple of weeks, I only had one salmon under my belt. 

I was asked to be in this tournament by a couple of guys from my work (Bernie and Brett Cobb).  We went four for six in the tournament, two lake trout and two king salmon.  We did not place, but we had a good time catching fish.  We fished the entire day in 25 feet of water right outside of the Saugatuck pier heads.  It was very crowded and very foggy, but we managed to get out of there with only one casualty.  We lost an entire spool of lead core, a planner board and a spoon to a charter boat.  Luckily, Bernie got a hold of him on Monday and got his stuff back.

Bernie actually took me fishing the weekend before the tournament as well.  We went 5 for 9 that night.  I payed close attention to lures, speed, depths, and other techniques that may be helpful to the success of the Kraker boat.  Some of the hot lures we used are pictured below.

A few things I took away from my lesson on the lake with Bernie was to watch for feeder fish groups on the graph, pay attention to the radio, glow in the dark lures are hot, bigger spoons may help during the later season, keep trying new stuff if you can't find the fish, and most importantly, stay out past sunset at night and get out before sun rise in the morning.

My hope is to use some of these tips, maybe change our set up and gear a little bit, and hopefully make the Kraker boat a little more successful.