Dialed in on Kings

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Tadmdad
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Dialed in on Kings

Unread postby Tadmdad » Tue Jul 26, 2011 2:57 pm

Last week was the Ludington stop on the tournament trail, fun fishing with family and friends, cookouts and some fishing,

This week stop on the tournament trail was Manistee MI, a more serious event for our group, time for our tournament team to fish. The five of us would be fishing on my buddies boat, 28' Cherokee, named " It's Me". The Manistee event is a open event, open to all boats to fish Pro division, Am division, Big Boys, and 333 event. This event is a 5 largest fish weigh in each day, any species, 9 rod limit, over 2 days Saturday and Sunday 6 AM - 1 PM, with a shotgun start at the pierhead.

Three of us will be prefishing with several friends and kids on Thursday 7/21 and Friday 7/22 in the attempt of finding a pattern to fish for the weekend.
Thursday we spot a vehicle in Manistee and launch out of Ludington, to fish North on Big Point Sable (the Stick), we clear the pierhead at 5:30 AM and make the 7 mile run up to the Stick, setting rods by 6 AM, just a nice morning and sunrise on the lake.

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The first pass brings nothing, good down temperature, alot of bait, no fish. We head NNW and begin hunting, the fist rod goes of about 7:30, nice king.

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Several more kings to the boat, as we keep switching up lures a pattern is starting to come together.

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And we finish the morning with a nice box.

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As we pull in to the slip at the Manistee muncipal marina, we notice several charter boats that we know the captains quite well. After we dock we pay several of them a visit, we are told how bad the fishing has been in the area.
After a couple of adult beverages, and some exchange of pleasantries, we invite a couple of the captains on our boat and show them the morning box. We exchange locations and lures choices, as one of the captains will be fishing the ladies tournament on Friday, with a group of gals. This exchange will prove it's value, and will be returned in spades.

Friday 7/22, we are searching new water to the North of Manistee for backup locations that we have fished in the past. We catch a few fish, and the kids have a good time.

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Nice Steelhead (released)

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And my master angler fish!! a sheepshead lol

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Jeff/Sid on the "Anglers Edge" Sturgeon Bay WI

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Saturday 7/23 day 1 of the tournament, 5 guys on the boat, our toyrnament team, spirits are high, were ready.

Headed out the channel, 5:45 am

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We make the 35 minute run to the stick, turn on a North troll and set rods. There is already 60-80 boats out of Ludington in the area that aren't fishing the tournament, they are fishing the shelf in 90-200 FOW, our pattern has been on top of the shelf in 50-65 FOW and all the boats are outside of us, close in is clean water. Our first pass results in our largest king of the tournament at 25.35 lbs, the whole team preforms flawless, clearing rods and netting, high fives all around, were on the board.

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We finish the first morning, and go 11-12 with 9 kings, 1 steelhead, 1 lake trout. We feel good about our effort, and have a good box to weigh in.

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At the weighin, we weigh our five largest kings, alot of cheers from the spectators as we take the fish out of the cooler, were all thinking WTF, we have a good box, but we didn't realize how good. The 5 kings weighin at 97.80 lbs, just under a 20 pound average. We register our 3 largest kings in the 333 event at 65.5 lbs. The tournament system adds 10 points for each fished weighed, and 1 point for each lb. We end up day 1 with 147.80 points for the 5 fish, we are the top boat in the tournament, 15 points ahead of the closest AM boat, and 1.5 points ahead of the top PRO boat. Back at the dock that night, we recieve many congratulations from the charter captains, as we are not competition fishing the AM division, we share information and tactics, grill a few steaks and have some adult beverages. All the captains are encouraging us for day 2, but can we back up ou catch from day 1.

Sunday 7/23 Day 2, as all the boats head out the channel to fish, there is a storm blowing across the lake, lightning and a good wind. The tournament is delayed until the storm passes, it's decided that we will resume at 8:30 am and have to be back in the pierhead by 2 pm. With a 35 minute run both ways,
this will leave us just over 4 hours of fishing time, and we all will miss the early bite. Conditions have changed, winds from the NW, and larger waves, those conditions will shut down the pattern we have been fishing for the last 3 days.
We have 5 charter captains making the run with us, the storm has blown all the weekend fisherman off the lake due to the bad conditions. Just before the 8:30 start, one of my buddies cell phone rings, he doesn't recognize the number. He answers, it's a charter captain out of Ludington, apparently he's is a friend of one of the charter boat captains we know out of manistee that we shared information with on Thursday, and he placed 2nd in the ladies tournament based upon us sharing information. He explains that the warm water has pushed in on the stick, current has switched from the north, moving the cold water deeper and the fish out, he's running a charter for a customer, and how we should switch our pattern. And there is 3 charters running the water he's in, and that everybody ran in before the storm. We make the run through sloppy conditions based upon his information, and setup our first pass.
We pickup a 15 lb king on the first and the second pass, were on the board.
At the end of our 3rd pass, we hit a double, buddy on one rod, I'm on the other. The only words that are spoken, " this is the tournament guys", rods are cleared, 2 net are out, and we boat both kings. There are 3 charter boats around us at this point, and they all start cheering and blowing there horns for us as the second king gets netted. We have a hour left to fish, and one fish to catch, we have 2 short hits, fish are gone before we can get to the rod. With 15 minutes left before we have to pull rods and run, we get a smoker on, this fish runs 100 yards in about 20 seconds, the captains on the rod, gains line, another run, we all start clearing the other rods as we are running out of time.
The fish is lost about 20 yards behind the boat, nothing done wrong, it's just the way it goes sometimes, at this point we figure we just lost, but we did our best. We make the run back, at the weighin, we weigh our 4 kings in at 62.3 lbs and 102.3 ponts, with a 2 day total of 250.1 points.
We wait for the other boats to weighin, at this point we have the best total, as the AM boat Tony/Craig on Hammbone that was behind us came in, they had 4 fish, for a total 216.65 for 2nd place. The Pro boats weighed in and the top Pro boat was Verdict II at 230.70 points.

Our team finished 1st in the AM division, 2nd in the 333 event, and 2nd biggest fish for the tournament, and top overall boat.

Congratulations to Captain Mark on the "It's Me", you earned it buddy, glad to share it with you. :D

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Last edited by Tadmdad on Tue Jul 26, 2011 3:10 pm, edited 1 time in total.


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JRM6868
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Re: Dialed in on Kings

Unread postby JRM6868 » Tue Jul 26, 2011 3:06 pm

Congrats! Sounds like paying it forward paid off. Did you get to buy that captain that called you a beer?
Great pics and recap!
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Re: Dialed in on Kings

Unread postby BigHunt » Tue Jul 26, 2011 3:18 pm

awsome it looks like you had alot of fun
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Re: Dialed in on Kings

Unread postby DEERSLAYER » Tue Jul 26, 2011 7:41 pm

Congrats on the win and thanks for the fillets! We had some tonight and they were great!
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Re: Dialed in on Kings

Unread postby Liberty-Hunt » Tue Jul 26, 2011 8:28 pm

Great looking time! Congratulation for the win!
Very nice boat too...
8-)
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Re: Dialed in on Kings

Unread postby dan » Tue Jul 26, 2011 9:30 pm

Awesome! 8-)
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Re: Dialed in on Kings

Unread postby Wrinkleneck » Tue Jul 26, 2011 10:25 pm

Great weekend!!!! CONGRATS!!!
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Re: Dialed in on Kings

Unread postby Tadmdad » Tue Jul 26, 2011 11:24 pm

JRM6868 wrote:Congrats! Sounds like paying it forward paid off. Did you get to buy that captain that called you a beer?
Great pics and recap!
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Thanks JRM....haven't had a chance yet to buy him a beer, but it will happen.

These guys that we fished with, and competed against, just showed true class.
It's nice to see in these times of so much negative news, and cheating to win, that at times it can bring out the best in people....the cream always rises to the top. ;)
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Tadmdad
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Re: Dialed in on Kings

Unread postby Tadmdad » Tue Jul 26, 2011 11:26 pm

DEERSLAYER wrote:Congrats on the win and thanks for the fillets! We had some tonight and they were great!


No problem DS.....anytime.....just say so....they make plenty more! :lol:

And by the way, those kings taste much better out of the lake, than after they run the rivers. ;)
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Re: Dialed in on Kings

Unread postby adrenalin » Sun Jul 31, 2011 10:16 am

Way to go tad! You can be damn proud of that. Our fishing over here has been the worst July I ever seen. I had 2 kings on my trip this morning both under 2 lbs. Talked to 3 other captains that had the same thing. We are targeting trout just to fill the void. Sucks, The dnr planted 50,000 kings in Milwaukee 3 years ago and 50,000 in Racine that all died before they released them, so that is 50,000 kings in a 30+ mile stretch of water with about a 20% survival rate after release. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to know that wont work.
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Re: Dialed in on Kings

Unread postby Tadmdad » Mon Aug 01, 2011 1:48 am

Thanks adrenalin....guess every dog has it's day. You know with all the negative things that has happened on the tournament scene that last couple of years, it was a true pleasure to bare witness to all the well wishes and good will exhibited by everyone, made all of us proud to be called "Fisherman"

The last couple of years in mid-summer the bait, water temps, and fish have been on the west side of the lake, this year they have stayed over on the east side, but not sure why? We have had more 3" alewives over here than I've seen since in the '70's, should be good for the future of the fisheries. Didn't know you guys had that big a dieoff on plantings, understand how that could impact your fishing down the road. They have reduced the plantings drastically over the last couple of years, the rationale is that we have more natural reproduction occuring from the fall spawning runs, not sure about that.
But the numbers of fish per trip has been down approximately 50% over the last couple of years, but the quality and size are up, with many more 20+ lbs kings being boxed. I've heard from a few guys I know that the waters up around Algoma/Sturgeon bay has been yeilding some big kings. You fish up that way? Are you going to fish the Sturgeon Bay tournament in a couple of weeks?
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Re: Dialed in on Kings

Unread postby Uncle Lou » Mon Aug 15, 2011 12:32 pm

heck of a post. Its been a while since I fished out of Luddington. If you have fished it much in the past 15+ years you may have run into Fishin Fool. Gordie is a friend of mine. I met him through a neighbor back in 98 or 99. He said this year has been tough fishing.
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Tadmdad
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Re: Dialed in on Kings

Unread postby Tadmdad » Thu Feb 23, 2012 4:16 am

The 333 TV series is being posted from last years tournaments. Fun stuff to watch and the tournament trail has come along ways from it's inception. Ready for the big lake season to start, time to get rid of winter already.

http://vimeo.com/36527527

http://vimeo.com/33803491

Was a good year for our team " It's Me", with a 3rd place for the end of the year. We qualified for the TV series this year and will be competing with the top teams, looking forward to the comradrie and competition with the big boys. :mrgreen:
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Re: Dialed in on Kings

Unread postby headgear » Thu Feb 23, 2012 5:59 am

Awsome Tad, congrats!


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