hermit

There is a parking lot to the North of the ramp, I usually park there weekends even if there is room by the ramp otherwise sometimes you get trapped by guys putting in (slowly). If you just put in pull forward to the road out (to the left) and turn right into the lot instead. If that makes sense. Never seen that lot full except once when they were doing one of the late afternoon concerts. Might happen but noon you're probably safe.

Yes there is, you're right though knowing what the weigh station hours are would be helpful.

Info here

That's one heckuva fish!! Wow! Nice catch.

Personally I wouldn't take it on the O though for sure there are guys who take out small boats. Just have to be very very careful. Don't go in cold water, know the weather back and forth, etc etc. Mine is smaller yet and no way Jose will it ever see Ontario!

Well all month I've been wishing for a cloudy day, finally got one and the fishing was good but not what I was hoping for. Really had to work for them. Took almost two hours before I boated a fish. Ended up doing okay, bite was half as good as last week. Had LOTS of grabs where the rod doubles over, feel fish thrashing for 3 seconds and it's gone. 9-10 AM was best, bait never cleared out though, maybe a later bite today. It was a case of too much of a good thing- this is what I had to deal with all day: (Bad pic, had to really darken the contrast) Just could not get away from the bait, and when I did the fish were few and far between. Best tactic was just dropping it into the bait and hoping for the best. Did find some clear water at times. Amazing amounts of bait though, had to be acres of it out there. Tried a bunch of spots on both the East and West side, bait thick both places. Here's where a better unit would help- this laker barely registered on the screen. Cleaning the screen would probably help. I did see it coming so I was ready to hook up. Then lost it near the surface because I was messing with the camera, you can see the fish going down on the upper right side.

Nice fish, pics and unit- someday I'll get a high quality FF. Was also drooling over ERABBIT's HD Navionics, definitely going to save up for one of those. Mmmmmmm more gear!

Cool beans man, couple nice fish. Wish my GF liked fishing she gets seasick stepping on a frozen puddle...

It often moves around, 60' is a good place to start looking.

I've had one for 6+ years and love it, hooks don't get tangled, easier on the fish, definitely worth it especially if you do C+R. Hauled up some huge lakers with it, no problems. Great FL net.

Does it say something about being Cornell property on it? I was out a few weeks ago when a boat pulled up and left a buoy. It was much further South than you though and stayed in one spot for at least a week so I assume it was tethered. Might be something completely different but it's gone now. (oops accidentally sent this as a pm but I'm deleting that)

Those are small bait balls. The way the sonar works is by measuring distance, so when you approach an object and it begins to enter the cone of the sonar, it is measuring a diagonal. When it gets directly under you it is straight up and down, and the distance being measured is less. So the true depth of the object will be the top of the hook, and not the sides. From the thickness of those hooks at the top (when it is straight below you), 5-10 feet, it is going to be bait. Being a big object (or bait school) your sonar will pick it up from further to the side and that's how you can see a hook that looks like it is 30 feet tall. Smaller object like fish will get picked up closer to vertical and the difference between the side and top of the hook will be less. This is also a good way to help you estimate the size of fish as bigger fish will have taller hooks as well as being thicker. But it's pretty variable- if you see a really looooong hook most likely the fish is swimming in the direction you are traveling. It is hard to tell and you will get better with practice but the hook just above the 'Khz' and the half-hook below the deeper bait ball are possibly fish. The Khz one may not be a fish as there is some other stuff near it but that's my guess. And don't worry about the surface clutter that will usually be there. And nice fish!

Well we had fun that's for sure, the big fish were hiding from us though. Wow I feel pretty roasted even though I had on a big silly straw hat, sunscreen, and a long sleeve shirt. Headed up to AES, trolled N, over to W side, and all the way back to Taughannock. 5-6 on lakers, 1 short salmon and 1 short rainbow, also lost one fish we never saw. Kept lures up high for salmon, plenty of lakers on the bottom. Lots of bait and hooks just couldn't get a pattern going. THANKS Ed for the day, fun and good times, sorry we never hit the mother load, the biggest catch of the day was a boat bumper!

North of Long Point is also very good, should be fish there but haven't been yet this year. Motor around at 4-6 mph looking for bait or hooks in 75-90 fow. And the 1oz ball with 3-4" soft plastic is what I use 98% of the time so don't worry too much about other stuff. Most plastics work well so don't worry about that much either, white/green/shad colors. It's really all about the action. If all else fails drop reel repeat, and if you see stuff on the sonar start reeling before the fish gets to it- you are trying to imitate a fleeing baitfish. It's pretty active and I spend a lot of time reeling at various speeds. Don't leave it on the bottom for more than 30 seconds. Also if you feel anything funny even the lightest tap start reeling. Once it clicks you'll start getting into them. Good luck. Guff ouch tough fishing sorry to hear that.

Hey very cool on the jigged laker, yeah a trolling motor is almost necessary to try and stay vertical. Limited computer access until next week but I sent you a PM, doesn't look like you got it yet.

I have 3/4 and 1 oz round head jig molds, also 1 oz Erie stand up mold. Won't be around until next week sometime but maybe we could hook up sometime after that... have the ear ball but interested in the spoons and my melting pot is shot. Nice looking stuff, what'd you use for paint?

woody 184, too bad about the wind that could be a lot of fun with the huge lakers in Ontario! Cayuga 7/4 Still pretty good fishing, came in spurts. First thing was very good, then a dead hour, then a flurry, then more dead time, then a flurry, etc. Not too much to report really other than good fishing. Kept moving around within the same area trying to find an active fish or two. Nice and calm but that isn't good for covering ground. Tried a new soft plastic, Berkely Havoc Subwoofer, with good results. One thing I was thinking about from the previous jigging thread was for new jiggers, I spend a lot of time reeling in trying to provoke a strike. If you're using the FF you can react to the fish but with more than one guy in a boat either jig on bottom for a few 10-20-30 seconds and reel in, repeat, or drop it to near the bottom via counting and just start reeling back in like ManOverboard said in his Keuka report. Drop reel repeat. Anyway.. enjoy the week and weekend everyone, happy fishing to all.

Okay well I'm sure this won't be a popular opinion but I think it's a terrible idea to lift fish vertically with Bogas or any other lip gripper. How would you like to be lifted by your lower jaw? Sure people are different than fish but in their native environment they are supported by water and aren't designed to be out of the water in the first place. I couldn't find any info about trout but I know from experience when handling fish I've kept I could feel internal structures ripping/dislocating when holding them by the tail and that's a fair amount of surface area to hold the weight, unlike a gripper where it's all concentrated in a small area. It can't be good for the fish. Did some googling, couldn't find anything specifically about trout or salmon but here's what I found: 80% of bonefish were damaged by lip grippers, an Australian study on Barramundi found lots of damage, and plenty of fisheries biologists do not recommend vertically lifting fish. Often the damage is internal (such as stretching out the spine or doing damage to the neck area) and you may release the fish thinking all is fine only to have it die later. Say what you will but if you're going to use Bogas use your other hand to support the weight and hold it horizontally, and if you want to weigh the fish, doing it with the net or in a sling. Worth looking at: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0165783608001781 http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1577/M08-232.1 http://capmel.com/index.php/articles/captain-mel-berman/639-anglers-more-conservation-minded http://www.fieldandstream.com/forums/fishing/catch-and-release-tips-big-pike-and-muskies http://myfwc.com/research/saltwater/fish/snook/reduce-catch-release-mortality/ http://www.thebassbarn.com/forum/archive/index.php/t-38676.html

BrookTrout, The long diagonal on the left is a fish that did chase my jig almost all the way up but didn't bite and is going back down. The other long diagonal headed down was my jig and you can see a fish come off the bottom, a thinner line than the other fish hooks at the bottom. It approaches my jig, I start reeling around 60 fow- if you look close you can see two separate lines for a bit and then the lines merge as the fish gets close, about ten feet further up is the big black 'fish on' area starting at 40' down. Better than an Xbox! t9 yeah it's nice when you don't have to worry about drifting into someone's trolling line or whatever... beautiful morning though a funny wind direction made boat control tough for the first couple hours.

Are you seeing fish on the sonar? What kind of gear, downriggers, dipsys? Also take a look in the Finger Lakes section and read some of that stuff. Try green spoons or flasher/flies or white like HookedUp says for lakers. Some reports have a lot of info about tackle in them, what works on Cayuga will also work on Seneca. You could also try asking questions in the FL section might get more responses.

You didn't say where you have been fishing but try the North end off the shelf, it's a few miles South from Geneva or launch at Sampson S.P. and fish your way North.

Excellent fishing this morning up by AES. Started off slow and I tried a few spots, was thinking of making a big move across the lake when I hit the motherlode… of dinks. First three fish were 20" and under. Again started thinking about moving but the size kept increasing so I stuck around. About 8 fish in I caught my first bonus fish this year, a 17-18" landlocked. Think I hooked another but it was gone quickly. One of those mornings where it started slow and kept improving until someone turned off the bite at 9:30. One minute there were fish everywhere and then they were gone. Okay it actually took two minutes but it was that fast. The wind died then too so maybe that had something to do with it. Pretty much stayed in 70-85 fow except when it slowed down tried out to 110 but nothing doing. Got some 8 lbers and some of the smallest fish I've seen all year. I could see a big temp break in spots on the FF down about 60. Also had my first breakoff, two actually. First I was being lazy and finally wore out a knot after about 40 fish over the past few trips. It's good to re-tie every ten or so to prevent this sort of thing. This one was definitely my fault. Second time I'm not sure what happened, started to set the hook on a fish and whoops it was gone with maybe 1/2 lb of pressure. End of line was pretty frayed. I had been checking the leader pretty regularly but not every fish, who knows, maybe the fish took the jig deep and the line hit a tooth. Very light fishing pressure, kind of surprised, one boat trolled past, saw another in the distance and maybe one other jigger showed up as I was leaving. Best day this year, 17 lakers and a landlocked hit the net. Two decapitated adult lamprey also got released. Dropped 5 or 6 other lakers I thought were stuck pretty good, oh well. Back at it tomorrow then away, unfortunately can't make the LOU-ALL. The downward streak on the left is a fish that followed me up to about 20' or so. The one on the right is my jig. Fish came up, followed it close for 20' and whacked it down 40'.

I put some 50 lb on my dipsy rods, cheapest way for me to go and I'm not trying to get too deep. Worked great last time I trolled. Thanks for the tip RR.

Wow great pic and fish! It has a huge head!

Dang lamprey. Been seeing a fair number of them, got rid of 3 big ones yesterday and another got away as I was netting the fish. Good report!