Ric66

Thanks, Ed. Like I said to Les, you and other guys on this site have helped me be a better fisherman. In turn, I hope my son will be part of the next generation to take up the sport.

Thanks for the suggestion Dave! Here is a pic of the LT Sorry its sideways

Thanks Guys. Fishing IS a great way to bond with our children. And probably a way a lot of us got started in fishing learning from our dads. I'm going to try and post a pic of the lake trout. My son will get a kick out of seeing a fish he caught being posted here.

My 9 year old son never liked fishing but very recently he's shown an interest. Brought him out for his first full day's of fishing although we were only out for about 2-3 hours, but for a kid, that's a full day! Launched out of Dean's and the wind was worse than I expected but started to let a wire rod with a dipsey and Spin Doctor and fly out. Got it to about 80 on the counter when something hit it, gave the rod to my son but by then he got off. Anyway, a good start. Felt a little pressure to catch fish to make sure my son stays interested. Set up that rod again and sent a second rod with same set up- 3 minutes later that rod fires and he brings in his first salmon, little over 18 inches but gave him a good fight. Set up both rods again and sent probe with temp on a downrigger. 55 degrees down about 45 feet which seemed shallow to me but I guess with the north wind it was bringing up cooler water closer to surface. Didn't get anything more until we decided to leave around 8pm and again one of the wire rods has a fish- another 18inch salmon, and the other wire rod has a fish on it which I thought was small because it lacked any fight to it, but as I reeled felt some weight to it, gave the rod to my son and we brought in a nice laker, I'm guessing about 6-7 pounds. My son was very happy and I was relieved that it turned into a successful trip. Now I have to convince my wife to let me clean the fish in our new house's kitchen . Thanks to all the people on this site who share as I've read many posts which helped me know a little about what to do. If it wasn't for this site I would not know how to fish with wire and dipseys, and that was the only rods that produced today. Wanted to get some pics of my son with the fish but he fell asleep on the car ride home. Anyway, sweet dreams.

atlantic= slightly forked tail, caudal area just above tail is slimmer than on brown, jaw does not pass eye as it does on brown. That's how I differentiate between the two. But it can be tricky

IIt isn't just the numbers of baitfish, it is the kind of bait fish. Great Lakes fish predators (including salmon and steelhead) that feed primarily on alewife are prone to thiamine deficiency. Alewife, an invasive bait fish in the Great Lakes, are known to contain thiaminase, an enzyme that degrades thiamine. A thiamine deficiency can impact egg quality and the survival of eggs and newly hatched fish, and, in severe cases, can cause the death of adult fish. So the trout and salmon in the finger lakes are eating primarily alewives because the smelt are virtually gone. The possible good news is that some reports on Cayuga Lake state that the trout and salmon are feeding on golbies, and golbies have thiamine. Maybe this will help with salmon reproduction in the finger lakes, although this may create another issue- golbies feed on mussels and they contain toxins, trout eat the golbies and, well you are what you eat

Les, I was thinking the same thing. And I also thought about the spiny water fleas filtering out the zooplankton in the top water.

Ahab Ric66 that looks like some good solid information thanks. SK8man If you think that statement supports your position you should reread what it actually does say. Do not extrapolate from it what you would like it to say. Every lake and every species is different but there is no doubt in my mind that commercial sale of angler caught panfish can and does impact the quality of fishing in many waterbodies across the state. Ahab, unless I am missing something this statement from the DEC seems to indicate exactly what Sk8man's point was. I am sure many people never thought the oceans could be over fished.....now we know different. The DEC is not likely to do any study on the impact of commercial fishing on perch, but if we wait that long, maybe is will be too late. The best thing we fishermen can do is when we see changes going on and we aren't catching as many fish as we used to, let the DEC know about it. With all the changes that have taken place on Seneca, it may be virtually impossible to know which ones are having the most impact. One more point I want to make is the DEC wouldn't put size and creel limits just for fun. They do it to try and keep the fishing viable. Maybe the 50 perch limit needs revising, at least for some bodies of water.

I've been following this thread for a while now and thought I'd ask someone at DEC about their thoughts. And here they are.... Robert, Seneca Lake is not in the area that my unit covers so I have copied the Region 8 Fisheries Manager who does handle it. Nonetheless, I’m fairly certain that we don’t have any data on the perch harvest from Seneca Lake or, more specifically, what portion of it goes towards the commercial fish market. Our sampling activities are not set up, at this time, to directly assess impacts from commercial harvest. We can infer impacts based on our fish population sampling results and what we think we know about angling pressure on some water bodies but currently that’s the best we can do. For example, we recently (2014) sampled Otisco Lake and the panfish size structure is now heavily skewed toward younger, smaller fish (which are growing well and are not stunted). We know from personal experience that sunfish fishing through the ice, at the north end, provided ample numbers of quality size fish 3-5 years ago. Where did they go the past few years? We are certain it was primarily into ice angler’s buckets since we had two consecutive long ice fishing seasons where staff observed consistent ice angling effort (often from the same individuals) for weeks on end. Over the course of these seasons the panfish size quality continually declined to the point where, by the middle of the 2014/15 ice season it was difficult to catch even a few “keepers.†Do we know how many of these anglers were selling the fish they caught? The answer is no. Do we suspect that guys fishing day after day, week after week are selling fish? Yes. Every lake and every species is different but there is no doubt in my mind that commercial sale of angler caught panfish can and does impact the quality of fishing in many waterbodies across the state.

With the pre set up seth green rigs, one thing you need to keep in mind- they were made for the deeper finger lakes. Hemlock is about 85ft deep. You will want to run your rigs with leaders/lures spaced about 10ft apart. I used about 7ft leaders which kept the lures from getting tangled. Sk8man is right. Hemlock can get pretty rough with a north or south wind. I used to fish it with a 12ft boat but quickly realized I needed a bigger boat. If you fish Canadice go to the north end in about 60 feet of water. I caught many lakers there with the seth greet rigs.

I have a pair of cannon downriggers that I cut the boom on so I didn't have to lean over the boat so much. I think they were sport trollers. Don't think they make that one any longer but they are similar to the unitroller. Comes with downrigger balls and bases to attach to the gunnels. I used to fish Hemlock and Canadice a lot. They can be tough lakes to fish if you don't know some secrets. Like some one mentioned, the seth green rig works very well. You drag a two lb weight on the bottom with 30lb line. The rod needs to be stiff to handle the weight of the lead. Then you have leaders at various points on the main line, say about 7 to 10 feet apart. I used 3 lures per rod but you can have as many as 5 lures. This way you are fishing one rod that has lures at different depths. One trick I learned with downriggers is to run towards shore off a point, let the rigger ball hit the bottom and then move out to deeper water. Hemlock doesn't always give up a ton of fish but it is a trophy lake. I've caught a 12lb lake trout, a 9 and a 8lb walleye, and the biggest rainbow I've ever seen that broke my line and my heart. It looked like a tarpon coming out of the water. Good luck!

I went perch fishing last week and all I caught was perch. Went yesterday and I could not get away from the gobies. Caught them from 20 to 60 feet. They were everywhere. Can't understand how one week can make such a difference. Anyone heard of gobies in Seneca yet?

I have to say I miss pulling copper. I used to use a flat fish and it was great fun feeling every stone on the bottom...until you felt the pull of a laker. There's fun in all kinds of fishing but there is something to be said for that connection to a fish without a rod. Too bad the zebra mussels ruined it this kind of fishing for me.