Cayuga Lake 6/20 + 21
Guided a couple trips off my beaten path over the past two days.
6/20 AM: Guided Robert and his son in-law Matt for a 1/2 day trip out of Union Springs targeting pickerel/bass. Robert has a place on the lake and a few years back we did a laker jigging trip as well as some perch fishing. Last year we hit Owasco Lake for perch. He got ahold of me somewhat late in the season for pickerel but I thought it’d be worth a try after the cool weather. The conditions were very difficult – the weekend weather caused a bit of an upwelling and water temperatures in some of the prime pickerel areas dropped around 15 to 20 degrees. The water was cold and sterile looking. We worked some areas without success. We tried a lot of areas and eventually Matt had a follow from what appeared to be a group of bluegills. From my quick vantage point, I thought it might have been a pickerel (I had polarized glasses on and I don’t think he did,) but he was certain it was panfish. As the morning went on, conditions got better and the lake started to settle in a bit. Robert hooked what appeared to be a nice bass in one area but it ran him into the weeds and got off. In another area we also had some perch following lures in.
Matt doesn’t fish a lot and I thought it’d be a good idea to get him into a lake trout, so I motored a bit south and in short order he landed a nice one as did Rob.
6/21 out of Myers: Today I guided Ed and his brother Gary. Gary runs/owns a couple businesses, one being Quarry Ridge Winery in Union Springs NY. It’s maybe 8 miles (at most) north of Long Point.
We had a great deep laker trip back on May 2nd, as well as a successful trip or two last year. Ed does a bit of kayak jigging/trolling and really wanted to get into some non-laker salmonids, so that’s what we tried. Gary had a hold of what appeared to be a nice rainbow trout in short order but it got off. Ed had a follow from one but it didn’t grab. We had a few other dropped fish that were likely lakers. We set up in a laker area and lo and behold I had two nice rainbows follow in my temperature probe – go figure! Laker fishing was pretty good and the guys nabbed four nice fish. We spent the last hour or two of the day trying another area for rainbows/browns/salmon without any success apart from a couple hits.
The thermocline is just setting up in certain parts of the lake. Water fleas were present while jigging, although not much of an issue. Lots of bait fish are around as well.
Gary with a nice laker
