Sodus Bay 6/15
I arranged to meet my buddy Jarrod and his wife’s grandfather, Max at Sodus Bay today. They started fishing early at 7 am and I started around 10:30. Storms rolled in this AM, but once they cleared Jarrod nailed a nice drum within a couple casts on a crankbait. Drum were following – two to four at a time, then the wind came up a bit and they stopped according to J. Bay temps were right around 69 to 70 degrees. Jarrod encountered some crappies, bluegills and bass while drum fishing. He saw a few gar surface too, though surface activity was very limited. He landed another couple drum on tube jigs and crankbaits, and lost what was probably a very large drum on a bladebait.
I had a tough time on the drum. There are tons of small baitfish in the bay – possibly emerald shiners. Drum, bass and panfish (and likely gar) are around these fish. I worked some open water suspended baitfish with a blade bait and landed one nice drum. Apart from a small bass, bluegills and rockbass, that was the only fish of note I encountered. The drum numbers still seem relatively low on Lake Ontario Bays compared to what we’ve seen over the past 15 to 20 years. But there are fishable numbers. I marked what was probably a school of gar in one area. Gar fishing should pick up in the next few weeks. Bass are active in the bay and anglers reported doing well on plastic worms like Senkos.