Cayuga 9/20 & 21

[Mower]

Fished long and hard both days. Saturday stayed on the west side did ok but not great. Average fish across the board. 3 Salmon 21 to 23 inches, handfull of lakers all small, 3 browns over 4 lbs and a few dinks. Everything was caught in less than 150 of water. Could not get a deep water pattern to come together. Downriggers down 50 to 70 w/ cheaters and dipseys from 180 to 270. I really fished the temps. Taughannock has good bait in front of it.

Sunday hit the east side w/ much more success. Fished the Lansing Station area to AES. Kept the riggers in 54 to 56 degree water over 200 to 300 and the fish came. 5 salmon over 5lbs, 2 Browns - one 9lbs, 10 lakers and at least 8 or 9 dinks all before 11:30 AM. The downriggers brought the majority of the fish, action was mostly at the ball, everything on the cheaters was small. Spoons yellow and orange w/ silver back and pink/white w/ white back. Dispeys took a few lakers 245 to 265 out. Most of our hits came on a speed up technique. Maintained 1.6 at the ball then bumped it to 2 or 2.1 and the riggers fired. maitained 1.6 or the 2 to 2.5 and nothing. We stumbled on a great pattern by luck. Another troller was going to squeeze us shallow and the speed bump did the trick.

Mower.

[chowder]

Thanks for the excellent post! Speed fluctuations must have helped to trigger strikes from fish that are becoming less aggressive. We are planning to go over on Wens(9/24), but probably will not get there before 10 or 11. I will post our findings.Was the T.cline still holding pretty consistent or did you find down temps changing a lot?

[Mower]

Chowder T-cline was ranged anywhere from 58 to 74 feet down. Really fluctuated in front of Taughannock. I stayed in the back and kept moving the riggers up and down to keep the presentation in it. My average depth was probably 63 to 67. I'll be back up Fri eve, sat and sun. PM me and I'll give you my cell maybe we can catch up? or 68 on the VHF Mower is the handle.

[stinger]

Thanks for the heads up Mower. I haven't fished since Labor Day and that's like an eternity to me.

I took a day off of work yesterday and I launched out of Long Point. Even though I don't use temp probe I had an idea of were to start looking for fish because of your post. I went right to the drop-off areas and looked in the 60' to 150' bottom to scout out some bait. As soon as I found some bait I dropped the secret weapons down (spoons & flies). The fish were taking both and as the morning went on the spoons started to produce a little better. I ended up with a mini slam (couldn't produce a legal salmon). Did 16 for 17 and I was happy . Took one 3.5lb rainbow home to eat and the rest are still swimming. Lakers were running small (18" to 24" size)

Flies were white on a white flasher and green/LLB on a silver glow dodger out 180' to210' on the wire dip. Spoons were 2 7/8" blk/white 10' behind the ball at 50' & 60' down. That 50' to 60' range was were the active fish were at. Got all four species there. Not one touch on the slidders.

Fleas are still hanging around up at that end of the lake.

So again thanks for posting your info. Hope others will also

[chowder]

We launched from Meyers at about noon on Wens 9/24. It was the maiden voyage for our new to us 96 Starcraft Islander. Cruised up to AES and setup in 240FOW. Set riggers running in 56 deg water, and 190-210' out on the wire. the white smartfish/green atomic was the hot ticket for the lakers, 22"-31".We got the best lakers after crossing to the west side on the rise just south of Sheldrake point. I just could not get the rigger program to produce anything big, I think we got 5-6 but they were all 13-16" LLs,bows and browns. I did get one ok brown on 8 colors, pink alewife pattern spoon( this fish was almost certainly out of temp). There was a lot to get used to in the new boat and I probably should have switched spoon colors on the riggers more, and experimented with other temp ranges,water is mixing some and you have to move the balls up and down a lot if you want to fish temps. I do think I need more weight on the DR with the Depth Raider probe, it had a lot of blowback compared with the other side.I was also frustrated by not being able to get the sonar picture to look like it does in my alumacraft( same Lowrance unit only in the Islander the sonar and the GPS are in separate units)- but, part of the problem was probably due a weakening T-cline and changing bait patterns too. It was a really nice day on the water and the boat performed flawlessly even if the new owner did not.