 The Great Lakes is not only full of fish, but it's full of beautiful scenery. A vast amount of forest and open water. Sometimes you won't even see a boat for days. The abundance of life up here this time of year is insane because they don't have very long to get it done. We are officially Yulpers, baby. We're going up to the Yulper Peninsula. This is two Texans heading up to fish the Great Lakes and experience a totally different fishery than what we're used to. You're going to want to stay tuned. I got it. Came and grilled it. Got to respect the heart of his smallmouth. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to the channel and the series sponsored by Ketchco. This is unthawed. So this is going to be a four-part series. The Dangle up north, the Great Dangle up north. I'm here with my buddy and do a good squad manager, Matt Kendrick. We're coming from Texas. We flew into Chicago. We're in Green Bay right now in front of Lambeau Field, the famous stadium where the Packers play and we're journeying on into the upper peninsula of Michigan. Where we're going, it's incredible, walleye fishery. It's been known here in the last few years for a great smallmouth. All sorts of other species, they have musky, they have pike. It's a lot different than what we're used to down in Texas, just giving them big old basses at the angle. So we're going to go experience new fisheries, new ways of catching fish. We're taking you along for the ride and since we're in Wisconsin right now and they have the greatest cheeses in the world, we've got to go find it. We've got to go find them cheeses. So let's go eat some squeakies. So we just had a little warm up, eating some cheese curds, some fried cheese curds, not the actual, we actually talked to the waiter, you know, like, hey, what's the deal on these curds, man? I know these are like restaurant style, like, he said, you got to stop on the road, get some squeaky curds, that means they're fresh, some un-fried, so we're heading to a spot right now to go try out some fresh cheese curds and then we're going to make way towards the Upper Peninsula, which once you get up in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, I'll be honest with you, I didn't even know the Upper Peninsula was like part of the state. It looks like Canada on the map. It's just, it basically is Canada. So it's the West area, and there's just a very low population, and it's in the wilderness. So we're not going to see many folks while we're up here, if this state is a lot less pressured. So a lot of these fish are just, they're not seeing lures. Fresh. It's how they come, I guess, you know, when they're being formed. So this is before they're into a block or a slice, the rawest form of cheese. Like little nuggets. So we've had them fried, you know, but this is the actual way you want to try them. So just side of the road, cheese curds, what do you got, man? You got some. I got some boat sacs. Boat sacs. Little minis. I mean, I figured we're putting in 20 hour lengths. Little drop shot baits right there. We might catch the same or two on them. This is more cheese. We will, We'll be having owls. We'll be having some profits. Blocked for a week. What do we got here? Oh, beer, cheddar cheese. Beer, cheddar cheese. Okay. All right, we're done. Folks, we're going to get a full variety of cheese curds here. Getting the full Wisconsin experience. We're going. Well, thanks for stopping. Thank you so much. Yeah, we might do that. You're welcome. We have a great date. You too. Thanks. See you. Bye now. We've got our cheese. We're loaded up on cheese. We've got our new Gleris, brews, spotted cows. We are officially Yulpers, baby. We're going up to the Yulper Peninsula. Look. What? There we go. You're telling me you just rolled out there and it's, it's lights out. He has no grub. What? On his boat. Why do you not have a grub? He got so excited. He went out without it. All that water doesn't look bad. It's not, it's not choppy. The report is good. The report is good. I can relate to this. This is similar to like when I fished in rainy you get these little reed stick ups and there's like gravel in it and they like to spawn in those little protected reed clumps. And then they're just hitting baits multiple times when you throw in there because they're protecting it. They're protecting their bed. I've already got these fish down. You haven't even thrown a cast in my brain. It's, it's done. Okay. Let's go and get the PB. Just finished up our grocery shopping fixing the head to the lake house and it is time to let our cheese curds. We also found that we lost an hour. Yes. Which we didn't even know. We were very confused. Didn't know there was a time change going straight north. In the great north, we lost an hour. So the cheese herds have been sitting out for a few hours. Oh dude, they smell amazing. So it's 9 p.m. and it's still freaking lightest day out here. Yeah. There's so much. It's like being in Alaska. We also found out they don't stop selling liquor in the state of Michigan. They just don't. It's never ending. When people are coming up here to get their, their lake adventures, they let them have a good time. Yeah. If you want to buy whiskey at midnight from Meyer over here, they're all for it. Okay. Cheese curd, my friend. Thank you. Cheddar, see if it squeaks in your mouth. Put it in your teeth. Oh, it's squeak, it's squeak. It is. Oh yeah, I just got one. It's squeaking. Mm. That's good. Turn left onto North 26th Street. Oh yeah, it's squeaking. That's some good cheese. That's them. It's like a squeegee. It's like a squeegee. My man is coming in. Starks off the water. He stayed a little bit longer than what he said. He might have been on a lot of something. He got on a little something. Yeah. That is a 350 horsepower engine, I want you to know. This guy has got the biggest basketball in America. It's like a 22 and a half footer with a 350 Merc on it. Coming in, he just backed this thing in an eight foot wide slot like it was a bicycle. Impressive. That works. Let's get some, let's get some on the water tips from our man. What's up man? You backed that thing in here like you've done it a time or two. I want you twice. Yeah. Hey man, run at it. What's up? What's up, buddy? Good to see you. Folks, this is Mr. Jeremy Starks. He is a professional fix. Professional. I still call you professional. You used to be. Professional hunter. Now I'm just a wanna be. Fisherman, you know, you're the man behind Bass Mafia, really? Well, you know, we have a partnership with Bass Mafia. Now I'm just a wannabe. You want to go out there and catch smallmouth all day long. That's what I want to be doing. That's what I love about you. I mean, last week we had stupid weather, which I mean, good weather on Lake Erie. We caught salmon and, and smallmouth and trout. You gotta get on that next year. I know, you FaceTime every time. Yeah, I couldn't help it. I couldn't help it. The action's hot, wherever you are. And we're here with you. Man, today, I really wasn't expecting it to be as good as it was, because it was really windy. When I come around that point, I mean, it was muddy. So I was a little worried when I come in that pocket or that bay, you know, we call it a pocket, but, you know, it's three miles long. I thought it was gonna be blowed up, and it wasn't. So we find clear water tomorrow. We're gonna crush it. So sunlight, clear water is key. Is, well, clear water is huge right now. Okay. They gotta see each other. They gotta. They're wanting to mate. Well, if they're not, if they're in there on a bed and a bunch of mud blows in, they're gonna move out. Okay. So we want the ones that are staying put. Okay. This man's got a ton of knowledge. I'm telling you, we're gonna go out early in the morning. What's, what's early here? Because the sun comes up in like three hours. 3 a.m. Because it's 10 o'clock and it's daylight. I mean, I was at their fishing. I thought it was like 7.30. It was 9.40. I know. I'm like, I gotta get back. Just, just so you guys know, you can still see a little bit of light in the, in the skyline. And it is 10.14 p.m. That is crazy, isn't it? Yeah. I mean, crazy. So I'm thinking Matt wants to get up at 2.45. Listen, we've already discussed the strategy. We'd like to go find a diner in the morning. Oh my. Drink some coffee. I know Jeremy's not gonna put up with this. I know he's not gonna put up with this. We need a Chick-fil-A. We're gonna need to drive out of the state. I gotta believe they're only gonna eat a top water for a certain amount of time in the morning. Nah, they're eating it all day. All day is right here. It's possible. Okay. So we're rigging up tackle right now. And we're also thinking about our objectives for this week. You know, the last time me and Matt went out in Buffalo with Jeremy, it was tough. I did catch my personal best smallmouth bass. It was a six-five. It's a giant. I don't expect to break that this week. But it was tough conditions. We didn't catch many fish. I think Matt only got like, it was rough. So we want to catch a bunch of smallmouth. First objective. We wanna try to catch 100 smallmouth in a day in our boat. 100 smallmouth. Next, break Matt's personal best, which is I think three and a half pounds. They have a healthy population of three to four pounders in here. They even got some fives. I think we're gonna get that done. That's gonna be a special moment. We also need to eat some decent food because last time we were in Buffalo on the Great Lakes catch a smallmouth, I'm pretty sure I got worms from some Buffalo wings. I was convinced I had worms swimming around in my stomach. It was terrible. And speaking of eating, we wanna catch some of the tastiest fish ever in fresh water. The walleye, maybe a perch. Put those in some grease, cook them up somehow. They are the tastiest fish. These northern fish, they grow slower, colder water. It's amazing. Walleye's the tastiest. And you know what? We think there's gonna be a fire bite going on here. So we got some other interesting challenges and developments that we're gonna be working on that you guys are gonna wanna stay in tune for. So right now we're gonna rig up a couple of the key things. Hopefully we can get this dialed into like a couple of rods as we get out there. But I'm hoping in the morning they're just on that top water bite and it's gone. Sun came up at like 4.30 this morning. I was already jazzed. Ready to go. So just fueled up. We got some food, we're putting it in the boat. Today's the day. We're getting to experience what this bite is actually like. We're gonna have to dial it in, get things figured out. That's always the most exciting part of the trip to me. It's like the first time, the first voyage going out there trying to learn what is gonna be the juice, you know? What are you gonna have to do? It's the mind game. The wind is blowing a little bit. Hopefully the waves are not gonna be too big and we're gonna be able to get in a nice calm spot and just start ripping them out. Hopefully our boat rise is not gonna be too bad. We're gonna get straight to it, baby. First fish is worth $75. The most fish is worth. Most fish, yeah. 300. And the biggest fish. No 50 apiece. That's 150. I don't know, with 150 on them. 150 on most. And 150 on biggest. Money on line. And pride. It's always pride. What am I gonna do with my $375, I'm not sure. You wanna have a side bit? See if he actually wins. Might as well make some jeans. Listen, if I can't show up and give you these skinny jeans, I have some women back. Y'all can have the boat and I can quit. All right. The Great Lakes is kind of a giant aquarium experiment over the course of the last 100 years. They put in species to control other species that get out of control and they put in other species. So there's all sorts of stuff in here, but today it's all about that brown finish. The beautiful bronze backs. And we're gonna try to catch 100. We're here, it's time. It's time. Talking over, about to grab this rod and yank on one. Starting out baby bullshad, swimming it up top. Let's get her down, baby. If I get first blood here, we need to. You boys better believe I'm pulling a low bout of that cooler over there and shotgun it on the deck right here in front of you, boys. I wouldn't expect no layup. I'm gonna cut it right, go a little deeper. Got it. God dang it. Got a game in the boat though. Godly. Welcome to Lake Michigan. Woo-hoo-hoo, baby. Look at that. That's a good first fish. Gosh, that's my PB right there. I'll take that as a start. Good first blood fish. You don't get a shotgun in your beer. I know. That's a good fish. That's an awesome fish, dude. Just a blind backer. Look how fat that tail, geez. Well, it's got to be more. It's got to be $5. It's got to be more than it's got to be. If you don't even want to weigh that one, it could be the biggest one. Oh, that ain't gonna be the biggest. It might be your biggest, but that ain't gonna be the biggest we're getting today. This whole big bay is just really shallow, five, six foot, but we're up here in two and a half right now. But we're looking for these reeds. There's a certain bottom if these reeds are growing in. And you can tell, I mean, you don't get bit till you get around those reeds and they're spawning at the bottom of them. You'd think they'd just be in some of this big gravel bottom, but they're not. They're always around those reeds. First fish on. Not a giant? Double, double. Double it up. Oh, I want to join the party. Looky. Yee-hee. Got eight found lying here. I hope we can come on. Little bit of difference. Here we go. My first official Lake Michigan smallmouth, not a giant. But gosh, you know I gotta give them a sniff. Some of that goo on the tip of my nose. Keep smelling it for a while. Okay, we'll let this fish go. Look how fat they are up here. Just healthy butterballs. See you, baby. So that's five? That's five. Five. Many more to go. We're only at the first spot. This place is gigantic. We have a pattern now. Just gotta run it. So we got bad sitting right in front of us. These dark holes. Too bad right here. And there are people, not people, there's fish in them. There's one. They're in there. All right, he just picked it up. He moved it. Moved it. Oh, that's a decent one, dude. Yeah, this is it. This is it. It's from here, that's why I knew it was there. It's going down. Matt's going to be mad when you catch him. The great thing about smallmouth is they're just so aggressive on bits. Normally you just bring the five. Got him. That's a good one. Oh, look how black, dude. That's a good one. That's a solid fish there. But if you get big fish on this one, it don't count because I think you have that one. That's a grown one. That's a grown one. Yeah, baby. That's what I'm talking about. God, he just picked it up slowly. You know, I should have let him catch that one because that would have been his personal bet. My smell left. Let's get this guy landed. Eight pound line. I'm going to say that's a three and a half. Oh, no! He basically landed. Will counted me. Backwater had to get his little shots and everything. You were helping him out playing with it. I felt the fight. It was all there, ladies and gentlemen. I think we're going to shut it down right here because we're just getting warmed up. We're getting dialed. And really the next objective on this next video that you guys are going to see is us trying to get this 100 mark. We're just starting to get the baits figured out, get the pattern figured out. We've come up here, we've seen the lake. We've done a lot today in today's video. So stick around, subscribe, and you're going to see hopefully 100 smallmouth caught in one day out of the boat. Possibly even Matt's personal best broken and just some amazing good times up here at Lake Michigan. So thank you guys for tuning in today. I will see you soon. Good luck in all of your dangles.