I don't ice fish a whole lot anymore, but when Keuka Lake freezes up I get pretty psyched. I love catching lake trout through the ice. The Keuka Lake fish are all wild and top-notch on the table. "They eat good" - as my old client, the late Will Burford used to say! On Friday, on the way to the Rochester Boat Show I swung by Keuka Lake State Park and saw a few shanties out on the water, but close to shore. The lake had just locked up with ice and I'm guessing that there wasn't much more than 3" to 4" of ice. Just a guess.
Some friends of a friend fished out there on Sunday and reported slow fishing but good ice conditions. I got out there at 12:30 pm. A client/friend of mine had been out an hour or two before me and reported pretty slow fishing. The few anglers I talked to, had pretty slow action. One guy hadn't caught anything and a couple guys with tip-ups had caught a couple lakers I believe. No word on how others were doing. Action was slow to start - I encountered nothing for a good 2 hours. I didn't mark much fishing from 40' out to 160' or so. My Vexilar wasn't working great, so I may have had some marks near bottom, but either way, no hits.
After switching out to a bladebait instead of plastics, I hooked a laker first drop. It was only 14.5" long, so sub-legal and back it went. As the afternoon wore on, I finally got a bite-window and nabbed 4 keepers. I had a couple other hits as well. I didn't bring a heater or lantern (for heat) so my gear started freezing up a bit by 4:30 pm. That slowed me down. Fun day and I saw a flock of snow geese fly overhead. At first it sounded like dogs barking up in the hills!
I talked to a couple of hard-core ice anglers as I was getting ready to leave. They'd been out all day long. They did well in deep water in Branchport with spoons and plastics. So some guys were getting fish. The action isn't what it was 10 years ago (at least not yet) but it isn't bad.
I do NOT guide ice-fishing (I'm really not much of an ice fisherman or all that equipped for it, although I do know my lake trout habits.) But to me, a Finger Lakes Report is pertinent to this website. (I don't post reports if I fish a small lake or private waterway that has nothing to do with the Finger Lakes or my guiding.) Word is, is that Canandaigua Lake just locked up! Now, that could be exciting!
