Cayuga and Otisco Lake reports 5/11 – 5/13
Had a good three day run of fishing. It’s been the most solid start to a season I’ve seen or experienced in a few years, mainly due to the milder winter. The fishing is where it should be in mid-May – it’s darn good for just about everything everywhere. Panfish, trout, salmon, pike, bass, carp – they’re all active. I wish May fishing lastest longer!
5/11 Cayuga Lake out of Long Point: Got out with a couple of girl-friends for some fun PM fishing. I always forget about “take a gal fishing day” but this year I remembered. Either way, we had a great time with 3 nice lakers landed between them including a fish around 10lbs. Fishing wasn’t easy but it’s pretty clear that the lakers are moving shallow at times. I laid back and smoked a few cigars while they had most of the fun.
5/12 Cayuga Lake out of Long Point: Guided Andrew and Jim for a 1/2 day starting around 8 am. Laker fishing was good and we caught fish both shallow and deep on both sides of the lake. Andy dropped 4 or 5 solid fish but we still found up with 4 nice keepers for Jim’s smoker and grill.
5/13 Otisco Lake: Guided Dave and his friend Chris for a full day of Tiger Musky fishing on the fly starting just after 6 am. Dave and his father Bob joined me on Cayuga Lake for a great fly-fishing trip on March 30th on Cayuga Lake. They are both exceptional fly-tiers and fly-fishermen and it’s shown on both trips. Their flies are superb!
Despite having only caught a couple relatively small Tiger Muskies on the fly myself, I felt confident going into the fishing today. We had a great weather pattern with a crescent moon, wind, clouds and obviously a falling barometer with the impending front coming through. But it’s still musky fishing and still a challenge on the fly. Just casting large flies can be a challenge for many fly-fishers.
We worked a few areas without any action. After about an hour, Dave connected with a 27″er. It was a nice clean fish and we all saw it grab the fly. Chris landed a chunky smallmouth. While Chris searched for a new fly to try, I got a chance to cast one of Dave’s SAGE pike rods (10 wts) and I even caught a small largemouth bass. BTW – The Sage casts beautifully! I now know what my next pike/musky/gar rods are going to be!
There’s a nice submerged weedbed that I remembered from my days of fishing with Jessica back in 2008 and sometimes it sets up nicely, so we gave that a shot. Dave’s fly got crushed again a long ways out and after a good battle I slipped the net under a 36″ Tiger!!! Awesome! To make a long story short he had more follows including another one around the same large class. I suspect he would’ve hooked at least one or more of the fish had he done “figure 8s” or “Ls” but the excitement of the moment got the best of him. Either way, it was the best day I’ve had on my boat for fly-fishing Tigers and it’s mainly because of Dave and his (dad’s in this case) aptitude with fly-tying and perseverance with muskies. He had been researching musky on the fly for around 10 years and the bug finally got him good over the past couple seasons.