Seneca Lake out of Sampson 6/30
Guided Mike for the full day.starting at 5:30 am. A few rain showers were in the area, but we were able to avoid them by heading north. Laker jigging was very good with around 8 fish landed, including 3 in the 28″ range. The thermocline had moved deeper and we had our best fishing around 65′ to 85′. Mike is an exceptional angler and even managed to hook into a lucky Landlocked Salmon in the low 20s inch range right next to the boat. Lakers were in excellent condition with very few lamprey marks. All were wild and many were totally clean with some beautiful colors.
We tried 2 hours or so of pike fishing and he landed one around 22″ and had another of the same size follow him in. Without a doubt most pike have moved into deeper water. At times they will certainly move up, but the fun, relatively easy pike action will likely have to wait until September and onwards. Medium to large sized pike seek cool and sometimes downright cold water if it’s available, so that’s likely where they are, and there’s plenty of it on Seneca Lake! On Lake Champlain in some areas anglers routinely target northerns in 20′ to 40′ FOW. At some point in time this summer I may try it, but it’s down on the “bucket list” quite a bit. We’ll see. Overall it was a great day on the water and we only saw a couple other boats out. The weather was generally very good. Mike’s fished all over the country and world and it was great hearing about his angling exploits and thoughts.