What do you use for wind forecast watching for St. Clair?

[glfgd82]

I've been neglecting getting my wife out on the water this year with this new business venture startup and I'm putting my foot down this Sunday and shutting down all plans so I can take her out. Going for the gusto and figure her first trip to St. Clair should be this trip since the lake has been fishing decent this year (understatement? lol). She's not keen on offshore fishing much, but she trusts me, Canada run is out of the question so I'm trying to find the easiest water for her to fish and every forecast I look at has wind predictions all over the place for this weekend.

Now I know, things change out there, adapt and overcome, ect ect, but just wondering what you guys use as I'd like to at least have a clue of what the wind MAY do so I can launch accordingly. If it was just me and my buddy I'd just launch and run all over not caring about water conditions, but we are taking out wives out and I'd rather launch smart and have her comfortable with the water we fish which means having a clue as to wind in my eyes. Thinking of fishing North side of anchor bay launching out of Harley or even driving around for Fair Haven. Harley launch would be so we could open up the boat and make the run up that way and fish back, that is if the wind is fair.

Sorry for the long post, simply...what wind prediction site do you use? (my wife thanks you already, she's nervous going out there but I assured her I will do my research lol)

[bob o]

www.windfinder

[1BADAIR]

Sailflow, windfinder and noaa

[glfgd82]

Awesome! Thank you guys, this should give her peace of mind, she trusts me, but also knows of the stories of LSC and she just wants to have a good day on the water rather than risk weather for big fish.

[1BADAIR]

[bob o]

i don't want to burst any bubbles, but if your on LSC after the tuna and go fast boats are out, wind speed has nothing to do with rough water

[castforcash]

I look out the window at the tops of the trees, only live a quarter mile from the lake. All kidding aside, haven't found too many reliable sites that can predict the wind. I would launch at Selfridge if you're fishing anchor bay. That way you won't have to run the gauntlet of pleasure boat wakes coming back to Harley in the afternoon. You can also look at the weather bouy data, but that is in the middle of the lake in Canadian waters.

https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/station_pa...?station=45147

[21XDC]

When they say 10-15mph... You add those two numbers together and it's accurate.

[castforcash]

That is spot on Mike!

https://goo.gl/images/auNz5x

[Hollada]

Sailflow, windfinder and noaa

This ^^

[fishinarc]

When they say 10-15mph... You add those two numbers together and it's accurate.

Exactly right!!!

[glfgd82]

Update:

Yesterday morning: Flat ass calm, run around was amazing for being my wife's first time out, she had a blast on our first run taking in all the beauty of the lake. I unfortunately suck finding fish so we didn't catch a ton.

Mid morning move: I told her "see those bigger boats, where we are moving to probably had 3x that amount and it's going to be a blender, if you want me to not go further just yell at me and we will turn around and fish the canals near the launch", 1/2 of the run was smooth, light chop, other 1/2 was fairly fun, still could run 45-50mph is my little skeeter, just had to stay on the trim to keep us safe. Again, I suck at picking spots.

Noon: She had to go to the bathroom so I decided to run into Harley so she could go, we went back out...mistake, came back in...mistake lol, at one point I think we got hit from waves from every direction while running maybe 25-30mph and it felt like we were going to break the boat in 1/2. She loved every minute of the rides, once she got used to being out there I think I was more scared than her lol.

She wants to go back, she had a good 3ish on the line that came unpinned right at the boat, it wasn't ready to be netted and she was timid playing it as she's never felt the brute force of a smallmouth before. Overall it was a great day and the wind forecast for the morning was spot on, I wish every morning could be like that out there, it was truly a gift to be able to enjoy the sunrise with her running on glass. We got in the truck and she said "thank goodness there wasn't any wind today, once those crazies started stirring up the lake it would have been 10x worse huh?"

She's now wanting to help me study the lake and pick out spots together to fish next time. She's been bitten by the beautiful St. Clair bug me thinks!

[castforcash]

Glad you had a good day! Now you understand why I recommended not launching at Harley on a weekend. That area is one of the worst on the lake for weekend pleasure boat traffic.

[glfgd82]

Glad you had a good day! Now you understand why I recommended not launching at Harley on a weekend. That area is one of the worst on the lake for weekend pleasure boat traffic.

Most definitely, we literally covered from north Anchor Bay, to selfridge and then made the dumb mistake to travel out towards the deeper water out towards the shipping channel almost due east from 12/13 mile. Not one of my better ideas lol, one day I will find them and have a good day out there