- Hello, everyone.

Welcome to "Michigan Out-of-Doors."

I'm Jenny Ciolek, and we've got a fun show headed your way this week, and it's all about salmon.

Jordan will take us out of the port of Frankfort chasing after salmon on a small boat.

You won't wanna miss that story.

They had a lot of fun out there.

And Jimmy's got some other salmon adventures in store for us this week.

- Well, that's right, Jenny.

We are keeping things all salmon on this week's show.

After we show you some fishing from the Frankfort area, we're gonna drop south to the port of Holland, where they recently had a really cool Fishing with Veterans event.

You won't wanna miss that.

And we're gonna have a good salmon recipe for you on this week's show as well.

Make sure you stay tuned.

I'm Jimmy Gretzinger, and it's time for "Michigan Out-of-Doors."

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(gun firing) (upbeat music) (gentle music) - [Jordan] A couple of weeks ago, I was able to spend an evening in Frankfort with a few friends competing in a local salmon tournament put on by the Northwest Michigan Fishing Club.

After a few days of bad weather, the forecast was about perfect for an evening trip, and I think everyone involved was excited to hit the water.

- We are here in Frankfort at the Public Marina.

And this is our Wednesday nighter.

It's a standard Wednesday nighter.

We do them all summer.

And the game tonight is the biggest five fish you can put in a box and/or the biggest fish.

You can head out at any time, but it's on your honor.

Lines in at 6:00, and you have to be back into the weigh station at 10:30.

So it's a mad scramble at the end.

This boat ramp will be full of boats.

And he who gets there first gets there first.

We've disqualified a lot of guys that are on their way to the weigh station but didn't make it at 10:30.

So that's half the game is getting in on time with a cooler full of fish.

- [Jordan] Frankfort is one of my favorite places in the entire state, and I was thankful to be a part of this particular tournament.

But these guys fish all over, and the club itself is about more than just fishing.

- Yeah, we're the Northwest Michigan Fishing Club.

We range from Mackinaw City all the way down to Manistee.

And I say range because we do avian predator control for the DNR for all the inland lakes, all the rivers, all the shoreline of Lake Michigan.

We basically go out and keep the birds off any fish that they stock.

We did 28 stockings this year.

We didn't miss any.

And yeah, that's kind of our big feather in the cap.

We work with the DNR quite a bit.

We do pen nets for salmon in the Boardman River, and we do a lot of bird's protection, even in Torch Lake and some of the outlying areas.

But yeah, Wednesday nights is a big thing.

We do a lot of kids' events and veterans events, but basically, we just wanna make fishing more fun.

So if you ever reel in a fish, it's fun.

But if you reel in that fish and know that there's competition behind it, oh, now every it's fish counts.

That's what we're after.

Make it more fun.

So we've been doing it all summer.

I think we have 8 events left, and then our capstone event is the veterans event in September in Elk Rapids.

- We're at the Northwest Michigan fishing tournament.

Lines went in at six o'clock.

We didn't get ours in until 6:10 in the water.

And we had a double at 6:15.

And this is fun.

Yep, keep the rod tip up so that way, he can keep it out of the motor.

Cool.

All right, we got one in.

(rod whirs) Mine's tiring out.

Take your time.

I got him.

- Oh, that's a good one.

Yeah.

- [Dave] Mine's trying to go back down.

(rod whirs) Trying, hang on.

There we go.

Got him.

- Nice.

- Landed the double.

- Look at that.

- Doesn't get any better than that to start off a day.

- [Scott] (laughs) We just got out here.

- Wow, that's amazing.

That is amazing.

- Yeah, we're out of Frankfort salmon fishing.

We're a few miles north of the port and running a spread of downriggers and Dipsys and lead core.

We had a pretty good blow last night, and the water temperature's in the upper part of the column, so that actually makes it really good for the short cores and short colors to go out.

So a mix of spoons and some J-Plugs.

This is a time of the year that the J-Plugs really start to shine, the body baits.

And just having a good time.

We got on the water.

Very fortunate we didn't get two lines in the water, had two fish on and got them in the boat.

So we made a turn, circling around, see if we can find some more.

- For tonight, we're basically just gonna try, we're trying to find out where the temperature was, or is, because the fact is we've had some serious blow days the last couple days.

So now, we're trying to find out where they've scattered to.

And what we're doing is kind of out to the point here.

We're gonna go back towards the humps and go in and out between the shallow and deep to find out where they're at.

But right now, we hooked into those first two.

We were in 130 feet of water, and we were probably 30 feet down, and we got both of them, a double.

So now, we just got to reset up.

We're gonna go through that spot again, see if we get more to go, and then we'll go from there.

But right now, we're running a secret weapon with a spoon on it, and we're running a J-Plug on the other side, and that's all we've been able to put in so far.

- It's my first time on the big lake salmon fishing.

I've river fished for them before, but I'll tell you what, I can see him back there.

This is a blast.

- [Jordan] Our trip couldn't have started out much better, with three salmon in the box in the first hour.

August and September provide the unique opportunity to catch salmon closer to shore, allowing for boats of all shapes and sizes to enjoy this fishery.

- That's the great thing about this time of the year, as we start to come into, as the salmon start to move towards the ports where they're gonna get ready to spawn and stage in the rivers.

You don't have to have a monster boat.

You don't have to have a monster lot of gear.

I mean, you can get going three, four rods, a couple downriggers, manual downriggers, a couple lead cores, a couple Dipsys, and come out here in a much smaller boat.

I know tonight, we've got one in the tournament by 16-foot, 17-foot aluminums.

You know, you got to watch the weather.

It is Lake Michigan.

And just know the wind.

But honestly, most days, you can get out.

You can get out on the water and do what everybody else is doing with some of the larger boats that you see a lot of the charters run.

But hey, if you don't have that, a lot of good charter captains out of Frankfort, they're really some of the best, I think, in the whole lake.

And I'm sure that they would appreciate the business as well.

But I actually grew up fishing primarily north of here in Platte Bay.

And I fished until I was in my 20s out of a 14 and 16-foot aluminum boat for coho salmon out of East Platte Bay every August and September.

So yeah, you can definitely get after these fish with a smaller rig and have just as good a time and put them in the boat like everybody else.

- Another one in the box.

We're hitting a little group with smaller fish, but I'm not behind the camera and I'm reeling in fish, so I'm certainly not complaining.

These are perfect eaters.

Beautiful night here in Frankfort.

- [Jordan] We were using a wide variety of tackle on this trip, some of which Jeff helped to build and design.

- My brother-in-law and I kind of looked at some of the designs that were out there.

I mean, obviously this looks just like a J-Plug or any other kind of plug you see on the market.

And we were just basically trying to figure out, due to the expense, what can we do to do something different and have something different to use?

And he's a engineer, and he's got a lot of background in design and building.

And so we spent a couple years really just kind of playing around with sound and trying to match a certain sound and match a certain wiggle.

And we kind of came up with our own fishing lure.

So really, nothing overly different than what's on the market, but it's kinda neat when you can make your own stuff and build it from scratch, including the paint and design and glow.

And I really understand a lot now where you get the guys in the fly fishing where they build their own flies and then they go catch fish with them.

There's really something satisfying about that.

So really appreciative of my brother-in-law, Kevin, working with me.

We kind of came up with this lure, and quite frankly, it's just kind of a side hobby and craft that we do, and I really enjoy it.

- Oh, it's got a nice hit on a Stealth Weapon rig off a downrigger, about 30 feet down.

Sitting out of here at Frankfort, and man, just a beautiful night on the water.

You just can't beat this.

It's sundown, so it's prime time, and we're ready to go.

So got a nice box of fish.

Hopefully, this will be our next one, and probably by the time we get him in the boat, it'll be time to head back to shore.

So it's been a great evening with friends, and I just can't think of a better way to spend a night in the beautiful state of Michigan out of Frankfort catching kings.

Can't beat it.

Got him.

Whoa, he's a big boy.

That's who we're after.

- [Dave] That was a nice fish.

That's a really nice fish.

Wow.

Man, whew.

Thanks, man.

(laughs) Thank you for letting me catch one, guys.

I want you guys to catch them, but that's awesome.

Appreciate it.

- Good catch, thank you.

- No, hey.

Had a lot of fun, man, it's been a lot of fun.

- [Jordan] After a great night on the water, we made our way to the weigh-in to see how everyone else had done.

And as it turns out, most of the boats had caught their limit of five fish, with several 60-plus-pound bags weighed in, proving that you don't have to be a charter captain or have a big boat to make the most of this fishery.

- And we get a lot of pushback on this, but this is one of the club's kinda stanchions, if you will.

We are an everyday working-man club.

It's 20 bucks to enter.

Could take home 500 bucks.

Who knows?

We don't allow first mates or charter captains to play in this event.

Now, the one in August, they will be able to play in.

And the one on the Fourth of July, the Uncle Sam Shootout, where we supported the Benzie Frenzy crew, that one is everybody included.

So this is just one of those ones where let's get the local guys out and the tourists and all the visitors in the area and, you know, keep the battlefield level, if you will.

- [Jordan] It was a great night on the water with even better company.

Thanks to everyone involved for letting me be a small part of it.

And good luck to all of the anglers chasing salmon over the next couple of months.

(bright music) (gentle guitar music) - Well, one really pretty cool trend here in the outdoor world over the last 10, 15 years has been the uptick of veteran fishing events.

There used to be just a couple of them, and now there are tons of them around the state of Michigan.

It's a great way to say thank you to our deserving veterans.

(bright music) - So are on (indistinct).

So you're gonna be just on the other side.

(bright music) (overlapping chatter) - I just want a few miles.

The fish are in close.

The thermocline came up today, so the fish should be a little bit shallower and up higher.

- [Jimmy] And the fishing's been pretty good lately?

- [Corey] It's been a little bit slow, but the big ones are starting to come in, and especially in the mornings, the bite's been really good.

So we'll see if we can get that done today.

- [Jimmy] And have you done this Veterans Fishing thing before?

- This has been, I think, our sixth or seventh year.

Super excited to do it.

It's probably my favorite fishing day of the year, being out with these guys, and it's the least we can do.

And we always have a great crew like we do today, so excited for it.

- [Jimmy] Good deal, and we're out of Holland today.

How far are we gonna go over as far as, you know, a couple miles or not too far?

- I think the best thing is just to get the baits in the water early.

The fish bite early.

So we'll probably just head straight west, set down, and probably then head a little bit south.

- [Jimmy] And how many boats are going today?

- [Corey] I think we've got around 40 boats fishing the tournament today.

Yeah, fantastic.

And I think Tracy Siltie does an amazing job organizing this, and she gets more and more veterans in boats every year.

- [Jimmy] This event has been going for a decade now, and I've been here a handful of times to capture it on camera.

Today, we had three veterans and quite the crew on board.

And just like we hoped, as the sun rose, the fish were pretty active.

- Hey, let that rod out further over there.

That long line, let it out.

- I think I got a wiggler on the other end.

(crew laughing) (reel whirs) - He seems to want it.

- You're on the wrong way.

- See him back there?

- Yeah.

- Nice job.

- That time I did.

- [Speaker 1] Not a whole lot more reeling.

Just try to get that rod up in the air a little bit.

- [Speaker 2] Good scoop.

- [Speaker 3] All right.

(crew laughing) (crew cheering) - [Speaker 4] Look at that, baby.

- Whew!

(laughs) Shoo.

- That's a dandy.

- Whew!

- That is incredible.

- Good way to start.

- [Speaker 5] Nice fish.

(speaking indistinctly) - Okay.

- [Jimmy] We had a full boat today.

Other than Corey and our vets, we had Ernie and Jack Barrons, Steve Baker, and Mike Highstreet.

A big part of what makes these days so special is the volunteers who give of their time and equipment to say thank you to our deserving men and women who have sacrificed for the freedoms that we have.

These days are so much fun, but also a great way to give back.

(water splashing) - Great fish.

- All right.

- Hey!

- All right.

- Opportune.

- Opportune.

- Hook came right out again.

- That's beautiful.

- [Speaker 6] You barely had to find him at all.

- [Speaker 7] Got it?

- Yeah.

- [Speaker 7] All right, Bruce, look over here.

All right.

He-he-hey-hey!

(all laughing) Hey, let's go!

- All right.

- Woo-hoo!

- [Jimmy] The morning was shaping up nicely.

We had baits targeting most of the water column in hopes of finding some active fish.

And as we did, I was able to chat with our vets on board.

What service were you in, how long?

- I was in the Army for two years.

Spent my time in Panama, not Vietnam, so that was nice.

But, yeah.

I do a little bit of fishing in Lake Michigan.

A 16-footer.

Mostly inland lakes and rivers.

And some walleye fishing in the spring, so.

- [Jimmy] And have you been to this before?

- No, it's my first time, so I'm really happy.

- Awesome.

- This is great.

It's wonderful.

- Well, thanks for being here, and thanks for your service.

- Well, thank you.

- [Jimmy] Our elder statesman was up next, Bruce Ippel, who served for 24 years in the Air Force, and the stories that he could tell.

- Went to Europe somewhat, sometimes on the Far East, a lot in Vietnam.

And I had some places in Michigan that I was at.

K.I.

Sawyer Air Force Base in Marquette, just for short periods of time.

And also down in South Carolina, Myrtle Beach Air Force Base.

And then at Eglin Air Force Base was one of my favorite places I was at.

Worked there, and we did a lot with the F-15s and so forth.

And it was a very nice thing because it was one of those jobs that I had to take care of some problems, but it was interesting.

But we got it all squared away.

It was good, yeah, yeah.

- [Jimmy] Well, thank you for your service.

- Well, thank you.

Glad to do it.

- [Jimmy] The event tries to get new veterans each year, but several of the folks have been on these trips before.

You've been to this veterans fishing thing before?

- [Earn] This is my second year.

- [Jimmy] What do you think?

- I love it.

This is great.

- Yeah.

(laughs) - [Earn] It's a great thing that they're doing.

- [Jimmy] Nice, did you get a chance to do much fishing yourself?

- Yes, I do a little bit.

- [Jimmy] Okay, yep.

- Do some walleye on the east side of the state.

And when we go to Canada, pretty much for northern and perch.

- [Jimmy] Nice.

Well, thanks for being here today, and thanks for your service.

- Thank you.

- Well, the crew's been working, and the veterans have been working.

So we are, what, seven for seven, guys?

- Yeah.

- So it's awesome.

So that's hard to do, especially with a bunch of really big fish.

I think all of our fish are north of 10 pounds, and been doing a great job.

But every bait's been working.

We've been doing different depths.

We started in 75 feet of water, caught a really nice big king in there.

We started to work our way out.

We're out in 130, 140 now.

But we've been doing well.

All the fish have been kind of up high in the 60-foot range or higher.

- Okay.

- It's been a fun day.

- [Jimmy] Nice, and so we got some stuff, deep and some stuff shallow then or?

- [Corey] Yep, we've had stuff.

Well, I'd say mostly in that 40 to 60-foot depth range.

- Okay.

- Mostly what we've been catching them on, so we just caught a coho a little bit ago that was a little bit higher on a higher bait, but yeah, they've all been in that feeding range, so hopefully, we can keep it going today.

- [Jimmy] Perfect.

It has been interesting to see just how popular these veteran fishing events have become.

What started with just one or two has grown into a lot of them all over the state, which is a great thing.

It's a way to honor our vets, and like Corey said earlier, it's one of his favorite days of fishing all summer long.

The volunteers want to get the vets on fish, and the veterans are from all over our state and really all over the Midwest.

One of the best parts of this trip is coming back in the channel and seeing the pier just lined with folks thanking our veterans.

We also had a very cool flyby today as well.

This event does a great job, and it's no small thing to put an event like this together.

- Fishing with veterans, this is our 10-year anniversary.

We have 110 veterans, 40 boats, hosted by Yacht Basin Marina.

So a morning of salmon fishing.

We'll now have a weigh-in, a luncheon.

We have a Medal of Honor recipient speaking this afternoon.

We've got a bunch of raffle prizes and then a live band later this afternoon.

So this is just a way for us to show our appreciation for veterans, the service they've given us and our country, and the freedoms we enjoy.

- Nice job, guys.

- It's awesome.

And a lot of volunteers today, right?

- A lot of volunteers, a lot of volunteers.

My wife, Tracy, heads up the event, puts a ton of work into it, but we probably have 25 more volunteers helping out with everything today.

So including boat captains and crews.

So it's a nice feeling.

- [Jimmy] And if veterans want any more information for next year, where can they go to find out stuff about it?

- FishingWithVeterans.org.

- Okay.

- Is where they can sign up.

The sign-up is open for next year.

So we're taking new veterans first that have never participated.

And then after that, we'll fill it with Korean War veterans and Vietnam War veterans.

- Special thanks to Russ and his wife, Tracy, and to all the boats as well.

Some days on the water just mean more, and this was one of those right here in "Michigan Out of Doors."

(bright music) Well, hey, everybody, we're here with Jim Wood, and we are at the Applewood Kitchen and Bar.

So let's just jump right in.

What are we cooking today?

- So I've got some fresh coho, and we're gonna sear it off, and then we're gonna serve it with some corn, jalapeño, and tomato relish underneath it.

We're kind of in that- - Okay.

- Perfect part of our growing season here in Michigan, the one that we get.

And then we're gonna make a street corn butter for this.

So kinda all the elements you'd get with Mexican street corn, and we're gonna integrate them into a salmon dish.

- And you said this was coho, but I'm assuming you could use any salmon, obviously.

But could you use lake trout too, or is that- - Yeah.

I mean, in my opinion, you could really use any fish.

- Okay.

- But I think a bit of stronger flavor.

Not that coho is super aggressive.

Coho's actually very good, but it goes really well with this.

- Okay, well, how do we get started?

Putting everything in a pot?

- Yes, this is gonna be a two-pot dish.

However, this is one of those things that you can make ahead and bring with you for whatever it might be, tailgate, deer camp, whatever it might be.

- Okay.

- So we've got just a little bit of oil here, and we're gonna dump our jalapeños and our corn in.

And this is just a really quick sauté.

A little bit of salt.

- [Jimmy] Now, the corn's not cooked or anything yet?

- Nope.

- Okay.

- [Jim] And in all reality, you don't have to cook corn.

But for this dish, it's warm, so it's gonna be cooked no matter what.

- Okay.

- But we're only gonna sauté it for a couple minutes just to kind of get all that water out.

So now that we've kind of cooked that down a little bit, we're just gonna add some tomatoes.

Get those with a little bit of salt.

And we're not really looking to cook these per se.

Just kind of soften them up, release a little bit of water out of them.

And now, we're gonna work on our salmon.

So while that's cooking, we're gonna add the other elements to the street corn butter, if you will, which is cilantro.

- [Jimmy] Okay.

- And this is a mix of chipotle powder and smoked paprika.

That's gonna give it that smoky element that we're looking for.

It's a little bit of sour cream, some salt, and since there's always some sort of cheese element to a street corn, we're gonna use some Parm.

It's a hard cheese.

It's got a good salty element to it.

And then we're gonna do some lime zest here.

- [Jimmy] So that's gonna go on top of the fish, and this is gonna be underneath?

- Yes, sir.

- Okay.

- [Jim] So the butter is essentially a sauce.

- [Jimmy] And what is the name of this dish?

- We're gonna call it salmon with Mexican street corn butter and a corn and tomato relish.

- Sounds good.

- I hope so.

(bright guitar music) - Thank you so much for joining us this week for "Michigan Out of Doors."

Make sure you come back in the upcoming weeks because we've got a lot of great things headed your way, including brown trout fishing at night and some good old-fashioned perch fishing up on Grand Lake in the northeast Lower.

If you'd like to interact with our team on a more daily basis, you can always check us out online.

- Well, that's right, Jenny.

Online is a good way to see what we're up to on a day-to-day basis.

Probably Instagram and Facebook are the best two ways to do that.

Or if you have a really good story you think we should be covering for "Michigan Out of Doors," let us know as well.

Make sure you are joining us over the next several weeks.

And if we don't see you in the woods or on the water, hopefully, we'll see you right back here next week on your PBS station.

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(bright music) ♪ When I wander far away ♪ A dream stays with me night and day ♪ ♪ It's the road that leads to my home state ♪ ♪ I am a Michigan man ♪ Changing seasons paint the scene ♪ ♪ Like a rainbow down in a hidden stream ♪ (light music)