Captain Bill Winowiecki of Watta Bite Charters reports from Glen Arbor:

Fishing out of Glen Arbor has been good. Early morning near shore has produced some nice King staging to run up the Crystal and Platte rivers. We boated a 14 pound master angler Coho last week. Some Kings are quite large. A 27 pound fish was caught in our little Glen Arbor Tournament on Sunday. J-Plugs and wonder bread spoons are working well.

Off shore fishing around the Manitou’s we are catching a mixed bag of 2, 3 and 4 year class fish. The salmon are scattered, with all the wind changes. Keep working the banks and out in the 300 foot of water until you hit fish. Then start working that area. These fish want to be spoon fed. Various colors are working depending on cloud cover, and water conditions. Usually when you hit a pod of fish, they’ll hit anything. Be very aware of North winds, in Glen Arbor. We had a little tournament over the weekend, the wind, shifted North-west fast and hard. We had a very bad situation at the ramp.

The Traverse Bays have good fishing for kings. Fishing pressure is heavy, but the Salmon are large. Both bays are producing nice Kings and Lake Trout.

Captain Gary Schaefer of Trout Scout Charters reports from Manistee:
CURRENT NEWS: The Big Ones are here. The annual migration of the Big Kings, are starting to stage off of Manistee as you read this. Fishing has been good and close to shore with big fish showing up every day now.. We have some new photos on the fishing report page and the photo’s page of our website. www.troutscout.com Call 1-877-731-4460

BREAKING NEWS: Our tournament fishing has been on a good track with two 1st place finishes a 2nd place and a 3rd place finish. We have a some select open dates left for August. Follow us on Facebook and Twitter to stay current with the fishing or you check out the fishing report from the website. www.troutscout.com

FUTURE NEWS: We are currently booking trips for September on the lake and river. When the Big Kings move into the river it’s a awesome experiance that everyone should try. Don’t wait to book your charter for the rest of summer as dates are filling up fast.

Capt Craig Kent From Killin Time Charters reports from Manistee:

A break showed up offshore a couple days ago and we were finally able to get out to it. The 35-37 line west held the temp break straight out and fishing was good for a mixed bag of Steelies, Kings and Lakers. These fish came primarily on 2, 3 and 5 color leadcore with free sliders and slide divers taking a coule of fish also. Best baits were regular sized Stingers in jawbreaker, mixed veggies, double orange crush gold blade and NBK. Bump your speed up to 3 or 3.5 for best results.

Capt Craig Kent From Killin Time Charters reports from Manistee:

Fishing is very good right now with mid sized Kings coming in big numbers. Fishing has been best in 80-150 feet of water straight out of the harbor and south. Fish the last couple days came on riggers between 35 and 65 down and leadcore from 5-10 colors plus divers out 100 or more. Our best baits have been Stinger Nitro Area 51 and Carmel Dolphin.

Captain Bill Winowiecki of Watta Bite Charters reports from Glen Arbor:

The summer fishing season is gearing up in Glen Arbor.  The water is still very  cold ,  41 degree surface temperature was common over the Memorial Day weekend.

The Lake Trout fishing is very good.  Trolling very slow over 30-60  foot of water seem to be [...]

Captain Bill Winowiecki of Watta Bite Charters reports from Glen Arbor:

A little review of last year brought some good fishing to Glen Arbor.

The early Lake Trout season was good, lots of fish. The King’s started slow, but when they showed up it was the best fishing in the State of Michigan, South Manitou was on fire. Salmon fishing was great until the third week of August and the wind started to blow and blow very hard. It churned Lake Michigan up like a blender. The fall fishing was a wash all the way down the west coast. It killed charter fishing from Chicago to Mackinaw. What this means is that there are a lot of fish still out there waiting to be caught.

I’ve attended many meetings on the fishery over the winter. As many of you know I’m on the Lake Michigan Fishery Advisory Committee, I’m on the Michigan Charter Boat Association Board of Directors, and an active Member of the Grand Traverse Area Sports Fishing Association. My main goal was to get the Lake Trout size limits changed along with all these organizations we’ve finally achieved that goal. We can keep big Lake Trout this year!!!!!! This will make our spring fishery excellent. No more dragging these big fish in, to throw back to die.

I’ve spoken with many Captains down the West Coast of Lake Michigan they were very envious of the Salmon fishing we had on South Manitou. The big King’s showed up around the second week of July and stayed there until late August. It was sure a lot of fun. Every year the fish return to the Manitou Islands with the fall fishing so poor due to the winds, fishing should be real good this year.

Let’s go fishing!!
It will be another fun season.
Captain Bill