Fishing the Detroit River

Today on the ol' Patio Boat blog we take a photoblogging fishing trip on the Detroit River with your humble correspondent; Malcolm and Henry Paret from Paris, France; and our captain, internationally renowned walleye master Dean Cushman.

We launch from Wyandott. Malcolm demonstrates the size of the fish we expect to catch.

Henry gets ready to cast.

Dean keeps a cool head and his rod in the water, despite the giant barge passing by.

Malcolm still has high hopes.

Dean shows of our first catch of the day, an enormous goby.

Henry and Malcolm keep on fishin' as we head downstream towards Grosse Ile.

Success! Malcolm lands a nice walleye.

Slightly less success! Malcolm lands a freshwater drum called a sheephead. They aren't edible, so we tossed it back.

That's not a sheephead. This is a sheephead!

Even Dean got in on the sheephead action.

With two walleye in the live well we decided to leave the sheephead behind and head upstream to Detroit.

The captain and crew were optimistic that we'd catch some cool industrial views.  Of course, they were once optimistic we'd catch more than two walleye.

US Steel Mill.

The old Boblo Boats awaiting restoration. They were used for decades to ferry people to the Boblo Island amusement park. The park closed in 1993.

A freighter gets loaded from a Canadian grain elevator.

Zug Island and the Ford Rouge steel mill.

Still upstream: the Ambassador Bridge and Detroit.

Henry and Malcolm enjoying the ride, which did move along a bit faster than the average Patio Boat ride.

The Ford Rouge steel mill.

Molten steel!

Henry and Malcolm enjoying the industrial ambiance.

The Ambassador Bridge.

The old ferry terminal.

We get closer to Detroit.

Cobo Hall and the Renaissance Center.

Windsor.

Captain Dean, still at the wheel!

The Detroit Princess Riverboat.

The Renaissance Center.

Urban blight on the river.

Chene Park, the Belle Isle Bridge, and Belle Isle.

The Hiram Walker distillery in Windsor.

The Belle Isle Bridge. This was as far north as we could go because of the Gold Cup hydroplane races on the other side of the bridge. Captain Dean was willing to push the throttle of his fishing boat to full speed, but it still wasn't enough to compete with the 200 mph boats beyond.

We turned around and headed back downriver.

Goodbye Ambassador Bridge.

Goodbye ferry terminal.

Goodbye Zug Island cranes.

Goodbye abandoned cars dredged out of the river.

We stopped at another US Steel mill and tried again to up the walleye score. Sadly, the walleye weren't hanging offshore the 80" hot strip mill.

Finally, back at the launch.  Malcolm proudly shows off his fine walleye while Henry -- for reasons unknown -- attempts to strangle the other walleye we caught. Despite the inexplicable strangulation of one of our fish, we're happy to report that after our most excellent cruise of the Detroit River, a very tasty walleye fish-fry was enjoyed by all.

Thanks, Dean, for a great day of fishing and a great day on the river!

A goal for 2011? Maybe not.

I just wanted to pass along a fish photo to our international fishermen, the famed Pontoon Pirates. You won't find this freshwater fish in the Seine, but you will find it in the Fraser River in British Columbia. It supposedly weighed more than 1,000 lbs (450+ kg) and measured 11'1" (3.38 meters) long and 56" (1.42 m) in girth (around the middle):



The momentarily exciting thing about it was that it came to me via an Internet hoax that claimed it was from a little lake only about an hour's drive from Wolverine Lake. Believe me, we would've tried to catch it had that turned out to be true!

So, if there aren't any 11-foot sturgeon in Michigan, what is the biggest sturgeon hereabouts? The Michigan record for a lake sturgeon was set in 1974 by a fish that measured in at 187 pounds (85 kg) and 87" long (2.21 meters) in Mullett Lake, which is about a four-hour drive north of Wolverine Lake.

Sorry, no photos of that one!

Fishin' Fotos

Just wanted to post a few photos of some recent fishing hereabouts, for the pleasure of our overseas fishing contingent.


The first is just a photo of Monique and I in the midst of the judging at this year's Wolverine Lake fishing tournament. I'm sure our crew of junior French fishermen would have been very competitive had they not been shipped back to Paris before the tourney.

This was a nice walleye caught be a very non-junior competitor. I had mentioned it in a previous post, and Michelle said that Malcolm wanted to see it for himself.

The grand champion of the fishin' fotos, however, is this picture of our neighbor Dean with a salmon that he caught on Lake Michigan last week. I suspect that when it comes to catching the really big fish, it may be that future French fishermen should consult Dean!