A few cool recent Cayuga Fish

[Reel Doc]

Yes but, the fight of one nice King can equal several Lakers......

[suttontroller94]

13 hours ago, fisherdude said:

I have also wondered how long before the fish take a hit from the fishing pressure. I keep 2 to 4 fish for consumption every other time out , I get out a couple times a week or try to . I seen charters come back in with pack coolers . Witch is ok by me . I would want to keep fish to take home also . Catch and release.. When the water is cold the fish go back pretty easy. Now it's hot it's much harder to get them to go back . I have had my share of floaters..witch makes me feel I killing the fish just so I can have a good time ..
I'm a rookie so this is just imo.

I fished Seneca for the most part and move over to Cayuga cause the fishing got hard and the quality die off for me . I got my fingers crossed to see Seneca to return to the pass days and Cayuga to keep producing the way it is . ..

Sent from my XT1609 using Lake Ontario United mobile app
 

I agree about how the over harvest and pressure are going to take a negative effect on the lake. Especially now that ALL of the other finger lakes are struggling and there are far more boats on Cayuga. Changing the limit to 5 fish each may not have been the best option. I know the boat I've been mating on is one of the charters you're talking about and we do encourage catch and release however as you mentioned if they are allowed to keep a limit you can't deny that to them. In my opinion I would like to see a 3 Laker limit again and maybe even entertain the idea of only 1 fish over 28inches. Alot of people wouldn't like it however protecting the strongest of our finger lakes for future generations needs to be a priority.

[Reel Doc]

Good point.  Does anyone, DEC included, know the status of successful natural reproduction in Cayuga lake?  Last I knew a mineral imbalance was such that essentially no lake trout could reproduce in Cayuga.  If that is true, then harvest rate control is not a factor unless a tremendous number of fishermen suddenly deplete the numbers.  Restocking rates are equivalent or above current catch rates. Otherwise the fishery would suffer.  I would sooner wonder the status of the landlocked program as very few reports of legal sized catches this year and I feel like despite my best efforts most skippies I catch do not survive after release.

[Lewis863]

I would say that 70 percent of the fish I catch are all natural spawn...

[Gill-T]

I saw a lot of fish with lateral fin clips 

[rustyrat]

On 7/11/2019 at 8:25 AM, Gill-T said:

Question for you finger lakes regulars. Do lake trout break off their teeth or gill raker parts into your fingers when handling?  My hands are a painful mess from last week. 

We call that lake trout fingers.  Yes it hurts.  

RR

[rustyrat]

I have a 3 laker limit on my boat.  I did not tell my customers that it changed.  5 in combo.  No one has called me out yet.  

RR

[justtracytrolling]

Kudos Rustyrat!  You certainly can impose your own conservation minded limits for customers if it is a personal concern.   I try to teach a mixed bag approach to my customers on harvesting fish along with taking mature fish and releasing some for future.  I take the approach that everyone needs to practice some level of conservation, and in order to do that you have to take home less than a limit especially when it's easy.   I don't allow any customers to keep tigers no matter if it's legal or not!  I'm not judging anyone following the law, but on my boat I set the limit and my customers come back year after year and respect the conservation.  I certainly kept more fish than I needed to for years just because it was legal and I could.  I matured enough to realize we all can make a difference by taking a long term conservation minded approach to our harvest.