April 2015: Monthly Recap — Team Trout Mafia

Here we are on the last day of April, and what a month of fishing it was for Team Trout Mafia.

Releasing one of the nearly 100 salmon our team landed this month

We followed the Coho salmon as they worked their way from the furthest point south on Lake Michigan up into Illinois and toward Wisconsin this month as the water steadily warmed from the mid thirties into the mid forties. We generally found the fish high in the water column, and in the warmer pockets of water we found.

As the coho salmon move north and school up, the brown trout have began to spread out. Winter spots that produced massive numbers of fish for us have gone quiet. We have found browns this month near the bottom in waters from Wisconsin to Indiana.

One of many healthy brown trout from this month.

With warming water temperatures on Lake Michigan come great opportunities for Kayak anglers to catch trophy smallmouth bass that flirt with state record status in Illinois and Indiana. We found smallmouth near structure all month long and were able to pick them off in many locations and during many different conditions. Tom landed his personal best smallmouth this month while coho fishing, measuring 1/8" longer than the state record, and weighing in well over 5 pounds. Mike caught a beautiful pre-spawn female just days later that was the highlight of his trip. These fish are pictured below.

We are currently competing in Kayak Wars, a year long kayak tournament in which we took 1st place in the United States freshwater division in 2014. We are currently in the lead world-wide in the freshwater division thanks to big catches of salmon and walleye this month. A link to the Team Trout Mafia page can be found here, go there to check out our catch totals and photographs of every fish we have logged this year.

In the first days of the month Kalvin and Mark were able to make another trip to the Green Bay area in search of spawning walleye. In one night they were able to just about fill the monthly cap on walleye for our team at 50 fish. They landed many trophy fish including this best of the night for Kalvin at 28.5"

Lastly, while searching for browns and coho salmon in Wisconsin, Mark and Kalvin stumbled into a pod of king salmon. The first kings of the year will make any fisherman on the Great Lakes justifiably jealous, here is a look at Mark with one of his nice kings.

Mark with a spring king, right around the 30" mark.

We head into May looking forward to more spring king salmon to be found, coho salmon moving up into Wisconsin waters, Smallmouth bass all along the lakefront, and inland lake seasons opening in the upper mid-west, allowing us to branch out to target Northern Pike, more walleye, bass, and other inland species.