Seneca Lake out of Sampson 5/3
Got out for a scheduled full day with Steve and his brother Stewart (hope I spelled Stu right.) I did a trip with Steve last year on June 2nd and it was a pretty tough day – so I figured that the fish Gods owed us one. And they came through! The lake was pretty choppy – or downright rough to start. I watched a boat trailer pull into the parking lot and saw the driver walk out, look at the lake and turn around to leave! It wasn’t pretty out there, but the lakers were active from the get-go at 8am. Water temps were 47 at Sampson so that’s where we fished. We marked a lot of bait so I was pretty psyched. In a nutshell the fish cooperated and hit on the bottom and on the chase. We used white flukes on 1oz. jig heads. The guys landed 9 nice fish – most were 25″ to 30″. A few fish were lost but not many. The lake got really rough and we started getting some waves over the bow, so we called it a 1/2 day. As I filleted the fish the lake calmed down, but we’d had our fill. Stomach contents of kept fish incl. mostly alewives but one fish had a trout-perch and some sculpin in its stomach.
After some contemplation I decided to re-launch and check on pike fishing. I jigged up a couple lakers then cast for some northerns. Hooked 2 nice pike on tube jigs. Both were around 28″ fish. One had a fat belly – I’m not sure if it had spawned or not, but I let both go. One bass also wound up on the end of my line – a decent 17″ smallmouth. There should be some great fishing over the next few months!