Sk8man

This topic obviously carries a lot of emotion beneath it and the unfortunate part of it is we have little functional control over much of it so the threatening nature of the fishery going sour can easily obscure the fact that we need to remain united and respectful of each other in our quest for information and solutions to this highly complex situation. It isn't fruitful or productive or fair for that matter to cast blame on anyone at this point as there are too many unknowns for one thing. It also is not right or even logical to blame the DEC guys out in the field either as they are mere pawns in the "chess" game that the State managers play on their big monopoly board and even they are at the mercy of his royal hindness (spelling intentional) King Andrew. it might be wise to stay within the realm of information sharing and bouncing around ideas instead of casting blame on anyone or any entity. We all have a lot yet to learn about this.

Fjaq you have a PM

The cormorants are doing their stuff on the Finger Lakes as well now. IT is hard to believe those lousy things are protected.

Nice going John PM me where you saw the perch guys

WTG! Geez Sean she is right up there with her granddad already

I've had mine for my 9.9 for over 13 years and it has been great.....never a problem even at high speed. Decent price too.

This time of year I run small to medium spoons off fluoro leaders run way back for the bows with 6-8 ft sliders as well off downriggers. If the water surface temps are in the 50's early in the morning before the sun gets high try running boards in close even near docks if fishing the south end of the lake for browns. I don't often use sticks this time of year but they may work (e.g. J-9 size or J-ll). The small Honeybee spoons also are known brown killers on Canandaigua. Often running 2.8-3.4 works for the bows with the smaller faster running spoons. Unlike lakes such as Seneca which has a very diverse bottom Canandaigua is largely a combination sandy muck bottom so a lot of the laker fishing is looking for active suspended fish around bait pods rather than dragging cowbells along gravel or rocky bottom structure.

After reading these last 8 pages I can't help but throw in a response. First of all like Keith I feel that the LOU crew is in general a cut above the norm in terms of not letting emotion totally take over an intellectual discussion. After more than 40 years of salmon fishing I've learned more details about Lake O itself from this thread than any other source I've looked at. I also note that much but not all of the commentary is subjective in nature meaning that specific data and interpretation by qualified scientists is missing from many of the issues raised and comments offered. We all have a lot to learn about the lake and it's fishery. One of the things that I keep coming back to in my own mind is the impact of the Zebra and Quagga mussels as well as the water fleas on the lake and the food chain itself along with the composite of things already mentioned as potential adverse variables (e.g. weather etc.). The food chain itself in any ecosystem is a complex interplay of many players and when a problem occurs the lower down in it that the problem occurs the greater the potential impact on the organisms above it. If the levels of phytoplankton and zooplankton have been decimated by the high levels of these invasives it could take a significant amount of time to actually see the severe impact on the higher elements in the chain such as the apex predator and its cohabitants and given the large expanse of the lake and diverse nature of the lake structure itself regions of the lake could be differently affected. It is not just the trout and salmon species that have been affected. The black bass and perch populations have also tanked, and it is not limited to just Lake O as the Finger lakes have also been seriously compromised and this may underscore what I'm suggesting. This is a complex problem and anyone seeking a "silver bullet" origin or solution to it is making a mistake.