Ludington Fishing Report: 40 Years Fishing Ludington...Apparently I've Been Too Far From the Pier!

8/30/20264 min read

Compared to our new normal haul, you people might think this morning was a disappointment because we only boated two fish. Spoiler alert! It wasn't…this was another great morning.

First, we weren't even supposed to be fishing today. The forecast looked like crap, so just getting off the dock and setting lines was a bonus.

Second, I've been fishing Ludington since the early 80s and have never caught a salmon off the pier. I've also never caught a salmon in the harbor, channel or Pere Marquette Lake. So today I had a chance to try something different by fishing with pier bangin’ veteran, Logan, and maybe stumble into one of those big shallow-water hammers I've been looking for.

Third, there were only three of us today: me, Surgeon Jenn and Logan. Nine rods..that's it. After running 15 rods with five people yesterday, nine rods felt like a freaking vacation!

Our plan was simple…hope the waves allowed us to troll outside the harbor. Run about a mile south, turn around and troll north with the waves at our back. Time the pierheads perfectly so the hammers started biting right when we hit the sweet spot. Keep crossing in front of the harbor until we either had our limit or found my Big King Bonanza fish. If the bite died out front, and the jigger flotilla allowed it, we'd duck inside and troll the harbor, channel and PM Lake.

Perfect plan…we executed the mile run south, turned around and started trolling north toward the pierheads. Well...kinda.

Apparently 40 feet of water and a quarter-mile away from the lighthouse is WAY TOO DEEP AND WAY TOO FAR AWAY if you're going to do this correctly. Who knew?

We set a spread of plugs on two, three and five colors, out downs and slide divers. All lines set. And, yep...nothing. Again. It's apparently difficult to catch pierhead fish when you're nowhere near the freaking pierheads.

We turned around and made another pass, this time cutting much closer to the pierheads. Hey! Two kings! Maybe Logan knows what he's doing after all.

Eventually we ducked into the harbor, which was considerably nicer than bouncing around outside. We made a lap around PM Lake and marked a crapload of fish. Fish everywhere on the screen. Surely this was finally going to happen. Nope…not a bump. My trolling adventures inside the arms have still never produced a salmon. Not even THE COIN and Logan combined can itch this scratch!

We eventually called it with two kings on four bites…and I'm perfectly good with that.

Hot Bites

Plug | Silver Horde 4 Inch Soda | Lead Core 3 Colors | 1 bite
Plug | Dreamweaver 4 Inch Red Head Black Dot | Lead Core 5 Colors | 1 bite
Plug | Silver Horde 5 Inch Sea Hawk | Out Down 28 down | 1 bite
Plug | Silver Horde 5 Inch Pink Lightning | Lead Core 2 Colors | 1 bite

What I Learned Today

There's apparently no time for video when these pierhead fish bite. At least not with the two we caught. Bite. Reel three or four times. Net. Done. It's a little different than fighting a king from 400 feet behind the boat!
Apparently there's also a difference between "Pier Bangin'" and whatever the hell we were doing out in 40-to-45 feet of water. Maybe ours was "pier fishing." Maybe "shallow-water fishing." I don't know. What I do know is if you're actually Pier Bangin', you need to "get right in there." And apparently "right in there" means something like an eighth of a mile from the pierheads. Not cruising around the 45-foot line pretending you're part of the program.
Apparently the Badger has a new light on the front that can shine all the way to Wisconsin if needed. That bad boy looks pretty official coming into the harbor with the light blazing. I don't know what they're looking for, but I'm pretty sure they can see it.
Logan is genuinely one of the nicest, most respectable people I know. But do not, and I mean DO NOT, wander too far away from the pierheads when you're supposed to be Pier Bangin'. You'll see a completely different side of Logan Wessendorf. Apparently there are boundaries. Very tight boundaries.
Although we've firmly established that Logan is good at this fishing thing, he continues to fail at his personal Pull Hard challenges...and I continue to enable him. Yesterday he was trying to earn a second After Fishing Mint™ by catching 20 fish. He failed. I still offered him the second mint. To his credit, he refused it. Today we had another deal. If we caught a 27.1-pound king, I would go to Café 106 and buy breakfast. We didn't come remotely close to catching a 27.1-pound king. I went to Café 106. Apparently my rewards program has absolutely no performance requirements.

And that's a wrap for the last weekend of August. We still have some work to do this season.

The obvious one? WE NEED A FREAKING HAMMER! I've probably got one, maybe two trolls left to find a Big King Bonanza fish. The clock is ticking, and somewhere out there is a stupid giant king that apparently doesn't know it's supposed to eat one of my lures.

But there's another number I'm chasing that means even more to me. I've fished with 69 different people in 2026. I believe last year was 70. I've got an outside shot at getting to 80 fishing buddies this year and, yes, getting there would mean more to me than winning the Bonanza. The hammer would be cool. The money would be cool. But getting a bunch of different people out on the boat, catching fish, eating BoatMeals™, ducking Jeeps and becoming part of all this Pull Hard nonsense? That's the good stuff. So... Kelly Ross, I've got my eye on you, dude!

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