Cayuga Lake out of Myers 5/11 + Seneca Lake out of Geneva 5/12 AM
Wow! Back to back solid trips. It’s been awhile since I’ve been able to string together some consistently good fishing. Let’s hope the trend continues. As I guide, I feel at the top of my game. Hindsight is always 20/20, but things feel good. The variable is always Mother Nature. Here’s the breakdown:
5/11 Cayuga Lake out of Myers: Guided Dean and Scott, who’ve been joining me on an almost annual basis since the crazy days of the Owasco “Lake trout overload” back around 2005/2007. We always have a blast onboard whether catching fish or not, and fortunately usually we do well.
Thunderstorms and heavy, steady rain were a game changer on the night of the 10th and 11th. Salmon Creek was incredibly muddy yet Ithaca tribs were running fairly clear comparatively. We tried some pike fishing with slow results. Dean had a hit but that was about it. Conditions were fairly good, although not great.
We changed up to casting for salmon and worked a long stretch of water. It felt like the guys were just washing lures for awhile, but some hits and follows from Landlocked salmon and perhaps a brown or two kept us focused. A few fish were momentarily dropped and we had a couple follows from some beauties. We finally managed to land some nice fish – an 18″, 19.5″, 21″ and 22″ salmon if I remember right. We kept the middle sized fish and let the small one and big one go.
Thunderstorms with some serious lightning rolled in north of us and we wrapped up a bit early. Any time we can nail some solid landlocks casting is a good day! Special thanks go to my friend Todd for a few recent trolling reports that helped us quite a bit.
5/12 Seneca Lake out of Geneva: Well I knew it would happen – the mega numbers of lakers on the northern portion of Seneca Lake would start to turn on, and it did. My buddy Mike hit them pretty good up here yesterday, landing some very solid fish. My 3rd annual half day trip with Jim and Andrew proved that this bite is getting consistent (at least up to the front that’s rolling in as I type this!) We had a somewhat slow start with 2 fish lost near the net and one other one dropped. Technical difficulties.
After a couple hours the bite really picked up and the guys landed a couple doubles. One SOLID 31″+ laker that pulled the scale down to 11lbs 7oz was landed by Jim, who wanted me to look at his drag because he was concerned that he couldn’t just “reel in the fish” like he could the others. Funny how that happens when the fish turns out to be a trophy sized laker! I can’t say how many times some of my clients hook big fish and are completely unaware of just how big they are. Big fish just can’t be cranked in like a bluegill unless you have tuna gear and you want to rip the hook out of their mouth. I use 7′ Medium Heavy rods for the deep fishing and I think they’re perfect. All in all a great day and one we’ll all remember for a long time. The fish are feeding heavily and in great condition for their length. Best depths were around 120′ to 140′. We kept all the lakers today.