Cayuga Lake Report 8/20/17

[Fishbowl836]

Cayuga Lake Report 8/20/17

Launched out of Myers Point at 7:00 AM.. Ran to the middle of the lake and trolled North towards AES.  This area has been very good for the last couple of weeks with a mix bag of fish. Plan for the morning was to run riggers in the silver zone and experiment with leader length from the fly to the Spin Doctor using Mag wire Dipsy on a #1 setting 180 to 275 out. Used a number of different color Iron Duke Trolling flies for this test.  Ran leader lengths from 12" to as much as 36" from the SD.  Landed nine Lakes and four Salmon in five hours of fishing but for some reason I had the dropsies. Dropped three Lakers and one nice Rainbow at the back of the boat.  All silvers were caught on UV spoons of different colors.  The experiment on leader length was very interesting. With a short leader (12 to 18") it seemed like the fish would come up and try to hit it but would not hook up.  I was surprised by this because I didn't think that could happen.  The rod tip would suddenly move or jolt but then no one home.  Just not sure what was going on.  But my guess is that the fly being that close to the SD the fish was very skiddish, not sure. Never hooked a fish in that configuration.  I normally run the leader length around 22 to 24".  As expected, as I increased the length to that distance I did catch fish.  My next leader length zone was 30" to 36".   As I increased the distance behind the SD I notices that the fly just seems to lose some of its action as I let it down.  The fly just seems to make a bigger circle with no additional action.  I did catch fish using a leader length from 20" all the way out to 32".  Has anyone else experimented with leader length before?  Not really sure if this is consistent from day to day or if that was how it was that day.  I do no, I have had days that the fish would not hit a certain length leader and make a small change to the length and you are now hooking fish. Not really sure if this was worth the time and effort but was just curious about this so I wanted to see what would happen.  Either way it was a good morning of fishing all the way up to Rocky Dock and it was surprisingly quiet until around noon for a Sunday morning. If you have experimented with the leader length between the SD and fly before I would like to hear your thoughts.  Attached are a few photos.  Thank you.

Edited August 23, 2017 by Fishbowl836

[goin hungry]

I have yet to get ff to work out. Don't know what I'm doing wrong, but thanks for your post - lots of good information! What are you using for leaders and what flashers are you using? If spin doctors, which holes you using? Did you catch all the fish out in the middle or move around the depths? Thanks and congrats on the great fish!

 

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[Sk8man]

I think you pretty much summed up what seems to happen....there is a length that generates the ation that the fish want and it pretty much coordinates with what the dipsey manufacturers recommend....probably not "accidental" . I also notice it with the flies that I tie myself the longer ones lose theirsction at the usual trolling speeds and if too short they whip too much  and the fish have a hard time grabbing them. I noticed that a few years ago when some of the guys posted videos of the fish trying to grab flies whipping sideways so I started making mine a little bigger and heavier so that the general action of the flasher stays pretty much the same but the fly slows its sideways movement a little allowing the fish to grab it a little easier. It reduced the "dropped" situation a lot.