Seneca fishing?

[kayslay]

Hey folks, been fishing Seneca this summer. Fishing 2 riggers with stackers with leadcore out. Running 90 to 45 over all different FOWS with just mediocre lls. Always kill in cayuga. Is the winter fishery worth sticking out? Thanks for the input!

 

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[BrookTrout]

Seneca has been slower than usual this year for surem (based on my experience as well as people posting reports).  The winter bite can be worthwhile for sure for LLS but this winter is prolly gonna be on the slower side I would guess.  My best advice would be to cover lots of water as there are fish but they seem to be concentrated and move from day to day but once you find a good area keep working back through it and turns seem to turn em on.  Good luck!

 

 

[kayslay]

Appreciate the input! When this water cools down think it's time to run some streamers on Cayuga! Can't wait for the weeds and fleas to piss off. I've been catching healthy little shorts by the dozen on Seneca and wondering where the big dawgs are. Lol

[Sk8man]

Recently I've had  some folks asking me the same thing...."What's up with Seneca?" My reply is that after spending nearly my whole life fishing it  I have yet to do real well on trout and salmon fishing Seneca during the month of August. In years past I switched over to fishing perch but even that has been off there for some time now. Of course there has always been the king salmon addiction wispering in my ear by Lake O around now too. The trout and salmon and more so the lakers may be there in Seneca but they are inhabiting ddifferent places and depths than usual  and more spread out right now apparently. Much as June seems to be a month of "transition" for Lake O August seems to serve this function for Seneca. A few years ago Cayuga seemed pretty "dead" and plagued by lampreys but this year it has been action packed  for nearly all species although lakers continue to be a mainstay of the action and they are hard to avoid when fishing for silvers. Once the water temps begin to plummet on Seneca the fleas will greatly reduce and then vanish mid to late Fall but the lake often turns over in late August or early September too depending on weather. Hopefully things will improve for the trout and salmon fishing around mid Fall although for me it is then a conflict with the perch game on multiple lakes Once again, what a great place to live.....

[Hillside]

The State was out on Seneca with gill nets about a month ago and were bringing in a large number of large fish with full stomachs.  They were saying there are more bait fish this year than they have seen in over a decade.  

[ERABBIT]

47 minutes ago, Hillside said:

The State was out on Seneca with gill nets about a month ago and were bringing in a large number of large fish with full stomachs.  They were saying there are more bait fish this year than they have seen in over a decade.  

did you read a report on that some where ?

[kayslay]

Dec definitely caught a bunch of healthy fish. However as sk8man said their very spread out. I've read so much bait every time out sometimes 30 feet thick. Finding fish has proven difficult. Sk8man couldn't agree with you more, we're all lucky bastards:)

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[Hillside]

10 hours ago, ERABBIT said:

did you read a report on that some where ?

I did not read it, a family member of mine lived it second hand (and saw the fish).

[Hillside]

Within the last two days, the DEC came back with nets to collect bait fish.  They verified what they thought, an abundance of bait fish (alwifes).  The lakers are gorging on bait fish.

 

The issue they now have to figure out is what happened to the perch.  Alewives are known to feed aggressively on the fry of yellow perch and lake trout.

[ERABBIT]

12 hours ago, Hillside said:

I did not read it, a family member of mine lived it second hand (and saw the fish).

I saw the fish also just one day , about 25% were shot , they had one laker in the 10#+ class. If you get more info on all the testing and #,s they took I would like to see that report. THANKS for the reply.

[ERABBIT]

10 hours ago, Hillside said:

Within the last two days, the DEC came back with nets to collect bait fish.  They verified what they thought, an abundance of bait fish (alwifes).  The lakers are gorging on bait fish.

 

The issue they now have to figure out is what happened to the perch.  Alewives are known to feed aggressively on the fry of yellow perch and lake trout.

I saw that boat in the rain during the storm the day before. Was not sure if it was DEC or from the sonar unit. Then next morning saw a marked out in front then they showed up. Looked like one in 17' to maybe 30' and one other out in around a 100' in front of my camp.

[lakebound88]

Rumor going around, our Atlantic's were stocked in Cayuga a few years ago.... hmmm

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[ERABBIT]

1 hour ago, lakebound88 said:

Rumor going around, our Atlantic's were stocked in Cayuga a few years ago.... hmmm

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I've said that a number of times without any thing to back it. Just that Cayuga fishing came back so fast , with all the fish that were killed by the over amount of lamprey because of the high water. Then the three larger lakes west of them had a decline in there fishing !!!!! Now with a bad spring again wonder what will happen there in the next year or so with the lamprey. 

[john1947]

Flea solution has been 40 big game for top 100 ft

[Sk8man]

I know for a fact that some have in the past come from Keuka lake via the Keuka Outlet. I caught one before they were stocked in Seneca (1979 or so?) and I sent a pic in with my diary and that was DEC's opinion. They said at the time it was the first one reported.

Edited August 24, 2017 by Sk8man