Sodus this past weekend

[Jeff Mick]

Made the trip up to Sodus Bay from CT this past weekend with my Dad.  Saturday was windy and cold so we headed up to Oswego Harbor.  We were able to troll inside the break walls for a few hours but there wasn't much going on.  No fish. 

 

Sunday we were able to fish out of Sodus and found some fish over by Maxwell Bay.  Water was a bit warmer and there was some color to it also.  Trolled that area out to about Boller Point. 

 

We did well trolling stick baits.  It wasn't fast and furious, but we picked at them.  The fish liked the smithwick floating rattling rogues.  In AYU Killer.  Thank you to Crazy Yankee for suggesting trying out some of the new custom colors.  Your videos / reports have helped us out a bunch! 

 

Tried some bright colored stick baits also (bayrats and storms) but they didn't seem to want those.   

 

Found some water that was about 43 degrees.  The rest of the lake seemed to be at 40.            

 

We were pretty shallow.  Usually under 10 feet of water.

 

The fish we got into seemed to be stocked either 1 or 2 years ago.   No big boys.   

 

 

 

Wanted to ask a general question to you guys.  Should we be fishing in deeper water to try and get into some of the bigger browns.  15 or 20 feet of water?  

 

Any suggestions would be appreciated!

 

 

 

Thanks,  Jeff Mickiewicz

 

[lumberjohn]

We'll be fishing Sodus this weekend. You were right where you needed to be. My dad caught the 1986 ESLO Derby Brown Trout winner out of Sodus in 6' of water in front of the Bluffs. It was 23.6 lbs on a glow green Rebel stick-bait.

[Grady95]

Jeff,

For what it's worth, when I fish browns in the spring, I'm running anywhere between I-Bay to Pultneyville.  The areas around Sodus are always productive as are the obvious ones like Webster Park, etc.  So as lumberjohn suggested, you're in a good spot.  As far as depths, this time of year I like seeing the sun come up from the water and I have no problem running in-line planers as close to the shore as I am comfortable getting them.  You'll find plenty of browns in 10' or less, especially early in the day.  About 100' back from the board, somewhere around 2.0-2.3, run shallow diving sticks like Smithwicks, Rapalas, Yo-Zuri or anything like that.   Good luck!

[Jeff Mick]

Thank you guys for your responses!  We only get up to the lake once a year but love the challenge of fishing Lake Ontario.  Can't image a 20 plus pound brown!  Any pics? 

 

We didn't use boards this trip.  Planned on running two stick baits, one off each side at 125 ft back.  And then a spoon down the chute in the wash.  We ended up just running the two rods with stick baits.

 

We could see the colored up water along the shoreline in certain areas and was wishing we had brought the boards to get in tight.  Sometimes things can get too crazy with just me and my dad in the boat when we start adding rods or the boards though.  Think next time we may try them just off the shallow side of the boat. 

 

Like the idea also of being out there with the sun coming up!  

 

 

Thanks again for the input!

 

Jeff Mickiewicz  

 

   

 

  

 

 

 

 

[lumberjohn]

1986 ESLO Derby Brown Triut division winner.

[lumberjohn]

Picture of my dad and his 23.6 lbs Brown with the Starcraft boat he won.

[Jeff Mick]

That is really cool!  Beautiful fish and boat.    

 

Good luck up there this weekend also. 

 

  

[Grady95]

 

 

Jeff,

 

All I use anymore are simple in-line planer boards.  Have not had the mast up in years.  I run Off-Shore brand, one per side.  Probably get yourself a set for around $100.  You'll wind up using them for walleyes anyway and I have even been know to run them for shallow water northerns.  As for "a spoon down the chute," that's a good idea for a small boat with minimal tackle but I would suggest that line at least should either be lead core of have a clip on in-line weight of some kind.  Spoons get weird in prop wash, even well back.  Once I switched that to the lead core or snap weights, that line fired a lot better.

Anyway, hope you had fun!  Making memories with your dad is all that matters anyway.

[Jeff Mick]

Thanks for that info on the boards.  A few years back when we first tried the lake for browns I had picked up a couple of the mini planer boards from off shore tackle.  They didn't seem to get the baits out very far from the boat so I found a used mast set up and tried that out.  Worked well but it was hard to use with just me and my dad in the boat. 

 

For the in line boards you are talking about are those the ones that you can remove from the line when the board gets near the boat and then you fight just the fish? 

 

In the past when we have run that one rod down the chute with a spoon I put a giant split shot (quarter ounce I think) on the main line side of my barrel swivel that connects the main line to the leader.   

 

I think that worked okay for us but it has been a couple years since the last time we did that.

 

And yes I am very lucky to enjoy fishing with my dad.