Canandaigua 12-23 and 12-26

[chuck527]

Started around 10am on the 23rd with some perch fishing that was somewhat lackluster. Decided after an hour to target some trout. Trolled North from midlake marking some lakers tight to bottom and not much suspended. The heavy predicted winds just died and we decided to work some jigs. Started on the fish we marked in 100fow but they were pretty negative and we finally did boat one about 6lbs. Ran a bit north and set up a little deeper and it didn't take long and we got another about 8lbs. We had a string of grabs after that and landed 4 more from 5 to 10lbs. Kept two for the smoker and called it a day. Headed out about the same time on Saturday with the intent of breaking in the new kicker and sticking with the trolling game. Threw a few jigs for about an hour and switched to trolling. Hit the same points from the 23rd and it started kinda slow. Noticed the deep rigger rod bouncing a little and Chris (Bass Pro) reeled in a nice laker. That would pretty much set the tone as we landed two more that never even tripped the releases. The odd part about the whole thing is when I wired in the kicker to the battery and started the humminbird back up it was showing the bottom depth as 125(numerical value) but on the graph itself it was showing the bottom at around 100ft on the horizontal depth lines?? As best as I can tell the numerical depth appears correct or at least closer in reference to the gps map side by side.

[Sk8man]

Nice going Paul. This weather has been unreal for this time of year hasn't it? I'm not sure what to make of the difference in depth markings unless maybe the display (LCD graph part) screen rewrite wasn't "catching up" at that point with the digital component for some reason (temp?)

[Fbog12]

Good for you, Paul!  So strange to see this kind of report at the end of December, but it's great!  Looks like things are changing a bit looking ahead.  Time to think about the Rochester boat show at the end of January!

[tiogafishaddict]

Jigging for lakers must be a blast.... great report

[Nautitroller]

Great report, sounds like they turned on a bit later in the day. That seems to be typical in the winter... Any thoughts on why? Feeding pattern only once a day?

Sent from my C771 using Lake Ontario United mobile app

[CVO]

It was definitely comfortable on the new boat with full enclosure and the heater running! Thanks again Paul

[Sk8man]

Anyone out there thinking about a guide trip on Canandaigua I'd be checking out Paul  as he is a very knowledgeable fisherman with a real nice new boat and he has a handle on the lake as good as anyone out there.....it would be money well spent

[chuck527]

Thanks Les! Anytime Chris. As far as the feeding patterns go I don't think there concentrated to once a day but later is almost generally better as the bait tends to move more later in the day which seems to drive the feeding. Even some of the die hard perch guys I know told me a couple weeks ago they struggled all day and the last hour of light they caught over 50.

[chuck527]

dbl post

Edited December 29, 2015 by chuck527

[Nautitroller]

Thanks for the insight, bait on the fingers in the winter seem to hang deep. Is it because they are safer down there or water temp? Or both? Itching to get out...

Sent from my C771 using Lake Ontario United mobile app

[chuck527]

Primarily because of the warmer compressed water column on the bottom. South and deep is a pretty constant migration of bait in the winter. The only bait I really marked was south of mid-lake and 200ft right on bottom. I have some pretty heavy jigs and next time out I'm gonna give those a whirl.

[ERABBIT]

39* water is the key.

 

got this from:

 

http://www.alcademics.com/2012/01/how-water-freezes.html

 

 

How Water Freezes

This post is about how a lake freezes, but it should be more or less the same for how an insulated container freezes in a freezer. The information is from the excellent book, Ice: The Nature, the History, and the Uses of an Astonishing Substance by Mariana Gosnell. 

Turnover

As temperatures lower, the water in a lake "turns over." The top layer of water is heated by the sun during the day and is therefore warmer and lighter than the layers below it. At night without the sun, the cool air above the lake cools the top layer of water, which makes it denser than the layers beneath it. The top layer of water sinks. The new top layer gets colder until it too sinks. This is repeated until the top part of the water column reaches the same cool temperature. 

This temperature is not the freezing temperature of 32 degrees Fahrenheit, but 39 degrees. That's the temperature at which water is at its densest and heaviest. This also means that water contracts at this temperature and takes up the least space. 

Latent Heat of Fusion

After the lake has reached 39 degrees throughout the top part of the water column, as the cold air above it sinks to a lower temperature than the water, the water cools off to below 39 degrees. Now, however, the water getting colder makes it lighter than the 39 degree water below it, so the water no longer turns over. It stays on top and continues to cool until freezing. 

For water at 32 degrees to convert to ice at 32 degrees, a lot of energy must be given up. Normally it takes 1 calorie of energy to change the temperature of 1 gram of water by 1 degree Celsius, but when water is changing phases to ice, it must give up nearly nearly 80 calories of energy to change phase without changing temperature at all.

Sometimes as the water is giving up the 'latent heat' to change phases, little wisps of fog are visible above the water's surface.  

 

 

[Nautitroller]

That's great info guys, I have read that the finger lakes are fed by many underground springs. The water temp of the springs should be 55 degrees, no? Wikipedia says that Seneca has springs feeding it 328,000 gallons per minute and that because of its depth it stays at 39 degrees throughout the year. So my theory that the bait stays down because they are safer in the dark may be off but I'm sticking with it, lol!

Sent from my C771 using Lake Ontario United mobile app

[FishingTheFL]

I wanna say Seneca fish are deep... last time I went trolling in November I couldn't find a fish in water under 180fow. Heavy marks in 200 fow. And that's where I caught a salmon and laker 100 ft down

[Sk8man]

Usually you'll see lakers deep and near bottom near bait which is also usually bottom oriented as well within that 150-200 ft range but you'll also find a few very large lakers in shallow water competing with large pike for whatever they can find there e.g. small perch, sunfish, rockbass and more. They are pretty much scavengers when cruising in shallow and I have never caught a small laker in the shallows at this time of year just big ones and I think it is because the bigger lakers can compete with the pike while the smaller ones could be considered "bait". The browns, landlocks and rainbows can be scarce about now at the north end but sometimes they can be found around the mouth of the outlet at Dresden and in the southern parts of the lake out from stream mouths especially. Slower trolling with heavier lures or spoons  that "wobble" (e.g. Daredevels) often take the bigger pike and lakers about now.

Edited December 30, 2015 by Sk8man