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That's great news! What port or ports were best?

By the way, thanks for the information!

Thanks for the info

When did the kings start showing up off shore?

Kings are going to always be around as long as conditions are right. Every year about this time til they stage at the pierheads I'll run an all king spread for 1 or 2 mature kings every other trip out. Looking in 70 to 100 fow for cold water (fishhawks are valuable for this) as close to shore as I can find it.

StormJunkie wrote:

Tmik34 wrote:

I could be wrong, maybe Ben could chime in to clarify.

It's confusing with the rotation of ports but I do know we caught 3 year olds at the port last year so my best guess is MC.  Ben would know.

 

It's hard to keep straight - I have to look it up myself usually to be sure


Trail Creek got kings in 2017,  2019, 2020, 2021, 2022

Little Cal got kings in 2018, 2020, 2021, 2022

East Chicago got kings in 2020, 2021, 2022


2017 and 2018 yearclasses are 99.5% dead by now and the oldest fish returning in meaningful numbers will be from the 2019 yearclass. So this year the only place with 3 year olds returning will be Trail Creek/Michigan City.  Everywhere else will have 1s and 2s.  Next year every port should have all 3 yearclasses returning. 

Given the anecdotal reports of lots of shakers up north this year, and decent amount of 1 year olds last year, I would bet that survival the last 2 years has been much better than recent history and if the weather and lake conditions cooperates in August/September (a big if!) there'll be decent fishing this fall at all ports. 


 

Great information! Thank you

Thank you for your information! I haven't fished fall kings since the mid to late 90s. I've been thinking about pulling the boat up to Manistee or Frankfort but I thought I remembered reading about people having good success last year from this group so definitely going to stay and fish our end of the lake!

Ben, I’ve been curious about how you guys age the fish. Does the count start at conception or after the fish is hatched? Is a 3yr old spawned in the Fall of 19, stocked in the spring of 20, and returning this fall? From my experience over this period of revolving stocking sites it seems like the most fish are coming back to the site stocked 2 years prior. Looking forward to having all sites consistently stocked again even if it is lower numbers per site. 

Thanks for the breakdown Ben,

Number of Cohos returning should be the same as they have been correct? No major decrease in stocking has happened to them?

southshore wrote:

Ben, I’ve been curious about how you guys age the fish. Does the count start at conception or after the fish is hatched? Is a 3yr old spawned in the Fall of 19, stocked in the spring of 20, and returning this fall? From my experience over this period of revolving stocking sites it seems like the most fish are coming back to the site stocked 2 years prior. Looking forward to having all sites consistently stocked again even if it is lower numbers per site. 

It starts after the fish is hatched, which is why i think there's often a year disconnect between anglers and biologists when talking about age. Same thing as humans. Start counting from the birthday. Eggs laid in the fall spawn of 2019 would hatch out and swim up in early 2020. And would be called the 2020 yearclass. They'd be 2 years old this fall when returning. 

A decent chunk of the fish do return as 2 year olds, and it's challenging to evaluate return when yearclass strength is variable in addition to stocking site rotation. Having annual stockings really helps even out things and get more consistently viable fisheries