Lake Erie fishing report for the week of April 12, 2015.: , ,
Fishing Report Posted: April 12, 2015

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Posted by Capt. Walt Ermansons on April 12, 2015 at 18:31:14:

A perfectly lousy work week! Wow did we ever have some real crap for weather this past Monday through Friday. We had dense fogs, torrential rains, severe thunder storms, tornado warnings, and oh yeah... on Friday we even had gale warnings with winds in excess of 40 knots at times! To say that most people's trips was a wash out is a understatement. I cancelled everything I had myself except for Thursday where we tried to make something out of nothing. In between weather fronts that were stacked back to back across half of the eastern United States, we stuck our noses out in a chilly, rainy and rough lake. After making a long run to where I thought we would find cleaner water, our window of weather closed rapidly on us and we were sent scurrying for safe harbor. Not good.

But for as lousy as the weather was during the week, we were handed one of the more delightful weekends that we have had yet this year. And a almost dead flat lake! It was truly a joy to be out there! The week's weather however took it's toll on the spawning fish making them skittish and not all that eager to hit for most. Surprisingly, water clarity was not really a issue. Just slow pickings. Some did better than others and there certainly were limits caught by some but it was far from a bonsai for most as it should be this time of year. Aboard “The Trophy”, we fell into the category of the slow camp only capturing 19 Walleyes for my same group that fished with me both of the days. It was not for lack of trying though. I logged a lot of miles trying all of my favorite reefs and beaches. And the group fished very hard. It was just slow for us. I don’t ever sugar coat anything. But better days are coming!

I did manage to jig up myself my second biggie of this spring season this weekend. Another 10 pound plus beauty with this one going 10 lb.. 9 oz! I would have much rather seen someone else on the boat catch it but again I don’t write the script and we take it as it comes. It sure did perk everybody up though! The second it hit I knew it was a very big fish. On the very light tackle that we use, it was a lot of fun to play out. That particular fish hit a 3/4 oz. John Deere Green hair jig. We were in 14 ft. of water just east of the Nuke Tower. One of my many, many stops that I made this weekend. Everywhere we went we caught a few. We just could not get a real program going ourselves. But boy if every boat out there this weekend caught just even one fish, there was still a incredible slaughter that took place! With the glassy smooth lake, I don’t think I've ever seen more boats out here! The packs were insane! And that in itself did not help us. I felt like I was fishing in a freeway every where we fished as un courteous boaters would blast past us one after another just feet away and wide open many times. I just have to shake my head.

So unlike last weekend where I was very uneasy with the coming week's weather, this next week here to come looks to extend this past weekend's great weather. I see many days in the coming forecast with waves predicted at only 1 to two feet or even less. And air temperatures do I dare say maybe even in the 70’s? We’ll see but I am very cautiously optimistic. Water temps in the early morning on Saturday were just a hair under 40 degrees and by late afternoon on Sunday I was recording 43 degrees already. Wow! I think if these fish are going to go crazy, this will probably be the week! 45 degrees has always seemed to be a magical threshold around here in the western basin for these shallow water fish. Warmer water, not too dirty, and not too rough... It should be good! Did I mention “should”? lol! Nothing surprises me anymore. We’ll just have to see how it all really plays out. Check back next week!


Capt. Walt





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