Skinny 9/16, Keuka Lake 9/17 + Cayuga Lake out of Long Point 9/18
Skaneateles Lake 9/16: Guided the Hermans for around 6 hours. We started with some dropshotting in deeper water today, but it seemed slow. A decent smallmouth and a few rockies were all we had to show in the northern portions of the lake. A run south produced more smallmouths. Shallow water was best with tubes and Lunker City Ribsters (on a dropshot) producing some good fish. Eleonore hooked a monster smallmouth on a Ribster in less than 10′ of water. Maybe the biggest smallie I’ve seen on this lake. It got off, but was likely in the upper 4 to nearly 5lb range. Very fat and long!
Keuka Lake 9/17: Guided Mark and Charlie for the full day. We started with some laker jigging and action was fair to good. The guys landed around a half dozen nice fish. We marked fish as far north as the College, but as usual the best action/fish numbers were around the bluff area. Bass fishing was pretty tough – mainly due to the weather pattern. Charlie got a decent smallie in short order on a fluke. We had encounters with some nice bass, but mostly short hits and follows. Mark fly-fished and I have a couple fluke imitation flies that work pretty good. They are still being tweaked, but again – the bass mood was tentative for us. We worked them pretty hard after the laker action. Fun day with Mark and Charles as always.
Cayuga Lake 9/18: Got Dave (from last week’s 29 fish trip) and his friends Blake and Todd out for the full day. Laker action was much slower than last week. Good numbers of fish were still north of Long Point and around Aurora, but the bite was tough. The morning produced 3 fish. We moved south towards Sheldrake later in the PM and found better numbers of fish. A few more lakers and a small salmon were landed. The cold front hurt the fishing, though it should be good tomorrow (we’re on Seneca.) Fun day!
Water temperatures on the lakes are dropping quickly. Lots of 67 to 69 degree water.