Ludington Fishing Report: Big Fish Brad, Where Are You?
We need to get a few housekeeping items out of the way first.
Hot tip from Nurse Chris…and he's a multi-time fishing champion, so we'd all be foolish not to pay attention here. Apparently every serious fishing boat should have Nature Valley Biscuits onboard. I'm still working through the exact details of the program, but they need to be Cinnamon Almond Butter flavor and his picture showed a 5-pouch box. They also make 10-pouch boxes, which raises all sorts of questions. Is more always better? Does the mojo get diluted? Wait, is this only good for walleye? Nobody knows. What I do know is that Pull Hard will be carrying two boxes of Nature Valley Cinnamon Almond Butter Biscuits moving forward and I will report my findings.
Speaking of Nurse Chris and his biscuit wisdom, it reminded me that I'm still searching for the legendary Ludington Fighting Coin (pictured). I first introduced this mission to my readers on New Year's Day when, apparently, nobody read the report. Now that we're up to somewhere between three and five readers, perhaps one of you knows where I can find one. I will pay top dollar. Or possibly trade a couple boxes of Nature Valley Biscuits. Negotiations are open.
Now for the haps...
It was a whirlwind week back in the real world. Work work was busy. UWGB decided I needed a double assignment week and I somehow got everything knocked out by Thursday. Can't have homework hanging over my head when I need to focus 100% of my brain power on salmon.
Then the crew situation started changing…First I found out my daughter Delaney and Euge were coming up. Cool. Then I found out they weren't. Unfortunately I had already built both morning crews assuming they were coming, so now we're back to doing what fishermen do best...Making stuff up as we go.
Friday was spent helping Surgeon Jenn get ready for daughter Claire's graduation party. I also smoked a batch of boneless skinless salmon bites for the party and, not to brag, but they were excellent – at least the one piece I samples. Left Muskegon around 4:25pm and met Logan at the boat at 5:30pm – got the opening lineup ready!
Got to Harbor View at 6pm for the Ludington Charter Boat Association meeting. I’ve been paying $30 a year for several years now, basically as long as I knew it was a thing. This was only my second meeting, with the first being this same meeting last year. What a great group of guys looking to do good for the community, for the charter fleet and for fishermen in general.
I did drift off for about 90 seconds and fantasized about that old Mean Joe Greene Coke commercial, where he throws the Steelers jersey to the kid. Only in my version, George flips me a legendary Ludington Fighting Coin. Not saying it’s going to happen. Just saying I’m emotionally available if it does.
Our crew today, me, Logan, Charlie Daniels, Kaedin, Cherry Pie Glenn and – freshly rested, Big Fish Brad. Yep, you heard right – BIG FISH BRAD. This is the guy that can stare at the exact rod that's about to fire, always stays cool and steady on the rod, and only, and I mean ONLY, reels in four-year-old fish. He prefers male salmon and somehow has the smoothest, healthiest skin in Ludington.
Apparently the north boats didn’t do a whole lot yesterday, at least by our new standards. We don’t have a bunch of time to move around so it was important we throttle down directly over a pod of feeding hammers – so south we went – to the exact same spot as Sunday – just south of the project tribal nets in 85 FOW and went on a south west troll. The water looked fishy. The crew looked fishy. Now all we needed was for the fish to cooperate.
Wow…All that hype about Big Fish Brad and he no-showed. The guy is in high demand. He also has a tendency to get lost around marinas. Maybe tomorrow?
A huge storm rolled through overnight, but by 5:05am we were heading south. We set lines in 85 FOW exactly as planned. What wasn't part of the plan was the wind and waves. WTF? I was crabbing like a moe foe and could barely keep the boat going straight unless we were heading west. We worked our way out to 152 FOW, turned around and basically stayed in the same stretch of water all morning.
The bite wasn't on fire, but we managed to scratch out a few. We ended up keeping 10 salmon. Two nice hogs and a bunch of minis. We threw three minis back.
Final tally was 13 fish on 17 bites. Not exactly the new normal pace, but not exactly a skunking either.
Hot Bites:
Warrior Standard Blue Dolphin on a slider 75 down – 3 bites
Dreamweaver 8" Blue Bubble Spindoctor / Dreamweaver Blue Bubble Fly on a high diver 125 back – 2 bites
Warrior Standard Coyote on the out-down rigger 75 down – 2 bites
Moonshine Mini Green Slice (non-glow) on the out-down rigger 84 down – 2 bites
Michigan Stinger Magnum Modified Yellow Dolphin on copper – 1 bite
Bechold 8" Heck Froggy / KRW Sweet Pea Fly on a low diver 100 back – 1 bite
Bechold 11" Kevin's Girlfriend / Dreamweaver Pickled Sunshine Fly on the chute rigger 120 down – 1 bite
Special Secret 8" Prototype / Howie Bank Frog Fly on a high diver 300 back – 1 bite
Michigan Stinger Magnum Blue Mixed Veggie on 10 colors – 1 bite
Michigan Stinger Standard Modified Coyote on 7 colors – 1 bite
Dreamweaver 8" Chrome Spindoctor on a low diver 220 back – 1 bite
What I Learned Today:
BFB is a mystery man. Gets everybody excited, gets his own introduction in the blog, then makes you wait another day. I can practically see him winking at me right now.
No warm fuzzy feeling yet on Nurse Chris' Nature Valley Cinnamon Almond Butter Biscuits. We had way too much food mojo going on to conduct a proper scientific study. BoatMeal™, Wendy's cherry pie, Kaedin's six donuts and Nature Valley Cinnamon Almond Butter Biscuits during a four-hour dock-to-dock troll? That's way too many variables. We're going to need additional testing.
Now it's back to Muskegon for a graduation party and to deliver Surgeon Jenn a slice of Wendy's cherry pie. Then I'll be back in Ludington this afternoon to meet Logan at the boat and work on tomorrow's lineup.
Current crew is me, Logan, Alison, Nick and BFB. Maybe. Stay tuned.
Continue Exploring with Pull Hard Fishing
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400 W. Filer St., C1, Ludington, MI 49431 | Phone: 248-534-9202 | PullHardFishing@outlook.com
