Reports

Guided a double on Saturday and then a half day trip today.  Fishing is generally good to excellent, although there was a considerable lull for us on Saturday from roughly 10 am until noon.  Fish are feeding on various classes of alewives ranging from 1.5″ long fish to full-sized adults.  Fishing pressure was high on Saturday with probably 30 to 50 boats out between the Long Point area and Burroughs (aka “the Silos”)/Levanna.  Surface temperatures hit 44 degrees but down 5′ it’s likely around 40.  I will start bringing my probe shortly.  We are finally starting to mark some baitfish schools.  We’re typically fishing 120′ to 150′, although some good catches have been reported shallow and some anglers are still working very deep.  Take your pick on how you like to fish and catch them.  Midge activity has been remarkably light.  No complaints here!

4/15 AM:  Guided Charles with his grandson Everett and nephew Jake, getting underway just after 8 am.  Charles and Everett were out yesterday with a friend of theirs and 8-year-old Everett wound up catching 5 nice lakers!  Today was Jake and Charles’s day, although the youngster managed to land a big 29″er on his own and reel in one that Jake hooked.  We had a good AM with 5 nice fish in our first hour and a half or so, then the action slowed until around noon.  The fish turned back on (we also moved) and the guys wound up hitting the double-digits.  Fun day and beautiful weather!

It was as crowded as I’ve ever seen it for lake trout jigging.

These photos only capture some of the boats.  There were plenty more!  I was using my smartphone’s zoom feature and with the sun I couldn’t really see what was in the image very clearly.

4/15 PM:  My PM trip was with Bob, who had some hilarious stories related to his business, which I will regale my future clients with.  He fishes up here for perch and occasionally trout.  We had a terrific day.  I started right where I left off the morning crew and he got right into the fish.  He had a 5 fish limit within an hour and 10 minutes.  All of the lakers were big – running 27″ to around 30″ long.  He wound up catching and releasing some more fish before we headed in after maybe 3 hours.

4/16 AM: Today I guided Matt, who grew up in Watkins Glen.  He’s an avid hunter and getting more into fishing the Finger Lakes.  He nabbed two fish in fairly short order right after our 8 am start time, then action slowed for a bit.  We made a couple mile run and then got right into them on the first drop and wound up having a very steady bite and he quickly filled his limit.  He wound up with a solid double-digit day.  The bite was pretty amazing and as a second, then third boat set up nearby, I could see that they were catching fish too.