lake michigan chicago Fishing Report 2024

~~Sep. 22
 We had a slow day.  And there's no sugar coating it.  There's no let's let you decide if it was slow.  It just was, and unfortunately for this trip we don't have another day to make it right.  There was a one hour window where if you were in the right place at that time and found a school you were in for a good bite but that was few and far between and unfortunately we weren't the few.  We scratched a little in the morning, found a dandy school before lunch that let us catch a few handfuls before swimming away, and we found a stretch of and area this afternoon that we thought we were going to make something happen, we found three kelps in a row with tuna on them but they would only boil around and not bite except for a few. 

 On the plus side our weather today was fantastic.  If you're going to have a slow day fishing, it's a whole lot better doing it in good weather than in bad weather.  I also saw alot more of San Clemente Island than I ever have before.  I now know more about the looks of the island itself and the bottom structure of it.  We're headed in now and we're turning around again tomorrow for 2 more days.

 And one last thing.  I'm not going to mention it because I only heard this second hand and I don't want to start a rumor if it's not true but a sport boat out here today caught a wahoo.  Now once again I'm not going to mention it, but one boat, maybe the Prowler caught a wahoo.  I'm not going to start a false rumor so I'm not saying anything.
       

~~Nov.10
 OK.  It took until 4:00 this evening but I finally made up my mind of where we're going to go.  All day long it's been running through my head.  "rocks or ridge, rocks or ridge.  They both had there advantages and disadvantages but I believe I made the choice with the more advantages for this stage of the trip.  It's like a chess game out here sometimes with the rest of the fleet.

 So as you know we traveled all day.  We did a fishing seminar shortly after breakfast and I feel I got everyone on board super pumped on catching cow tuna so now we're going to have to do it.  No pressure though.  Tackle rigging, naps, relaxation, antsy.  Basically all the feelings.  Right now most of the boat is watching a batman movie loudly.  Some are lounging on the upper deck but dinner should be soon and off goes the movie.  It smells terrific too.  Baby back ribs tonight.

 So we have about 1/2 a day of traveling left to do and then we'll be in full fish mode for about a week straight.  Here we go.
          

~~July 31
 Good evening folks and welcome to the last July 31 of 2015 ever aboard the Polaris Supreme.  The water we fished today just didn't have that right feel to it if you know what I mean.  The whole set up changed since we were there 2 days ago.  It was 2 degrees cooler for one thing.  Maybe we weren't in the right zone , but I don't think so.  I think things were off as far as the tuna and Dorado goes.  We were finding bull kelp areas instead of nice bushy kelps and catching only dinker tuna.  I only saw one tuna over 10 pounds today and 10 pounds was a lunker.  Needless to say we let every single one of them go.  So at 7:00 pm, it was looking like we were going to chalk this one up as a travel day.  I was just about ready to shower.  I mean I literally had all my clothes on the floor with the shower water running when I heard the call.  "We have a real nice kelp up ahead".  I thought about it and decided I better suit up again just in case and it was the right move.  Easily the best kelp of the year.  Until well after sunset things were busy and exciting aboard the Polaris Supreme.  The whole boat was bit.  Every single person.  Wide open 14-25 pound yellowtails.  It was good.  4 fish per rod that stop.  Uh huh.  Dinner was much more satisfying than it was flling like it was going to be.

 Another reason dinner was so lovely would be a fella, my friend Herb Yamanaka.  Very possibly the nicest man in the world.  At least tied for the nicest man in the world.  Every year he spends I don't even know how much time behind the lathe machine, making everyone on board an original wooden bowl or things like it, and they're wonderful.  He works for the Oregon Ducks origination so go Ducks!!!

 Tomorrow we'll be arriving to Cedros at about 7 in the am.  We're going to plan on wind, and we're going to plan on some good tailing to go along with a good time.
      

91 yellowfin 138 yellowtail 2 dorado. All it takes is one stop.

Sep. 1

Today was kind of a disappointing day. We woke up catching yellowtail but it quickly stopped biting after daylight. We trolled up the place for several strikes on wahoo but the catching was slim. The ratio of hooked to land is never good with wahoo but this morning it was especially bad. We lost 3 marauders today. That's about what you lose when you have a 100 fish day on these things and we did not. Anyways, after that we weren't getting strikes anymore so we kept her rolling to a couple of spots I've been real excited about trying for the last couple of weeks and it really bummed me out. No wahoo, no tuna, not even any dorado. A few yellows was all. So we ran back up to this mornings honey hole and had a strike where the odds were in our favor. I'm not sure if we lost a fish. 8 lucky anglers caught a nice wahoo. We trolled it up till dark for nothing else. We're going to give it one more chance tomorrow looking in a different wahoo, dorado zone and if it stinks we're going to finish up the trip in the closer to home zone. We're keeping an eye on the storm so there's nothing to worry about ladies. I'll bring you hubbies home safe and sound.

Drew

Captain Mike Pritchard checked in with an audio update from the Tribute out of Seaforth Sportfishing in Mission Bay.  We have been drifting for 5 hours now.  We have 16 Bluefin Tuna in the 60 to 80 pound class.

The Tribute is online at Seaforth by the seashore.