Lake Oneida

[Labguy32]

Heading up Wednesday for 5 days and going to try my hand at walleye fishing.  Any tips for a first timer?  I will be staying in Brewerton.

 

Thanks in advance!

[dockdoctor]

Go to "Oneida lake diehards " on Facebook.  Great group of guys willing to help out 

[Stillwater]

If you are set up to troll and have a fish finder I would start by trolling sticks and harnesses in 25 to 40 feet of water. Troll east and look for marks on your screen. If you find some stay on them. I haven't been to Oneida this summer but usually caught eyes fishing the drop off on the north shore just east of Cleveland dock. I like to jig with bucktail jig with a night crawler. Good luck. Hopefully you get some.

Sent from my SM-G975U using Lake Ontario United mobile app

[Jomat]

Was up there last week...opposite side of the lake than you but a ton of fish East of messenger shoal in 35 to 40 fow.  They were preferring smaller shad sized baits and crawler harnesses, over big cranks.  Good luck!

[HOOKEM & COOKEM]

Took my son out Saturday afternoon fished 3:30 til 6. Trolled East south of 119 to 109

caught 2 keepers and 1 short lost 2 others blue flicker shad and blue flicker minnow was what they wanted. 

[Todd in NY]

15 hours ago, HOOKEM & COOKEM said:

Took my son out Saturday afternoon fished 3:30 til 6. Trolled East south of 119 to 109

caught 2 keepers and 1 short lost 2 others blue flicker shad and blue flicker minnow was what they wanted. 

 

How did you keep the grass off your hooks?

I fished there last week and I couldn't keep the grass off my hooks. I caught a small keeper on a perch colored spoon.

[HOOKEM & COOKEM]

38 minutes ago, Todd in NY said:

 

How did you keep the grass off your hooks?

I fished there last week and I couldn't keep the grass off my hooks. I caught a small keeper on a perch colored spoon.

Wasn't much in the way of grass, there was some green moss-like/slime that would build up on the snap locks that I had to clean every so often. It was blowing pretty good that might have had something to do with it. I've found on calm days trolling I tend to have to clean more weeds of lines on Oneida. What speed do you troll at running spoons? I tried to keep it between 1.6-1.9 running the cranks, thought that might be a little to slow to run spoons but I thought about throwing one out there.

[Chowdaire]

Inline boards catch the weeds but when they're bad I put a snap weight 50' ahead of the lure or just an OR-16 clip if I don't want to affect the depth I'm running. That'll catch the weeds so your lures run clean. I'll also bury the tips of my leadcore rods in the water sometimes so the weeds catch the rod and don't go down the line. 

 

 

[Todd in NY]

44 minutes ago, HOOKEM & COOKEM said:

Wasn't much in the way of grass, there was some green moss-like/slime that would build up on the snap locks that I had to clean every so often. It was blowing pretty good that might have had something to do with it. I've found on calm days trolling I tend to have to clean more weeds of lines on Oneida. What speed do you troll at running spoons? I tried to keep it between 1.6-1.9 running the cranks, thought that might be a little to slow to run spoons but I thought about throwing one out there.

 

The wind was blowing 5-10 when we started fishing, so we drifted some jigs until the wind died down. Then we trolled at 1.9-2.2 mph with a worm harness, a stick bait and that spoon. We never got a bite on the worm harness. We had two hits on the stick bait but no hookups. We marked a ton of fish between 15ft and 30ft, but only one taker. We changed colors, shapes and sizes regularly, but I've never had any luck there on calm days. Granted, I've only fished that lake 5 times (3 days last summer, and 2 days this month), so I'm still trying to dial things in.

[Chowdaire]

If you're marking suspended fish up on bait try running faster. I generally stagger lines around 20' down (+/-5-10') and run 2.0-2.5 for those fish, and have had stretches where the fish wouldn't go unless it was 3+ (not often). The other way guys do real well is slow and low. Under 2mph and within 10' of the bottom.

 

Lots of ways to catch 'em but those are a couple if you like to troll.

[justtracytrolling]

The 2.5- 3mph reaction bite is very dependable there in the middle of the day when they don't wanna bite.  Even works for structure fish if you can get near em.  Great tip for anywhere when it's tough.  Everyone has this preconceived notion walleye want it slow, but that's simply not true.   I don't do it here as much these days because it's tough to land big fish when you hook em at speed especially on braid.  No prob with that on Oneida though!  There are some lures with lots of action at lower speeds that allow you to fish a feeding bite and or reaction bite at the same time.  I do it here every day.  Vibration is definitely a big key and usually I prefer a tight action that doesn't wander so you get bit if they feed also.  

[justtracytrolling]

Small walleye spoons like the scorpions run very well from 1.8-2.2.  You can catch a little slower or faster, but I want em at 2 ideally.  2 is also a great speed for flicker minnows, and shads, husky jerks, and honestly most hard baits.  you can run crawlers mixed in at the same speed off spoon harnesses, gambler rigs, or hatchet blades on regular harnesses.  A proper spread covers the bases, works together, and should tell you what they want.  A clip weight 3-5' down from an inline board will tow lots of weeds.  The heavier the weight the more it will tow.  Fish shaped weights catch em best and I use a couple quick connect clips to hang em down to so I can tow a whole mat especially with my big boards.

[greenhornet73]

I decided to stop at Oneida on the way home from work for the sunset bite and caught a couple in short order. The second one was 20” with a huge head but the pic shows the shape of the body, it isn’t an illusion.  When I filleted it, there was only a skinny strip of meat on each side that resembled that of a bullhead more than a walleye.  My guess is some sort of muscle degeneration. The color of the fish looked very healthy but the flesh told a different story. Has anyone else seen anything like this?

[Todd in NY]

Strange looking walleye...

[Chowdaire]

I caught one like that once on Oneida. Pretty freaky looking but I didn’t keep it. Heck, maybe it’s the same one.


Sent from my iPhone using Lake Ontario United

[reeleyz]

I have caught one as well a few years ago shore fishing in the fall. I should have tossed it back, there was no meat in the fillets at all and it was discolored.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Lake Ontario United

 

[Kevin J Legg]

Caught a couple similar on the SLR. Think I found it was sandy flesh disease.


Sent from my iPhone using Lake Ontario United mobile app

[greenhornet73]

That’s the closest thing I found it to be except the flesh didn’t have the discoloration of sandy flesh. Just very white and smooth, almost slimy texture?

[Stillwater]

I caught a smallmouth with a condition like that on Owasco Lake a few years ago. It was about 19 inches long and had a normal head but allskin and bones with a big curve in the spine.