Blue Hen Outdoors Podcast
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Blue Hen Outdoors Podcast
Episode 73: At Dawn Guide Service
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This episode we talk with Riley Smith of At Dawn Guide Service about some fishing on the Great Lakes as well as how spear fishing is growing there as well, how they started to guide for dive/spearo trips, as well as all the incredible diving opportunities in the Great Lakes with wrecks.
Check them out for your next Great Lakes adventure
@at_dawn_guide_service
Welcome back to another episode of Lu Hen Outdoors Podcast. I'm here with Mr. Riley Smith of at Dog Guide Service up in the Great Lakes in the Michigan area. How are you doing tonight, sir?
SPEAKER_01I'm doing great. We've uh we've had a pretty good season so far, and it's it's just starting to heat up.
SPEAKER_00Oh yeah, for sure, for sure, especially with the weather getting better. I assume it's only gonna get better as the weather gets better.
SPEAKER_01Absolutely.
SPEAKER_00So how'd you guys start as a runner real service?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, uh first. Long story short, I've uh I've gone through a couple new boats. We had some problems. Uh I bought a couple uh I had a brand new lawn I had, and I had nothing but problems, so it really hindered our ability to really start. Um, I've just finally gotten a smoker craft, absolutely no problems. I'm really like really appreciate that. Um, so we I live right on the Saginaw Bay. That is the spot to catch walleye. You can go out there, uh the limit's eight, the rest of the state's five. Uh, so there's just an obscene amount of walleye in that system. You can go out there and catch your eight, you can get a five-man limit in an hour if you know what you're doing. So yeah, it's uh it's a great fishery. Um, I've been going out a lot. I uh work as a nurse, so I only got three days of work for a week, and I got four days off, so I go out there, and uh what really started it. Um I've been going out taking people out, and uh in Michigan you can only charge for gas money. Um, you know, and that's not a bad deal or anything, but uh there's definitely an opportunity to at least pay the boat off too while you're doing it. So that's uh that's really where we started. Um, and then we found ourselves here.
SPEAKER_00Oh, yeah, for sure. Do you guys just die for uh walleye up there as far as the Ron Reel, or do you guys do lake trout and other species on the lake?
SPEAKER_01I uh I I do it all. Um walleye, lake trout, salmon, um, do a couple jig and salmon trips. Uh what really sets us apart is we don't have one single home port. Uh we trailer the boat everywhere we go. So we'll go up to UP for a week, we'll be down in Port Huron for a week, we'll be all over the state. Uh where most charters are only out of one port, maybe two or three at most, depending on the years. Uh, so we're just so mobile. And uh whatever, whatever kind of what we're fancying that week, or whatever's biting hot, that's where we're gonna be.
SPEAKER_00Oh, yeah, for sure. Now I don't know about as far as where you guys are particularly, but I've fished on Lake Erie a couple times for lake trout, walleye, all that fun stuff before. Is the bite kind of seasonal as like the seasons change? Like there, like like in Lake Erie, or is it kind of like steadily like through the year?
SPEAKER_01It's uh it's steadily through the year if you're okay to travel. Um, so like early spring, like here on on the southern end. Uh the coho bites really strong early April. That kind of goes on. Um, right now in May, the lake trout are really, really picking off. You can go up there and you can get a five-man limit very quickly on lake trout, too. Uh, the salmon will start picking up uh over on the west side, Lake Michigan. They're starting to get them pretty hot and heavy. We got a trip uh planned for Saturday. So hopefully we can get some uh salmon on the boat and shoot some lake trout with the guns.
SPEAKER_00Oh, yeah, for sure.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, as uh as the water heats up and you get into August, uh the salmon fishing just gets hotter and heavier uh as they start pushing back into tributaries where they're spawning. Um walleye on the stag of the bait. I mean, you go out there year round. Some months are better than others, but you know where you're going, you can get your limit.
SPEAKER_00Oh, yeah, for sure. Do you guys now I kind of call them outriggers because I'm more kind of like of a saltwater guy being from the coast? Do you guys run the outriggers for walleye when you run a reel, or do you guys just run uh we have snaggers off the back?
SPEAKER_01I'll actually just show you because I got some sitting right here. We run uh planner boards, they're inline planner boards, so they clip to your line, yeah. Um, so we'll run oh, depending on what we're feeling like, you can run five of them on the side of a boat pretty easily.
SPEAKER_00Okay, nice uh that's what I was thinking of the planner boards.
SPEAKER_01Yep. Uh state of Michigan, you're allowed three rods per person, so you get five guys on your boat, you can throw out 15 rods, and it's it's pretty fun.
SPEAKER_00Oh, yeah, for sure. Especially if you catch a hot walleye bite, you catch the school right or catch catch them in the right area, you'll be hitting them left and right.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. And you're just trying to fight not to get all tangled up.
SPEAKER_00Right, right, right. Well, you kind of mentioned it. You how did you guys get started in the spear uh fish carters up there? And I think, as far as I know, and probably for most people, that's you think spear fishing on the Great Lakes.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, uh spear fishing on the Great Lakes, actually in the state of Michigan, been around for I'm gonna say for a long time. You used to be able to do scuba, you used to be able to do it at night. Uh, there really wasn't any limitations on really anything. Uh the species were limited though, so uh you weren't able to do the walleye, lake trout, pike, uh, but you can do other fish, carp, suckers, drum, furbit, whitefish, cisco. Um, so I scuba certified, I scuba dived, and I was like, man, it's a lot of fun in the water. What else can I do while I'm scuba diving? And I kind of looked into the spear fishing. Uh that winter when I got all the spear fishing stuff to do it, uh, they changed the laws, so now you can do the walleye lake trout and pipe, but no scope scuba gear. So then I had to learn how to free dive, and uh, that's how I met uh my buddy John Durka. I went out on Facebook and I'm like, all right, I'm going out. Who wants to go? He it was like a Tuesday. He took the day off of work, he was like, I'm game, let me hop in your boat. We went up. Um, I about died. I'm not gonna lie. Like, I grew up in the Great Lakes, I grew up in the water, I know how to swim. I got in that water and I about died. The water temp was like 42 degrees. I had no idea what was I was really getting into. It was horrendous experience. Uh, we didn't even see a walleye. Cold, nasty, horrible day. But one again, saw some fish. He was able to get a lot of fish, and I was like, man, this is this is a new thing right here. This is a lot more fun, a lot of underwater structure. We have a lot of shipwrecks to check out, and then it uh just kind of evolved into that. Um, we're pretty big, and uh so John Durka is the president of Michigan Spear Fishing Association, and I'm the vice president. So uh we've been really big on regulation pushes, he's done a phenomenal job. Um, I I cannot stress like how much he's done for the community. Uh, but we have tournaments, we're having our fifth uh annual tournament up to Alpina, uh end of June here, June. I want to say 27th. So uh the last couple years, as far as like charter businesses go, uh, we were at a trial phase for the wall I like trout and pike. Um, so I was kind of building up into it. We're taking a lot of new people out, trying to get a lot of people in the sport, a lot of interest to really showcase what Michigan has to offer. And uh this year we're finally uh we're ready to start taking more people out and actually doing it for real. And honest to God, it's been going great. Every trip we've had is I I really want to say it's been absolutely phenomenal.
SPEAKER_00That's awesome, man. How has the regulations changed? I mean, you kind of mentioned that a little bit. Um a big part of that. Was it kind of like open while wild west source, so to speak, with like uh limits and stuff like that, or was it kind of just like they were more strict, but now they're getting a little more liberal with it?
SPEAKER_01It was uh I I I hate to say the wild west, uh, before before you do the lake child pike and uh walleye, it was uh, I mean, whatever you want to do, you get on scuba gear and you can do it in the middle of the night. Uh, a lot of those fish that you are able to take, like the carp, don't have a limit. Um, so you just go out there and just if if you wanted to shoot 500 carp in a night, and that's that's your motto, you can do that. You can still do it now, but you can't do it at night uh for the underwater spear fishing. Um, there's limits on the burbit now. There's five, that's a different story. That's not really related to the underwater spear fishing. Uh the Dinar don't have a great idea of the Burbit population, so they've kind of just put a limit on them just to make sure we don't get too aggressive, uh, rotten reel angling and underwater spear fishing. The white fish uh populations are kind of collapsing in the state. The zebra mussels and more specifically the quagga mussels have cleaned up the waters, um, which is cool for us because the clarity is just uh some spots in that clarity. Um, I think I lost you.
SPEAKER_00I don't know what there we go. So technical difficulties it happens sometimes, but no, I was just saying we launched that when you were saying um it was kind of like the wild, wild west, and you were saying that if you wanted to go shoot like 500 carp in a night, you could, and then you cut out after that.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so the carp, um, you can still do that. The carp are technically invasive. Uh, they've been here for a long time. So, I mean, uh, technically, if you really want to get crazy, salmon are invasive too, but the DNR planted them, but they're still the salmon are held higher socially, so you know, whatever on that. But the Bourbot, uh, that they got a five limit on those. The white fish, they put a limit on um the zebra mussels and the quagga mussels that came into the Great Lakes, uh, which it works in our favor. Uh, the mussels really help with the clarity. Um, some of the spots we go will have 70 foot of visibility, it's almost like the Bahamas. Um, but what that does is that takes a lot of the phytoplankton out of the ecosystem, and that's what a lot of those small whitefish eat when they're fry, so they're having a really hard time keeping a population. Uh, you can say commercial fishing has also not helped at all. Um, but that's uh we could beat a dead horse with that. But now that it's uh we we had uh mandatory reporting for the last three, four, four years now. Um, so we have really good data sets on how many people are going, how many fish are getting taken. Something like uh 400 walleye a year are taken with underwater spear fishing in the whole state. Uh just out of the sagina bay alone. Out of the saga bay alone, I want to say the rod and reel anglers are taking right around two, three million walleye. So, I mean, that's a wow, not even a drop in a bucket.
SPEAKER_00Right. Do you guys have any uh size limits when it comes to like the quote unquote trophy fish like walleye and lake trout and salmon?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so we don't have like a slot limit where with a maximum size, uh our minimum size limits of the walleye are 15 inches, unless you're in the Saginaw Bay where it's 13. Uh lake trout kind of varies throughout the state. Uh most of the time it's 15 inches. Uh we can't shoot salmon, but rod and reel, uh 10 inches or bigger, you can keep the salmon on the Great Lakes.
SPEAKER_00Oh, so you can shoot salmon. Yeah, do you guys think that that'll change?
SPEAKER_01Um, we're hopeful. We'll see. Uh hopefully everything goes good, and everybody uh really likes spear fishing. We had uh, you know, there's quite a bit of pushback. There's a lot of people, um, for whatever reason, you know, they don't like it, they don't like people in the water. Um, they're afraid that we're gonna crowd up spots where they like to fish, which you know, that's that's their that's their opinion, they're entitled to it. Um, salmon technically we can spear salmons, you know, lake trout are salmon, whitefish are salmones, um, but like your kings, your cohole with stuff like that, not yet.
SPEAKER_00Okay. Now you mentioned that with evasive muscles that you guys have up there, it makes the water clarity better. I would have thought that it was kind of like not like like where I'm at. I mean, I mean, not as bad, but um it wouldn't be as spots.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so the the biggest challenge with visibility for us, uh, we get algae blooms pretty bad, but our our weather, uh the Great Lakes are massive. Weather changes so rapidly. Um, a lot of it, depending where you're at on the Great Lakes, is a sandy bottom. So you get that wind kicking up, and that stirs that bottom up, and you just you can go from having 60-70 foot vis one day, come back out the next morning, and it could be five foot visibility, if not worse. Um, the muscles just kind of take a lot of the the bigger stuff out of the water, like the phytoplankton, and that kind of helps with the algae blooms. Um, but that's a double-edged sword because now all that small fry doesn't have something to eat.
SPEAKER_00Right. Exactly. Now, do you have a specific species you like to go for, whether it be rotter with a spear gun, or do you just like them all?
SPEAKER_01Uh it's uh variety is a spice of life, right? Um, I really like white fish. Uh, they're pretty challenging to get, they're very, very skittish. You get in the water with white fish, uh, most of the time you can't get within 80 feet of them. Um, so actually, today uh we were diving uh port here on, and the surgeon are spawning down there. So I was down 35 foot. We had about 10 foot of visibility. I'm coming down, and here's this six-foot surgeon right next to me, eating on the bottom. I'm staring at it, I'm like, holy cow, that's so cool! And there's a white fish right behind it. So I was able to get that white fish, and that's the first white fish I've shot in like three years in the Great Lakes. So that's if I see a white fish down there, I'm that's that's game on for me. Um, but yeah, like I said, variety spice of life, wherever you want to go, whatever you want to do, the Great Lakes, you can do pretty much year-round. So if you want to go catch salmon tomorrow, we can go get on salmon. You want to go catch walleye, perch? It's uh as long as you're okay with a couple hour drive, uh, Michigan's your oyster.
SPEAKER_00Oh, yeah. Now, how have you guys, and I'll just say the whole freshwater spure community in general changed things for like the Great Lakes or just in general with like the regulations? Like, has there been much of a difference from before?
SPEAKER_01It's uh I'd say the community is definitely growing in the state of Michigan for sure. Um, I didn't even know there was that big of a there wasn't really a spear fishing presence. There was some, um, but I wasn't aware of it. Uh, now that I'm into it and we got the regulations changed, it's uh on a lot of the fish uh Facebook pages, you know, people post something about spear fishing. Um, a lot of interests in here. The best thing about the community is it's pretty tight knit, tight knit community, and a lot of people are willing to take other people out. You know, somebody will be like, hey, going out spear fishing, who wants to come? And people just jump on the boat. So that's super nice. I don't know. Uh I don't know how it is other places, but I I can't believe it's like this. A lot of shops are spot sharing, you know, no one's really afraid to shoot their spots. So that helps.
SPEAKER_00I know, at least from my knowledge, up where I'm at, between like Mass and down to uh Delaware, Southern Virginia. Um people are kind of like, hey, we'll take you out if you want to go out, or like if you know the right people in the community. But I will say there is still some spot guarding on some things, yeah. But it is what it is, you know.
SPEAKER_01Right. I was gonna say with time, I'm sure this will kind of people get a little more tight-lipped, but as of right now, I mean it's it's a great community. Our last tournament we had, um, what do we have 40-some people? I think 12 teams didn't have access to a boat, and uh, we were able to get everybody on a boat in that tournament. Everybody just said, Hey, I got spots in my boat, I'll take them with me. So that was real cool to see.
SPEAKER_00Nice. Now, from being in the freshwater, have you guys gone out and speared in salt water before, or or do you guys have people like do you guys have a many carries? There we go. There we go.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so um we we've done a little bit of salt water. Uh I know, John, the the community here definitely goes down Florida a lot. A lot of people are going out saltwater a lot. I was down in Florida back in October, and then we were in actually uh, I want to say it was New York. Went out of New York there. Um trying to get on some yellowfin too. Now we were like 120 miles off the coast on that continental cliff out there. Yeah, that was a really cool trip. Uh unfortunately we didn't get any yellowfin, we didn't even see them. Um, but we got a lot of Mahi. Uh we got a big eye uh that were trolling for that, and then uh white marlin and a swordfish. So that was that was pretty cool. Um I've been to Florida uh what was it three times now? I've been down there diving. Um it's uh that's salt water, man. You can't drink it. You know, up here you're diving around, the water's pretty clear. You can just take a little sip here and there. You can't do that in salt.
SPEAKER_00No, definitely not. Definitely not. Now, do you guys have like see the Great Lakes as like a bucket list or like a quote unquote? Uh prime saltwater fishery. Not saltwater, I'm sorry, freshwater spearing uh fishery.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Um honest to God, the lake trout are very skittish, they're very hard to hunt. Uh walleye aren't so hard to hunt, uh, but the pike are very elusive. They will bury themselves in the weeds, they'll camouflage them real nicely. Uh, there's a lot more to do here than just shoot fish. Uh, we have a lot of shipwrecks, thousands of shipwrecks to hit. Uh, we have shipwrecks from like the 70s, big steel freighters, four or hundred and some foot long, um, very easily divable, you know, 40-50 foot of water. So there's a lot of cool things to see. Um, but it's it's very different than the salt water experience. Um, I think there's it, I would highly recommend coming and at least doing it once or twice.
SPEAKER_00Oh, yeah, for sure. I definitely want to eventually get up there and go out with you guys and see what the freshwater is all about.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, it's uh it's cold.
SPEAKER_00That don't bother me much. I kind of dive some cold water too, but yeah.
SPEAKER_01But it's uh it's different, it's definitely different, it's definitely definitely unique. If you haven't done uh any sort of freshwater diving, I mean this is the place to do freshwater diving.
SPEAKER_00Oh, yeah, for sure. Well, I got one last question to ask you. It's my favorite question I ask all my first time guests on the show. Absolutely, and it is what is your why that keeps bringing you back for more?
SPEAKER_01Oh man, I don't know if I got the old ADHD or what's going on with me, but I absolutely love adventure. Um, a lot of our trips, we go out and uh we'll sleep in our truck overnight, we'll sleep in hammocks. Um, like we're going up this weekend and we're just pulling the truck on the side of the road, back on some state land, sleeping in the truck, having a little campfire, and going out spear fishing for two, three days, uh, rod and reel fishing. I mean, it's it's so cool. All the places we go. Um, it's almost like uh we're tourists, we're going to new places all the time, experiencing new things, seeing new things. Um, and the the Great Lakes are just so unique. Down south, it's a little more sandy, up north, a little more rocky. You got a lot of bays. Uh, pictured rocks in Munising is absolutely gorgeous. There's underwater caves you can swim into. Um, they're not, you know, you're not gonna die in them, but they're 50 foot long or so. Uh, there's just so much to do. Just very beautiful country.
SPEAKER_00Oh, yeah, for sure, man. Well, thank you for coming on tonight. I appreciate the time and all the information. Uh, I never knew as much as you told me tonight about uh freshwater diving. So thank you for that. And um, I always like to throw out an invite for every round the Delaware, Maryland area. And want to go out diving or go fishing, just hit me up, man. We'll make something happen. And like I said, I'll definitely have to get up there with you guys and have you show me around the freshwater.
SPEAKER_01It's uh you better bring your A game because we're gonna be uh long, long days and short nights.
SPEAKER_00Oh, yeah, for sure, man. I'm I'm down for it. Always down for a good time and uh give me some fish, can't beat it.
SPEAKER_01No, absolutely not. So I really appreciate you having me on today.
SPEAKER_00Oh, yeah, for sure. Do you have any um uh shout-outs or plugs or uh final thoughts before we head off?
SPEAKER_01Hey, if you're looking at Michigan spear fishing, man, you gotta go to Michigan Spear Fishing Association. Uh, I think it's dot com. I don't know. Um, check it out. We have a lot of videos of what Michigan has to offer for spear fishing. Um, you can book charter with me at dawn guide service. Um, but if you're you're all in doing it yourself, there's a lot of cool things to experience.
SPEAKER_00Oh, yeah, for sure. Thank you again, Mr. Riley, for coming on, and thank you all for another episode of the Blue Hen Outdoors Podcast.
SPEAKER_01All right, have a good night.