Guided Ken and his friend Josh for a full-day trip starting at 8:15 am. The days are gradually getting longer and sunrise is currently around 7:35 am. Ken has been out with me twice in the past two years - always in the winter time. For whatever the reason, he always seems to pre-select a good day and today was no exception. I believe that our original trip was scheduled in mid-to-late December but the weather forecast was horrible, so we cancelled it and rescheduled. Either way, the Ken-magic still worked!
I wasn't sure what to expect on Cayuga Lake today. We had terrific lake trout jigging in the lower portions of Cayuga Lake in November - were these fish still around? I also hooked a couple gorgeous, albeit small (but chunky) browns on the fly-rod last time I was here - would they still be around? How about salmon, pike, bass or rainbows? You gotta fish to know what's happening.
We had some duck/goose hunters not far from where we were going to set up along with calm conditions, so we started with some deeper vertical jigging out aways from shore. Josh hadn't done any before - he had never caught a laker either. Within an hour or so we had landed 4 lakers and kept a couple of them. The bite slowed and we moved in a bit and worked assorted gear including stickbaits, plastics and blade baits. The blades wound up being the ticket. In short order, Josh lost a good brown trout that hit boatside. He also nabbed a good laker then a better one (at 28.5".) Both of the guys did great and we had more browns (mostly just sub-legal landed) as well as a nicer legal chunker. The lake trout fishing ran the gamut from very good to excellent and we had a great double-digit day. At one point late in the trip, Josh made three casts and missed a hit and then landed two consecutive fish. The action was reminiscent of the hot goby-era lake trout bite of the late-2010s. I don't believe that the gobies have made a comeback but the guys were going to check stomach contents of the fish they kept (i.e., their limit of nine lakers and one brown.)
Who knows how long this bite will last? We did not encounter any salmon or rainbows today but overcast weather tends to favor browns. NY State changed its brown trout strain going into the lakes and streams and these fish acted much more like wild fish, rather than hatchery fish when stocked at Long Point State Park back in late April or May. They only stayed around the marina harbor for a couple days and were gone! The previous strain had lost much of its "wildness" and would just swim around the marina for weeks while getting decimated by herons, terns and lake trout. So I think we're seeing a good brown trout resurgence due to the new strain of browns. Hopefully DEC will update the strains on a regular basis (even if every 10 or 20 years,) so they do not get too inbred or hatchery-oriented. We'll see. But either way, it was a great first trip of the year on Cayuga Lake! Water temperature was 40 degrees on top and the lake level is low, but was rising. DEC Law Enforcement was out in a large boat checking on hunters. Don't forget your licenses!
