After our second mild winter in a row, we end up with a cold and wet spring, strange weather for sure. Let’s hope this summer is an improvement. We saw really good numbers of keeper sized lake trout over 23” all spring and this should continue through the summer, the population is doing well. The trout will shift out of their shallow water haunts of springtime when the water warms into the 60s. That may take a while this year, so some lakers could remain shallower into June, especially if the smelt are there. Early in the month with the deep water still pretty cold slower presentations will catch more fish; this is one time of the year I will run christmas tree rigs with a small to medium lure that has good action at slow speeds. As the water temps increase I will switch to spoons and speed up a bit: Suttons and the similar Plazma spoons from Fish307, Mooselooks, Speedy Shiners, etc. work good in LG. The old standby color was the OBD, orange/black dot, but these are no longer made, not to worry many other color patterns will work under the right conditions.
We spent very little time fishing landlocks this spring, last year they picked up for us in late June when we finally found them; the previous year’s hot spot was void of fish. Will have to see what happens this year, did see some nice salmon caught in May, including an awesome 26” male with a big kype caught by my buddy Ray casting from shore. The key with them is temperature, find the thermocline and follow it as it goes deeper. The temperature rule is one that salmon will often break to feed, so you can catch them deeper or shallower especially on June when surface temps are still in the 60s. Bass season opens on June 17 this year, they can be fished for prior to that date with artificial lures and C&R only. They should still be on the beds early this month and can be caught pretty shallow, 10-20’. The Keitech swim baits and Yamamoto Senkos are popular, and shiner’s will work good after the season opens. Big shiners can produce some real nice largemouths and smaller ones will work too, plus the smallies like them early in the season.