BlueEye

Thanks guys for the kind words! Panfisher - I couldn't agree more!! I've seen and experienced what you talked about too many times. Been working on the new site now for over a year to hopefully avoid that exact situation. We haven't changed the website in 7 years now (if it ain't broke don't fix it idea) and the only reason we decided to take these steps now is because our forum software version is no longer going to be supported/updated. It's like owning a truck with 200,000 miles on it and then someone telling you that you can't make oil changes any more on it. While the truck isn't broken now, it is probably a good time to start looking at other options (i.e., maybe a new truck that looks and feels exactly like old truck?). Cheers Chad

Hi everyone, I wanted to make a quick announcement about what has been going on “behind the scenes†at LOU for the last year with respect to the website’s core software. We found out last year that the forum software we use to power the LOU website (phpBB) is no longer going to be supporting the version that we use in the near future. After a lot of thought and research, we decided it would be in the best interest of the community to start making some updates to ensure that the software that runs LOU is safe and better positioned for the long term. Since then we have been working on the “new LOU†for over a year now! My biggest concern (and maybe yours as well) is that I personally don’t like change. I believe in the idea of “LESS IS MORE†and simplicity. That is why we spent the last year working on trying to make the new site look and feel as close as possible to the current website. What you know and enjoy about LOU will not be changing. The only main “change†is that the updated LOU will be supported by much more current software, hopefully translating into a more user friendly experience. At this point I’ve lost track of how many hours I’ve spent each night working on this simple concept, but I do know that today we are closer than ever. I don’t have an exact timeline for the launch of the updated website software as I would rather “get it just right†rather than simply pushing it out there as fast as possible. With this updated software, you will get to enjoy some new features. One that I am excited about is the option to integrate your LOU account with your Facebook and/or Twitter account. In other words, you can post your report on LOU and have it automatically go to both your Facebook and Twitter pages (PERFECT for Charter Captains and avid anglers who are into social media!). I’m also looking forward to the new and easier ways to post images. We are upgrading the classifieds section to allow for user reviews. Pro Members will also have the convenience of quickly seeing the latest posts from their “friends†on LOU right in the sidebar. Think it would be nice to have the option to subscribe via email to only the specific forums that you are most interested in? Or to have the option to run MULTIPLE polls from a single post (i.e., your own survey)? Both of these will be possible with the updated software! Pro members will also get access to our new lake cams in Wayne and Monroe counties. The list goes on and on but like I said before, the key is to make the new website look and feel similar to the current website. I am not a big fan of change but I also don’t think letting the site’s software drift into a legacy state is smart either as it puts the community at an unnecessary risk of not functioning the way we want and expect it to. I also want to assure you that all your usernames/passwords/topics/posts/private messages/etc. will be automatically converted over to the new system so your login information will be the exact same as now. As always, thank you all for your support! Working on LOU never feels like “work†to me – I love it and will continue to strive to make the site even better now and hopefully for years to come. If you have any questions, please ask as I am more than happy to help. Happy Holidays to you and your family! Chad

Nice pics Pete!!! Thanks for sharing

Congratulations to all the wives and girlfriends for surviving another musky season - you finally get your husbands and boyfriends back for the next 7 months (at least in New York State)!!! I can tell you my wife treats December 1st like a holiday in itself Had a good final two weeks of the season that could have been GREAT judging by some of the fish we had up to the boat and couldn't get hooks into. Fished this weekend with Joe and buddy Tim from work. Had to break through some ice at the dock to get Joe's boat out to the lake (see pic below). After making it out onto the water in mid-afternoon, bluebird skies and chucking around oversized muskies lures.... of course we catch a 28" walleye The funny thing was that I got him to hit boat side on a figure-8. He was barely able to catch the lure and just bit the back hook (typical walleye style I guess) Clouds moved in on Sunday and we were able to boat only one of the four fish we hooked yesterday. Lucky it was a nice fish and left me feeling good about ending the season on a high note after loosing a good one first thing in the morning on a tube, then Joe dropped another one a lunge, then Tim dropped one after a few second fight, then Joe fought one all the way to the boat only to watch that one slip off at the last second and swim away... so finally when the fattie below found the bottom of the net, I was a very happy man Our best lures for the day were tubes, wooley bully bucktails (yup, I still throw them even in 38 degree water!), lunges and glide baits. I should note that in the last two weeks of the season, I saw more 45"+ fish (with a few "scary big") than I had seen all season combined! We also seen that the future of the lake is in good shape with a lot of low to mid 30's fish seemingly everywhere! It didn't matter where we fished, everywhere seemed to have fish and big ones at that this time of year. I talked to Mr. Lunge Lumber after we pulled the boat yesterday and he confirmed the same thing we had been seeing. Sad the season has to end, would love to have another week or two out there RIGHT NOW! Here are some more pictures from our trip last week that got deleted earlier that some of you have PMed me about asking me to repost. Hope you guys enjoy them. In another couple of months, I'll be heading down to the Columbus Ohio musky show. Maybe I'll see some of you there??? It's a great chance to break the cabin fever and get out of the house for a little. The wife has even decided to go with!! If I don't see you there, maybe I'll see you at one of the New York State Muskies Inc (Chapt. 69) meetings? Those are always a ton of fun as well What are your plans for the winter months??

Let the fun begin Happy Holidays everyone!

That is amazing! I have been meaning to stop down there and check it out. Had my boat there this spring/summer and had to pull it early. Thanks for sharing those pictures! With only 12-inches of water, do you think the whole bay will have a chance of freezing 100% through this winter?

Happy Birthday Uncle!!! This year marks the 2nd HURRICANE you have survived on Lake Ontario right??

Panfisher - glad I could help Adam - agreed! I talked for a little while last night with Mike Sperry and he said same thing. He has seen many as well over the years and calls them "Buffalo Heads" - haha. My father has seen similar deformities out on Lake Ontario as well most likely caused when the fish was juvenile. I wonder what a 50" Buffalo Head would look like?? Scaryyyy! [ Post made via iPhone ]

Hi guys, If you are having troubles logging in, try resetting your browser cookies. Try to click on this link below which should clear out the cookies set by your browser: ucp.php?mode=delete_cookies If after clicking on this link you still have issues with logging in and out, then try to manually remove the cookies set by the website using your browser. FIREFOX BROWSER go to FIREFOX > PREFERENCES > PRIVACY > REMOVE INDIVIDUAL COOKIES and then delete out all cookies that have LakeOntarioUnited.com in it. SAFARI BROWSER go to PREFERENCES > PRIVACY > Cookies and other website data > DETAILS > type in LakeOntarioUnited.com in the search window and remove only those cookies. INTERNET EXPLORER go to this link: http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/wind ... et-cookies INTERNET EXPLORER 9 go to this link: http://www.worldstart.com/clear-specifi ... xplorer-9/ That is what fixed the issue for me as I was having exact same issue as you. Hope this helps! Chad

Rolmops/Panfisher - the spammers found a way to automate the registration process and then post links back to their websites. They are not able to get into database with passwords - all encrypted, plus they have no motivation there anyways. Their motivation here was simply to post lots of spam links back to their websites and try to get users to click on them and drive traffic over there. We lost posts and private messages during the backup restore process (not because of hackers). We don't store any financial information on the site anywhere. Bob/Tigerhunter - Thanks for sharing. That is interesting Bob that they said it is normal during the spawn. I'll have to see if I can find out any more information on this. Will post if I do. Hope you all have a great Thanksgiving! Cheers, Chad

Happy Turkey Day everyone - enjoy it with friends and family

Hit the water for a couple hours yesterday and was able to boat two. Nothing huge but one of the muskies we got had a really unique body shape to it. Have any of you ever seen a hunchback like this??? I've seen this once or twice before but I've never seen a pike or tiger look like this. Water temps on Chautauqua down to 42-44. On a side note: My other post from last week got deleted (incase some of you were wondering) because the site got hacked and we lost some posts and private messages in that process. Very frustrating as my post from last week was one that got lost. We traced the hackers back to somewhere in Russia. Will be looking into some long term solutions to prevent this sort of thing from happening again. We lost about 12 hours worth of data before restoring the site. More importantly, hope you all have a great Thanksgiving and enjoy it with your family and friends! Cheers , Chad

Happy Birthday Bob!!! Enjoy your day and I hope you and the family have a great Thanksgiving!

Fisherman - I'm a believer that picking out a rod is as much a personal preference thing as it is a technically functional thing. I know guys that hate long rods and refuse to use them and I also know guys that won't use a rod under 8'6 and they are both throwing the same baits! One thing that I like across all my rods is a fast or extra fast action. I find my hooksets to be MUCH better with those faster rods and I can get better action on my lures. I personally carry a 7'6 St. Croix Legend Touranment and an 8'6 LT (Big Dawg model) and feel that I can throw just about any bait I need to with relative ease. Again, I think this is more of a personal preference thing for me. With your budget you could get one or two St. Croix rods (depending on the model) or you could get two rods from Tackle Industries that I also like. Ronix - do you own any Tackle Industries rods still? I know you use to in the past as I remember using them on your boat and really liked them. Cheers , Chad

Adam........ AWESOME! Thanks for sharing. That bottom pictures is real slob

Steve - Good to hear you guys were able to get out and see some action. I'm itching to get back out now and will hopefully be going this weekend sometime. I don't know where exactly yet but most likely it will be either Chautauqua or Niagara River. Next Friday I took off work to go down and try some casting on Chautauqua with Mike Sperry - looking forward to that! The storm last night left my entire neighborhood without power. My house smells like a Christmas Tree exploded in it because of all the candles my wife had going..... geeezzzz..... looking forward to getting back out there and enjoying some FRESH air again! Chad

Line guy - yesterday was slow for everyone around the area. I was able to get out and fish with Dan Hughes for the afternoon and it was a slow day all around. I talked with a couple other friends who fished Chautauqua yesterday as well and they each had a couple follows but no fish. Today is the day I think you want to be out there (more specifically this afternoon when the front starts to roll in). Keep at em' buddy - the mental game is biggest obstacle to over come when musky fishing. Unfortunately, it doesn't look like tomorrow is going to be a good day fishing - let alone casting. As Ivan stated, 40's rain and north winds will most likely keep us at home. If we do fish it, it will most likely be trolling with the bimmy top up but my guess is that we will most likely sit tomorrow out and use the time reorganize the garage - I got more musky lures and hooks in there than is considered "reasonably safe" for the wife Good luck out there!! Chad

Awesome job Bob - well done

Sounds good Ivan - and yes it was Dan but it wasn't last week. Couple weeks ago. Trolling bite should be picking up as water continues to clear up. Good luck out there and stop over if you see us!!

Ivan - If we get it out it will be on Saturday and I'll most likely be a stowaway aboard Joe's boat. He has a 18' Tracker boat (grey) with a walk-through windshield. Do you have a VHF radio on your boat? We use channel 9 on Waneta to talk to friends while on the water. Cheers, Chad

Hey guys - Thanks for the kind words!!! Pizzaboy - I was lucky enough to have a friend down there who has a cottage on the lake and let me keep the boat there for a small fee. I was down to about 2 feet of water at his dock and so we decided to pull it. The plan was to keep it there into November but water level was getting low and we ran into another "unexpected" situation. That situation was that if you are the only dock left in on the lake, then you are the main resting point for EVERY SEAGULL on the lake! Ahhhh My nice grey boat was totally covered before that weekend and it took me a good chuck of time to clean it off...... that was kinda my breaking point - haha. I didn't have any troubles getting through the main channel when launching the boat but I did trim the big motor all the way up and took the boat out on the trolling motor. My boat is an 18ft Starcraft Superfisherman and it drafts 18" inches when the motor is trimmed out. It does remain pretty shallow even out of the channel for like 50-100 yards so just a word of caution. Ivan - I live about an hour closer to Waneta than I do Chautauqua and have a friend with a dock on Waneta. That convenience is really the main and only reason - nothing to do with the fishing itself really. On top of that I got a couple friends that I fish with on their boat on Chautauqua when I go. It works out good so I don't have trailer the boat down there each time and in return they can hop on my boat to fish Waneta anytime. I'm actually excited to get back on Chautauqua hopefully this coming weekend. My friend Dan just boated/released a 51" slob and lost another of equal size in the same day........ crazy!! Best time of the year for us musky anglers I'd like to try the Niagara River or maybe even the St. Lawrence next..... hmmmm decisions, decisions.......

Well it's the week after the Mark Troy tournament and I decided to sneak out yesterday for a couple hours and see if I could show my brother and his wife some musky action. Had went out on Saturday as well and had a good day fishing with Mike - got a bunch of mid-to-upper-30's fish but also raised some really nice fish we couldn't get hooks into that day. Hot lures on Saturday were Suick's, Tubes and Lunge Lumber's. When we first setup in the middle of lake near south end, I noticed some thrashing on the surface and upon closer view it looked like a good size musky trying to suck down a bass. After seeing this we slowly headed our boat over to that direction and started casting around where we had seen the thrashing. It was early morning and so I started throwing my all white lunge with no luck. Switched over to tube to see if they wanted something worked a little slower........ no luck. Switched over to 9" perch prowler.... first cast in same area we saw thrashing, 2nd turn of the handle and rod loaded up. Knew it was a big fish right away 49" on perch prowler - short fight and quick picture later, back she went to grow another inch hopefully next year I sent a text to Mike (winner of Mark Troy tournament last week) saying "a day late and dollar short..." About a half hour later or so my brother was able to hook up with nice fish up tight in about 5 feet water ripping a LEO jerkbait over the weeds. After that we had a one more follow and fishing slowed right down to "almost" nothing..... Didn't have Joe on my boat this day so someone else had to catch the pickerel As soon as the sun got up, blue bird skies, fishing slowed to a crawl. After the pickerel we had no more follows or hits and we called it a day at 11:00am to try and get home early to watch some football. I was down to 2 feet of water at the dock that I keep my boat at on Waneta and so I decided to pull the boat this weekend before I get myself in a jam. Looking forward now to fishing Chautauqua and Niagara River in coming weeks. Hopefully I'll see you all out there Chad