Seneca Lake out of Watkins 10/9
I just LOVE fishing Seneca Lake out of Watkins Glen, especially in the fall. The cliffs give you the feeling of fishing in a huge stone quarry. Nice! Today I looked around for lakers and staging salmon. No luck on salmon – though that one is a long shot. Lakers were abundant from Peach Orchard Point south. They weren’t active and I only had a few hits and landed one small one. I marked more bait than I’ve marked on Seneca in the fall in quite a few years.
I took a handful of casts with a crankbait for northerns and landed one small (20″) fish. Conditions weren’t good for pike at all – sunny, bluebird, calm and warm water, so I wasn’t expecting much. Word is that the pike are back on Seneca in a big way. I believe it. I’ve certainly seen more young fish this season than I’ve probably seen since 1994 or 95. Let’s hope they turn into monsters!
Bass fishing was good and I landed 3 nice smallmouths in short order. The fish ranged from 14″ to 17″ and hit hair jigs and tubes in 5′ to 12′ of water – but they were all near the deeps! H2O was 64 on top at the south end, and around 60 elsewhere. Can’t wait for this lake to “kick in” fishing wise for pike and salmon. Probably be in around 3 weeks! 🙂