nine mile/Mexico bay -new thread

[tinfin]

Out at 5:30 this a.m., fished in front of little salmon in 120 to 105 F.O.W. Some bait with a small amount of hooks, not a great screen but there is some life. While setting up the 280 dipsey takes a rip with no one home,(8"green glow chip followed by a green crincle) After getting set, the same dippy gets wacked again, with no one home, (same set up) After an hour or so the riggers started poping with the same  result. Set up that was hot, was green dot spinny over a light green fly with a bit of silver,not sure of the fly's name, same results, fish pops off after a brief charge to the stern, We went on to be 0 for 7 for the day, packed it in by 1:00   Fish have super hard mouths, probably should have skipped the trebles and went to inline singles, hoping for better penetration. Fish were on or close to bottom on all accounts!  Oh well that's fishing!  Also had a few huge rollers, kept us on our toes, LOL

[Adk1]

Looks like the fish are getting dark in color tick tock goes the clock

Edited August 27, 2015 by Adk1

[slip61]

Came up to Sandy Pond Last Saturday and have been fishing all week, lake has been a little angry all week. Fishing has been very tough, i have been out every morning at dawn and usually fish till 2 or the lake chases me off. Not one fish in the boat yet. I have tried everything in my arsenal. Flies spoons of every color combo and many different bait rigs. even put out the planer boards a few times with no luck. I was getting a few hits or releases to come up empty,so switched to single hooks.

  i went to the inlet this morning and decided to turn back, there were 6 footers at the shallow break. being alone in the boat i decided to wait until the afternoon fish.

This is the toughest week of fishing i have ever had in Mexico bay, I was here the last week of July and we killed them, Kings, coho and Lakers.

  As my 12 year old daughter always says the fun is in the fishing catching fish is a bonus. That being said I have had alot of fun this week but i am still waiting for the bonus!

 

The weather report says it is going to calm a bit by noon so i will go out for the afternoon fish. i hope i can get out to some deeper water i have had no luck in front of the plant

or the river in that 90 to 150 fow range. Tomorrow looks like the best weather on the lake maybe the Kings will agree and join us for the party.

 

The King i did hook and got a look at was on a Brown and white stripe Pro king Spoon dipped in Smelly Jelly Salmon Feast with a 30" leader and a White and pink chipped flasher. Down rigger at 90 in 105 Fow.

the water was rough and i had to stop the boat to gain on him, i got it to the boat after about a half hour, he was over 20 and very light colored.

 

  I t is nice to see some of you guys catching fish, i hope to join the club by the end of the week i have to head back to the grind on Saturday morning. i am running out of time.

 

Wish me luck, all the technology in my boat is not working this time!

 

Cheers

 

Mike

Edited August 27, 2015 by slip61

[Gualtom]

Launched out of Mexico this morning in my ski boat lol set up for salmon, me an the girlfriend made it out to 100 fow dropped the riggers to the bottom, 5 min later boom fish on! Got to snotty out there made it hard to troll an set up so we turned around an headed back to launch, will be back out later today to let the lake calm down.

Fish landed on green flasher an glow fly not sure of the names lol

Sent from my iPhone using Lake Ontario United

[EverybodyUp]

What speed is good for trolling Mexico Bay toward Salmon river in 100 fow?GPS or at the ball

Also what is the fisherman's VHF channel for the Salmon River area?

[tinfin]

Depends on what the fish want to see, yesterday the speed was 2.4 to 2.6 @ the ball. Channel 68- Goodluck!

[steelfire]

My final trolling report for the year. Fished Salmon River to the  Nuke plant for the last 7 days straight. We hooked a couple fish each day. Depth of best fish activity for us was from 110 ' to as deep as 130'. UV glow green flies and glow green and green dot spinnies worked best. In the sun, Mtn dew spinny with Hammer lime live worked well. Biggest king was 26.4. Had a couple females who eggs were not loose but ready to go soon. Also King of sting spoon trolled 5 feet off the bottom worked well. 

For the bad news. I have been fishing this same week for 12 years straight.And the number of fish we saw on the sonar is just plain sad. We averaged seeing 5 fish a day on the sonar. This is the time of year when the mother load shows up between Oswego and the Salmon river mouth. Years past we would mark Squadrons of salmon all over the place. As soon as you went thru them multiple rods would fire. The last two years it was just one fish here and there. Every body at the cleaning station all seemed to have just one or two fish each. All the charter boat captains we talked to are struggling to put a few fish in the boat every day. They all say its the worst season they have ever seen. If it wasn't for all the two year olds out in the blue water it would have been a bust this season . We have a dock at the house we rent in the estuary of the salmon river. Every year at this time regardless of water temp, there are always a bunch of kings sniffing around the RT 3 bridge and lower estuary. We saw none!!. We did however see 4 kings in the raceway at the hatchery in Altmar. One other notable observation we had was every fish we caught, had Lampreys  on it. And all of the lampreys were HUGE. Usually we see 1 or 2 a week but this was on EVERY fish we caught. Same with a bunch of other fishermen we talked to. I hate to be all doom and gloom but something is VERY wrong with the King fishery right now. Most of the local Charter boat captains think the Hatchery is not stocking the number of fish they claim to be. I hope it turns around for next year. I love everything about this fishery and I hate seeing it struggle. I'm no fish expert but..... two years in a row of bad returns is a sign.    I'm not sure of what........but I hope somebody starts looking into it.  Just my two cents. 

Edited August 28, 2015 by steelfire

[Rich s]

Thanks for the report

We returned yesterday from a 6 day run . Most days the lake was just to angry for us and we only put in a 2 days effort . We didn't feel like battling 4-6 footers just to try and fish . That said, I have been fishing the Mexico area EVERY weekend all summer since June 18th and fortunately the lake played nice every time out so we put many , many hrs and miles in that time . Our results have been dismal for the hrs logged. Folks here have been great trying to offer help and advice but as said you , we have seen very few fish on our sonar . To me , givin that , I don't think our approach or gear is the problem if the fish are just not there to be caught. It could be location but having the best of the best gear is not going to help without having fish around .

We have 2 more weekends to fish before I pull the boat for the season .

Lets hope they are just hiding " somewhere " out there and the river gets a FAR better showing then last season . If that's the case then I will at least realize we need to redefine our approach .

Thanks agin :

Rich

Edited August 28, 2015 by Rich s

[Adk1]

yeah, been another tough season, second one in a row right?

[maddog]

We were up 2 weeks ago in Oswego for a couple of days. We managed a few browns and didn't see or hear of a King being caught. Nothing at the cleaning station either.  Maybe there was a die-off due to the super cold winters the last 2 years?

[Finders Keepers]

While I agree that numbers have been way down last year and this year, it seems the North shore has been pretty good. I remember a few years back when we had a banner year, the north shore really struggled. Maybe (hopefully) this is the case where for whatever reason the bulk of the kings hugged the north shore leaving us to search for a few each outing. Time will tell....

[skipper19]

Look closely at the green shaded areas of the lake. You see no green in the mexico bay area at all. The green water is fertile for bait and cover. You would have to go very very far off shore to productive water. Probably near the fence. Until the north wind stops blowing warm water into the corner over there, it will be offshore for a while. That's why the Canadian shore is doing better. No lack of fish just lack of good inside water. Same on the west end. Only because of the close proximity of the Niagara outflow the distance is not as far, but still offshore a good 12 miles. You will burn some gas for a while for consistent fishing. This week the forecast is showing more south and southwest winds. Maybe next weekend the cooler water from the north will swap out the more warm inside waters and be more favorable for staging matures to become intrested in the near shore setup.

[skipper19]

See the green tint moving across from Niagara to the north. It's dividing point from black looking water is near the center of the lake. The most black water happens to be in the corner over there in Mexico Bay. A lot of it!

[Organized Chaos]

It's over boys, been fishing this lake for over 30 years. Trust me it's over

[Rich s]

Well I'm not out this weekend but my boat and crew are. Combat fishing today was their early report ..

[Landshark]

It's over boys, been fishing this lake for over 30 years. Trust me it's over

Elaborate? The fishery or the season?

[Organized Chaos]

The salmon fishery as we have known it. The few good years were because of the tremendous amount of naturals. Simply look at the return rate of the tagged fish to the hatchery. The numbers don't lie, it has been a steady decline year after year. Yes , Ontario still holds the greatest amount of bait fish of all the Great Lakes. Unless DEC is not releasing what they say they are( which I doubt). The Browns and the slimers are doing fantastic but the Salmon different story.

[skipper19]

I take it you aren't looking at the "real reason" 70 degree water to 140 feet all the way to Canada :rolleyes::blink::huh: tagged returned fish are not the entire picture. Thousands upon thousands are caught and never scanned. In fact the scanning data collection has ended already. This coming next week and weekend are going to miss many thousands of data points due to early termination of the collection program. Therefore it's actually quite useless information lacking significant factual data on loss over a large percentage on catch rates across the entire lake. I don't regard it to be the end all. ...and I can't sleep cause gobies...zombies...will eat me.

[minion]

There's plenty of salmon ....there not to hungry today for some reason:huh: from 120-550 fow

Sent from my SCH-I545 using Lake Ontario United mobile app

Edited August 29, 2015 by minion

[fishdepot]

Afternoon bite launching at 130 till dark never know

[skipper19]

Afternoon bite launching at 130 till dark never know

That's actually a good idea. Late afternoon after full moon clear nite.

Those fish down deep are cold offshore. Slowly digesting that nightime binge on piles of alewives. They will look again.

[fishdepot]

Going old school Dodgers jplug

[splitwindow1]

We just spent the last two weeks fishing the Sandy pond area.Last week it looked like a desert from 85' to 150'. Right now there are a ton of salmon stacked in 110' to 130' off the North dunes to Sandy Creek. The fish are out of tempin 60 to 70 degree water. We landed 10 adults in the last 2 days. Green on green and green glow j plugs did the trick.

[on the lam]

There are many fish inside in Oswego/Mexico area but not the norm. But offshore 650 to 700 plus there are plenty of 2 year olds and matures, and have been for weeks. Double diget catches many this week for those who ventured out. Don't give up yet.

[Rich s]

It's funny . We have been inside and guys have been outside . We go outside and guys go inside .

After 11 straight weeks of fishing that area , I still can't figure it out . Next year you betcha I will !!

While I didn't fish this weekend , I'm not into river style fishing on the Great Lake as my crew reported today .

Will be back at it next week , I will try outside , lol

Rich