Got a call from Doug Esch and he invited me out to a lake north of Chelsea, said he has been doing very well on it. Fished with Doug, his cousin Ted and his friend Lou. Temp this morning was in the lower 40s and when we quit fishing at 10:00 AM it was in the upper 40s with lots of sunshine and no wind, another great day on the ice.
Doug likes to start early and we did, he calls it O Dark Thirty. We were on the ice and fishing at 6:45 this morning, over an hour before sunrise! Picked up a crappie after 15 minutes fishing and then as the horizon started to get some light the gills started to bite. That bite lasted for less than a hour and things started to slow down. We did some hole hopping and that seemed to help quite a bit as we would pick up an occasional fish. I was using wax worms and those guys were using mousies. We kept 52 gills between 7 1/4 and 8 1/2 inches and one crappie 10 inches.
I took some pictures of the guys fishing on the ice today but when I got home I noticed that there was no memory card in the camera, my mistake. I wanted to post a photo, so when I got home, I took a picture of some of the fish we caught. Lou had a rough time catching fish today so Ted and I gave him some fish to have for dinner tonight. The ice is 10 inches thick and the shore ice is still good. Those guys should have 3 or 4 days of excellent fishing yet.
2 comments:
Doug, got the message from John. I sent an e-mail to my Buddy up there to get you more information. I will pass it on once I get it. As for the length of the boat ride to the fishing spots 7 miles. 2 1/2 in Portage Lake, 1/2 mile between the peir (slowest part) and then 4 mile about to each spot one NW and the other due W.
Gary
Doug
I got the scoop on the Marinia's around Onekama. There are 3 in Portage Lake all owned by the same guy. Slip are available but they go fast. The phone number for the Onekama Marinia is (231) 889-5000. The other spot he suggested was in Arcadia it is a State run Marinia there off season Phone number is (231)889-4463. As for cleaning stations he knows that Onekama Marine has a really nice one. (that is where he charters out of)as for the Arcadia marina, he has not used theres to be able to tell you how good it is. As far as fish storage goes, most of the hotels around there work with there guests for some type of storage, be it ice or freezer space.
I know the hotel we stayed at had unlimited ice and offered up there freezer to store of fish in along with a place to clean our.
Travel to the fishing holes from either marinia is a toss up. Arcadia is the same distance to the north side of the Barrel as the pier heads coming out of Portage Lake are to the south side. With the advantage going Arcadia since you don't have to cross the portage. The Shelf is 4 mile w to the north end of it as well. Any questions feel free to contact me.
Gary
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