Giving Credit where Credit is Due! (Part 2)

Daiwa Rods -n- Reels - I hear stories all season long how a Salmon burned up a reel, or how drags are getting sticky. I just listen and give a smirk! I cant remember the last time a Salmon burned up a reel on our boat! I cant remember the last time a Salmon snapped a rod on my boat. Daiwa has been in business for a long time! They have a great staff of professionals that give feedback, and aid in the development of better products. From thier top of the line reels to thier price point/weekend warrior reels you cant find a better company to purchase from. The Daiwa Sealine reels on our boat married to Daiwa Heartland rods have been put to the test and they are still begging for more! When you charter part time and fish 7+ tournaments a year you cant just settle. You have to have the BEST!

McCoy Fishing Line -  6lb test and I hurt myself trying to snap it between my two hands. Thats how my love for this fishing line began. You want tough, supple, abrasion resistant fishing line? This is the stuff! McCoy Mean Green is formulated to do all the above, but it wasnt formulated to rid the evasive spiny sea flea. However, this is exactly what it does. These pesky fleas stick to every line people are runningin the Great Lakes when water temps reach thier summer range. McCoy MeN Green sheds these fleas for whatever reason.  If your sick of peeling these fleas off your lines, or are simply looking for a tougher fishing line check out McCoy!

Giving Credit where Credit is Due! (Part 1)

Tourney season is almost over for Team Yankee Troller with our last event taking place in mid August out of the Port of Oswego. We are on a roll by collecting a top 10 finish in the last two tourneys, and have had highlights in other tourneys with HUGE boxes of Salmon. There are many things that need to coem together to have a good tourney, and everything has to come together to have a GREAT tourney. There are some people out there that without them we couldnt have done what we did in the last few months.

A-TOM-MIK Manufacturing -  Operated out of Oswego, NY this company makes THE BEST trolling flies on the market. Want proof? Go through all the Lake Ontario Counties (LOC.org) leaderboards Spring-Fall. His flies land more Salmon on those boards than any other lure on the market. He has the largest selection of colors available when compared to his competition. Durability on his trolling flies is topnotch, and his service rating is well above normal. Not to mention your keeping the money right here on Lake Ontario supporting local manufaturers. It doesnt stop at just flies with A-TOM-MIK either. He sells TONS of copper and copper set-ups. He carries wire for wire dipsey set-ups, and many more top products used to chase Salmon and Trout on the Great Lakes.

Legendary Products -  Want to talk about a guy who loves to tinker? The owner of this company brought Downriggers to the Great Lakes by inventing and selling Big John Downriggers around the Great Lakes. He has since sold that company off and started a new company called Legendary Products. One of his staple products is the SmartFish you read about in all of my reports. This is the first adjustable flasher to hit the market! You can tune it to the mood of the fish. If they want a trolling fly to whip hard then 11:30 is the setting for that. If they are lazy and want little movement we have found that 8:30 is the settign for that. Check out his website for other innovative products to aid in your fishing needs on the Great Lakes. His flashers have put 4 fish on the Lake Ontario Counties (LOC.org) leaderboards from our boat in the last year. 

These two products together have been deadly for us this year! 11th place finish in the Wilson Scotty event using both the Wonderbread and Green Dot SmartFish trailing A-TOM-MIK Hammer and Ultra Green Glow flies. This past weekend it was Green Smartfish in various patterns with A-TOM-MIK Hypnotist and Green Crinkle flies. These combos also boated us the second largest box of fish in the Oswego Pro AM event! Not to mention they have put 4 fish on LOC leaderboards in about a year. Check them out!

Sodus Pro Am 2009

Friday (Practice/Pre Tourney) - We hit the water about 6am and took a run down to Fair Haven. We heard the bite was good down there and when we pulled up the screen on our fish finder looked very good. We dropped lines and worked the waters between West Nine Mile point and the Silos West of Fair Haven. We picked away at them throughout the day, but we only had 11 bites by the days end. Our hot combos were Green Double Crush Glow SmartFish with either A-TOM-MIK Green Crinkle or Ultra Green Glow flies. Out 175 rigger and our 600 and 700 copper took most of the fish. Although we only took 11 bites we had a good class of fish in the area. We ended up taking 10th place in the pre-tourney they hold the Friday before each Pro-Am. 

Saturday (Day 1) - We used our 30 minutes of run time to head East to try to get back to our waypoints from the day before. We set down at 6am and dropped lines. It didn't take long to figure out with the current conditions that we would be in Oswego in no time, and that it would be a good idea to turn around and head back West. As we turned the boat and trolled back West rods started firing. We worked the are right off Port Bay the rest of the day circling an area about a mile and a half long. 175/140 riggers, 350 wires, the 500, and 600 copper all took fish. Again, it was the Green SmartFish pulling A-TOM-MIK Green Crinkle and Hypnotist flies that did ALL the damage. We would box 9 fish, loose 6, and throw back 2 skippys. At the end of the day we were sitting in 13th place with a 215 point box. 2 fish out of first! So, imagine what 3 would have done for us. Our highlight of the day was a HUGE 26lb Salmon. The boats biggest fish of the season, and good for 11th place in the Summer LOC derby. The last fish I had on the LOC board was last summer. Prior to that we had a string of 4 LOC fish.

Sunday (Day 2) - Again, we said that our best bet was to head back to our waypoints to the East during our free run time. We set rods in front of Port bay and it didn't take long. At one point we were tripled up with fish taking the 500 and 600 coppers and the 325 wire. Same Green SmartFish worked today. However, a custom SmartFish from Legendary really took honors today. It is a Green blade with Twinkie tape on the front and Crush Glow on the back. We put an A-TOM-MIK Pro Am Glow fly behind it and out it went on the 500 copper. It went about 4 or 5 times until one Chinook Salmon hit it and never looked back! My only paddle in that combo and it was now sitting in a fish's mouth! Oh well, stuff happens! So we continue the rest of the day picking at them and dropping our fair share of fish. WE had to wait till our 20th bite to box our 12 fish. I hate to sound like a broken record, but it was the Green SmartFish paddles with A-TOM-MIK Hypnotist, Green Crinkle, Wigglers, and Pro Am Glow flies. The 500 copper was HOT today! Our riggers down 120-150 were also on fire. We boxed out at 12pm and headed in. When our box hit the scales it was a whopping 290 point box. At the end of the day it was the second largest box of the tourney. We would finish in 8th place overall. 44 points out of 1st (2 fish)! Thats why its fishing and not catching! We would also end up in 4th place overall in the East End Cup race. 

Oswego Pro Am 2009

So, it was the beginning of the East end leg of the Lake Ontario Challenge Cup this weekend. Our tourney season in 2009 has been real up and down. Some GREAT days while other days made you wonder.

Friday (Practice) We headed West past Ford Shoals and set down in 120fow. Screen looked pretty fishy so we set lines. Our fist fish didn't come for an hour or so. We managed 4 fish the whole day! Not vary exciting for our team, but we knew where the fish were. We just had to get them to eat on tourney day! Three of our fish took a Dreamweaver Spin Doctor in a Gator pattern pulling an A-TOM-MIK Ultra Green Glow fished off a 500 copper rig. So, at the very least we had a pattern! Two of those fish were nice steelhead in the 9lb range and one was a skippy Chinook Salmon. Our last fish of the day took a wire diver out 270 pulling a 00 Orange Dodger with a Blue/Gold Coho fly.

Saturday (Day 1) - We were met with some strong SW winds up to 20mph. We started right out where we had our fish from the previous day and we went an hour before our first fish hit. Our first fish was a 20" Chinook Salmon that we had to box. Next was a 8lb. Laker, and then a nice teenage Chinook Salmon. All three on a Green Double Crush Glow SmartFish pulling an A-TOM-MIK Green Crinkle. We would then take a 22lb BRUTE on a NK Mag Sea Sick Waddler. Finally, we finished off our box with another teenager that took the Dreamweaver Spin Doctor Gator pulling an A-TOM-MIK Ultra Green Glow.

After the fish hit the scales we were sitting in 6th place with 117 points. Fishing was tough for ALL!

Sunday (Day 2) - Canceled! Too windy! So we waited around till 12:30 to collect our check (first of the year) which felt like a long time coming!

A lit'l Bass Fishin'

The Russ Louk Memorial held by Southern Tier Bassmasters took place this weekend on Conesus Lake. It attracted 50 boats, which is a lot on a lake the size of Conesus. Fishing on Conesus has been very tough! Post spawn phase, which is normal for the first few weeks of the season, has really shaken up even some of the best Conesus lake anglers. I took the time to head down there Friday to practice for the tourney considering I haven't done much of anything on Conesus in the last few trips. Well, things really didn't change. It was tough, and most all of the fish we took were on Senkos. However, we did have one highlight of the day. About 11:00am we took this brute on a Senko. He bouinced between 5.4-5.6 on the scale:

Come tourney day I made a last minute decision to go to a weedline that the big guy above hit on. It didnt take long to get into the fish, but they weren't exactly jumping in the boat. We fished the whole day bouncing from spot to spot. Everything looked so good, and you would think that we should be loading the boat up with fish. At the end of the day all we could scrounge up was 11 pounds. Kicker fish just weren't active for us on this day. It took 16 pounds to win the tourney, which is very light for this lake.