Gill-T

Bull, where in the column were you getting them? We were marking fish in the 20-25’ range and 5’ off bottom.

We marked fish west of the Catt in 72-77’ but they were not in the biting mood. Didn’t see anyone else use their net. Gave it two hours, smelled a rat and went inshore for bass. Mayfly husks everywhere

Mayfly blues

Started a troll off the Catt in 72’. Plenty of boats. Anyone have a pattern going?

It should never happen. Canadian hatcheries have contributed in the past shortfalls in numbers.

Different lake. The lake was almost brown in the 80’s. The amount of fish that were near your lures while trolling was double what it is now based on stocking numbers. The problem is those fish couldn’t see your baits during the dirty water decades so 30-50 hit days were not an option. The issue is more complex than the blanket statement “we have too many fish”. Water quality means predators have less cover to be successful in catching their prey. The food web has also dropped towards the bottom from the invading mussels. Kings coming out of winter into spring look like crap and seemingly always have empty stomachs. Are fish losing three months per year of feeding and therefore growth because they have difficulty feeding on the bottom at 400’ of depth where alewives are wintering? Before the mussels the epilimnion had all the productivity and lots of fatty Daphnia. The food web has shifted the deep chlorophyll layer into the metalimnion and the plankton is now less fatty spiny fleas. Fish will have to evolve to hunt at depth. With fish living only two or three years, I am not sure how much kings are going to learn/evolve new feeding tactics. Tough to compare Lake Michigan. Those fish can travel to three lakes to find bait and have a more diverse diet of whitefish and bloaters. Lake Michigan fish may just be further along in adapting to the changed environment. For example, with ultra clear water, Michigan fish are feeding more at night. Charters often have to leave the dock at 4:30 am because the bite is over by 8:30. For sure the right formula of stocking numbers vs alewife numbers needs to be gotten right by trial and error plus data modeling but it still might not fix the problem. I think this thread was started as a call to action that we need this subject studied. Is the problem environmental (fish maturing faster)? Is the problem man-made (hatchery process)? Is it just the new reality?

I think it is perfectly fine to say the fishery is great, but let us see if we can improve upon its greatness. By their own mission statement about how to treat the fishery, the lake managers are to manage Lake Ontario for a trophy fishery.

Livingston walleye stick -fast retrieval

It looked skinny ! Could have been 40 lbs

Wow! Why did I drive past Buffalo to fish the Catt???? lol. 😂. I suppose with a handle like yellowpike4 you probably catch’em. What kind of program was working, sticks or worms?

Struggle bus for walleye this morning. We were in search mode all day. We tried a couple of inshore structures with no walleyes. Plenty of nice smallmouth and big sheep but not what we were looking for. Stickbait program scrapped, Rack and stack to plan C - offshore shoal. Worm harness on bottom bouncers, riggers and snap weight lines. We managed 4 walleye and three jumbo perch for the box BUT way too many sheep to cycle through. Most of the boats ran towards Dunkirk and worked the 65’ band or deeper. Today was a good day for total biomass but a challenging day to create fish fry memories.

I am hearing some decent fish 65’ off the Catt today with lots of bait around. A Barcelona boat is reporting a grind bite with lots of shorts to wade through. Anyone got a decent pattern working? I will be out to enjoy Father’s Day tomorrow.

I got of work early and took advantage of nice evening tonight. Fished til 8:30 trying a new piece of rock. We went 4-6 on walleye, a bunch of sheep, a bass and a football brown trout. Bandit electric zebra took all the fish on my brother’s side of the boat back 55-65’. On my side it was a Livingston Deep Diver back 115’-65’ that took the most fish. Word has it that Barcelona has tons of fish.

Weird. Lake Ontario buoys are rockin’. Erie buoys and webcam at Sunset says fishable??? Must be wind aloft over Erie. Windy as hell at my house all day. My buddy tried to cheat the wind and drove to the bass islands and got skunked. He said he was not marking anything either. That tells me the fish are probably here.

Walleye winds this weekend. Looks like I am working on the honey-do list and boat fix projects. The winds should start the first big trickle of Ohio fish to the region.

That matches with what I have been seeing. At night the bite is up high.

1700 views on this thread in one week and nobody has put up a fishing report. Good or bad fishing it helps everyone to post what is going on. We need fish taken out of the system as there are 100 million walleye in Erie. No reason for tradition secrecy.

For you night trollers, a nice little tip for your planer board mods, I placed DOT reflection tape on mine and with just wearing a little headlight the boards light up the night like an airport runway. No glow in the dark night sticks. No battery operated accessory add-ons. Cheap and easy. (I placed a sticky note over my name and number to keep groupies away 🤪).

Another good evening contour trolling 15’-23’ fow off a hard point. We managed one shy of a two man limit in the 7pm-11pm window. Interesting how every time out the age structure differs. Tonight all age classes represented. Took another big also (7.5 lbs). Some on bandits, some on scatter raps, one on meat spoon down 12’ on rigger but most came off a Livingston stickbait unassisted -back 70-80’ on outside boards.

Now you tell me lol. I placed an order to expand my Livingston arsenal last week. I swore I would not buy another lure the rest of the year.

I have not seen many boats fishing around Buffalo when I have driven by. Usually only a handful at the Hanover launch. I think everyone is fishing Dunkirk or Barcelona IMO.

Farm animals.