Conesus Lake 5/19
Fished Conesus Lake today with Tony. We were out a few weeks ago on Cayuga jigging lakers. He called and was interested in something different, like some pike fishing. I’ve been spending a lot of time on Cayuga, Seneca and Skaneateles Lakes thus far this season, so a road trip sounded good- I suggested Conesus Lake, which I don’t get a chance to fish a whole lot. It’s a good hour and 45-minute drive from me these days. Anyways Tony agreed and we headed out at 5:15 am.
We arrived around 7 am with calm conditions and sunny clear skies – not the North winds 5 to 10 mph and cloudy conditions with a chance of rain that I was expecting. We worked a bunch of areas without much to show for it. Tony had a small pike follow him in. He had a Tiger Musky around 24″ follow him in. But fish were clearly negative. We saw pike on the bottom of the lake buried in cover. They weren’t aggressive at all. Even the panfish were lethargic. I think the weather system had a lot to do with it.
Bass are spawning and we saw plenty on beds. Fishing was so tough that Tony wanted me to take some casts with a different presentation to see if anything was hitting. I managed one 14″ largemouth on a dropoff in around 10′ to 14′ of water. Tony nailed a nice smallie on a shelf. We saw another Tiger and a lethargic pike, as well as a ton of bass, panfish and bullheads with a few carp thrown in.
We tried a lot of areas with very little to show. But we never gave up. After trying the south end weedbeds for pike without a hit we tried a windblown area (skies clouded up a bit and the wind came up out of the N. by around 1:30 pm!) We were talking about leaving in about 10 minutes when I handed Tony a rod with 8lb test and an alewife tube jig. After 5 min. of casting he hooked a fish and I saw a flash. I thought it was a smallmouth bass, but he said it was a “good fish.” I knew right away it was probably a walleye, so I ran up to the bow and got the boat positioned so it wouldn’t drift over the fish. I grabbed the net too. After a few good surges I got the net under the fish just as the hook popped out! What a nice walleye! It was around 26″ long and weighed almost 7lbs! I asked Tony if he was going to keep it and he asked me if I wanted it and of course I said yes! A few casts later and Tony landed a nice 17″+ smallmouth. Perseverance really paid off! We never gave up till the last cast. A 7lb walleye is a nice fish anywhere, but on Conesus Lake in the daytime while casting, it’s a heck of a nice catch. Especially when the pike/Tigers didn’t come through for us.
Water temps were 56 to 58. Expect some good nighttime casting for walleyes here over the next 3 weeks at the very least. Pike/Musky action should pick up too. I’ll be back here a couple more times over the next month and I’m looking forward to it.