Smelt dipping

[Outdoor Lover]

As of 7:00 AM, the Lake Ontario deep water temp. is 35 degrees........

 

[BobM]

Wow, seems like the Temp dropped a few degrees. Well, Smelt on Memorial may not be a bad thing either....LOL. Really late this year.

[Outdoor Lover]

So is Spring......& it gets later every year.

[BobM]

I just checked the Niagara River temp at the falls, 39 degrees. It might be worth a try to spend an evening wading in the river this weekend. They like 42 degrees but it is also getting quite late too. Good Luck.

[Steve.e]

• Still have ice flowing down the river.Hopefully gone by this weekend. If so, they should start running hard. Verified at a bait shop yesterday.

[john1947]

has anyone info on whether the smelt run wasstill on at lewiston?

thanks

john

[BobM]

Here is an updated link to DEC in western NY. No Smelt yet, according to them. Water is still too cold, 35 degrees in the river.

https://www.dec.ny.gov/outdoor/9217.html

[john1947]

thanks for letting me know

 

[BobM]

No problem, glad to help if I can.

[BobM]

Any action yet? One site says a some showing up out deep, Another denies any smelt at all yet.

[Lucky13]

If you take a look at the Baitfish report for Lake Ontario, you will note that the smelt biomass is just a shadow of what it once was.  Because they are so few and far between, except maybe at Lewiston, you kind of have to go and stand around and watch and wait on the chance that a small school actually comes into the tributary you are on.  The days of filling 5 gallon pails are long gone.  Most of us gave up our nets  long ago.

[Smeltz]

I went to Artpark yesterday to dip & not one car in the parking lot, so we left. Then off to the Sand Docks. A few people night fishing and one dipper on the end. He had his net in but was looking around with his headlamp for smelt in the water. Not a one and he wasn't even dipping. Nothing to net. After that, headed back to Hamburg. I did notice that the water level was up quite a bit at the launch ramp. That jet boat is going to play he77 with the shoreline.

[john1947]

12 hours ago, Smeltz said:

I went to Artpark yesterday to dip & not one car in the parking lot, so we left. Then off to the Sand Docks. A few people night fishing and one dipper on the end. He had his net in but was looking around with his headlamp for smelt in the water. Not a one and he wasn't even dipping. Nothing to net. After that, headed back to Hamburg. I did notice that the water level was up quite a bit at the launch ramp. That jet boat is going to play he77 with the shoreline.

thanks for the report, 

[Smeltz]

john1947:  I'm going to take another trip up there maybe Tues or Wed & will report (hopefully Tues). I'll take my stream thermometer along & get a water temp. The dippers know. If I saw 3 or 4 trucks in the lot I would have given it a try but if there's absolutely no one there that only means one thing!

[BobM]

Ok Great! Let us all know. This very very strange that nothing has happened yet. Thanks.

[tuffishooker]

The Lake Trout and now the cormorants pretty much wiped them out !

[BobM]

Usually Charter Captains report Smelt in the bellies of trout and salmon at the mouth of the river.Have not heard that this year. Also, I think the Gobbles have something to do with decreases in fish populations too. Too bad....they have ruined the lake fishing everywhere, unless you're fishing for those @#$%$# things. Plenty of those around!

[john1947]

hopefully someone will come up with a control for gobies.I thohgt maybe we can rig up a device to elctrocute them aybe drag a cable over the bottom  seeing they are shallow water fish

[Capt Vince Pierleoni]

Smelt are now being found in the stomachs of fish from Niagara county waters. Also reliable reports of them in fish from Oswego county waters. They are late to run the Niagara river this Spring because of the late ice out. Temp is climbing now in the river.  

[Smeltz]

I'll be there Tues to check things out! Thx much!

 

[BobM]

Ok, Like I always looked for. They show up as food for trout first. I think this is the week for all to try. ......If the rain ever stops!

[jimski2]

Smelt are a foreign invader that exterminated the blue pike, whitefish, ciscoes and lake trout.Things will change for the better now.

[Lucky13]

https://www.dec.ny.gov/animals/85787.html

 

There are lots of Lakes on the map that have smelt and have healthy lake trout populations.  Lamprey and over harvest are usually given credit for the decline of Lake Trout  populations in LO, and water quality in the 50's and 60's in the big pond wasn't helping anything.

 

From an Ohio publication on Blue Pike: (my bold)  http://www.ohiohistorycentral.org/w/Blue_Pike?rec=2783

The extinct blue pike (Stizostedion vitreum glaucum) were often confused with walleyes, of which it was a subspecies. Differences include the larger eye of the blue pike and their bluish-gray back, fading into bluish-silver on their sides. Another name for the blue pike is the blue walleye.

Blue pike had similar spawning activity of the walleye. They did not build nests, but were free spawners during April and May. Adults reached an average body length of nine to sixteen inches and weighed five ounces to one and a half pounds. They were carnivorous, eating mainly fish but also aquatic insects.

Blue pike habitat consisted of the clearer areas of Lake Erie, mainly in the eastern two-thirds of the lake. Bass Islands in the fall and winter Blue Pike were extremely important to the Lake Erie commercial fishing industry. The commercial catch in 1885 was 3,152,400 pounds. The annual catch for all U.S. and Canadian ports between 1950 and 1957 ranged from 2,000,000 to 26,000,000 pounds. In 1959, catch numbers dropped to only 79,000 pounds. In 1964, fish dealers sold less than 200 pounds of blue pike. Years of commercial fishing had taken their toll. Similar statistics occurred in the United States wherever there were blue pike.

No blue pike were found around Cleveland between 1971 and 1975. They were thought to be extirpated from the Ohio. In 1977, the United States Fish and Wildlife Service listed them as endangered in the United States. The blue pike has been considered extinct since approximately 1983. The main causes are attributed to uncontrolled commercial fishing and hybridization with walleye.

 

Smelt are definitely nonindigenous, but I've seen nothing that indicates that they have had any effect on other populations to the extent that alewife have. 

 

 

[BobM]

Anyone caught any....no news?

[BobM]

I wonder if the Finger Lakes are any better for Smelting. Historically Niagara has always been bountiful.