Owasco Lake 10/6

Back out with Tony and Pete today starting at 8 am.  I brought pike gear but after looking at the weather conditions, figured lakers would be the best bet.  Tony wanted to give the northerns a try, so we gave them around an hour and a half.  Just before we were about to call it quits on the pike, Peter wound up nabbing a nice 26" fish on a Rapala Husky Jerk.  He also caught a perch shallow.

Lakers were the story today.  The fishing started out fair to good and then became very good.  We almost had a double.  The guys landed 10 solid lakers, including a 28" and Tony's 32" behemoth.

The laker egg take at Taughannock Park has gotten off to a great start.  Fish netted ran to around 11lbs.  No live lampreys came up.  41 ripe females were processed.  Around 75 more fish need to be processed.  With luck they should be done in two days.

Day 2 of the eggtake (10/7) resulted in 61 ripe hens.  Crews set less nets last night and set even less tonight. They anticipate to complete this year's eggtake tomorrow morning.  The percentage of wild produced lake trout in Cayuga Lake is currently estimated at 5%.  So we had a spike in natural production starting in the late 1990s, when the lake went from around 0% wild fish up to maybe 5%, then close to 10% approximately 5 to 10 years ago and now back down.

October 31st remains open this month for guided trips and then we're on to November!