Pete Collin

idn, I have had some success jigging Canandaigua, so I will tell you what I know. First of all, Canandaigua is by far the most difficult lake to jig, so know that when you venture out. It has a lower population of fish than the other lakes, and you have already experienced the challenges of keeping your boat at the desired contour. On Keuka, Seneca, and Cayuga, there are large spots the size of several football fields where fish hold for months at a time. you drive out to these spots, throw out a drift bag, watch your graph, and jig until you drift out of the productive water. Pull in the bag, motor back upwind, and repeat the process. Cnandaigua Lake fish don't conentrate anywhere near as much. Sometimes they aren't bottom oriented at all, and the big expanse of deep water is a lot to swallow whole. if you discover that lakers are sitting on the bottom at a particualr depth, here is what you do. Get a bow mounted electric motor. If the wind is out of the west, get on the protected side of the lake. If the wind is blowing down the lake, throw your drift bag out the stern of your boat and use the electric to nudge yourself back into your target depth. Work yourself down a length of shoreline. In the fall it gets way easier on Canandigua because the fish get bottom oriented. you will have an advantage over guys trolling with downriggers, because they fear snagging bottom of that steep-sided lake. Good luck, and post your progress on this board. Seriously, if you want to be easier on yourself jig the other lakes to get used to the feel of the techique. Pete Collin http://www.pcforestry.com

Hello All, On our way to Seneca Lake, Ray and I had a bit of back-and-forth over which launch to use. P: There were piles of fish at Severne on Saturday. R: What do you want to go all the way there for? With the cost of gas? Geneva's closer. P: Yes, but I know they are there at Severne. R: There's fish all over the lake. The north end's a good spot too. P: Yes, but I remember several trips in march when they hadn't shown up yet at the north end. I don't like wasting the good morning hours trolling around looking for fish. R: In the extra time it takes for you to drive all the way to Severne, I'll be at the north end with a limit already! P: OK, we'll go to Geneva. But if the fish aren't there, you're gonna hear about it from me! R: I ain't gonna hear nothin! So we set out lines trolling south through the fog. First jingle of the clip-bell came before I got the second rod down. Good sign. It wasn't so foggy that we couldn't see where the sun was, but a handheld GPS helped with following a contour along the west shore. Trolling motor was still sputtering and acting strange, but we made out alright. The graph was, overall, pretty blank. We got fish every so often, but the urge to needle Ray about the vast bounty at Severne we passed up was strong. With a bite here and there, we managed 9 fair to smallish lakers by 11:00. The fog finally cleared. Now that we could see where we were going, we opted to pull the lines and go prospecting for a better concentration of fish. At one spot, there was a satisfying number of bottom blips beneath us. With little wind, we decided to drop some jigs and try for them vertically. Ray got his first fish before I could even get my lure tied on. That first drift through 85-125 foot depths yeilded very fast action. It was shaping up to be a bonanza day! next drift, things slowed way down, but suddenly I got 2 back-to-back giants: 31 and 30 inch lake trout. My spring is off to a good start! Both fish were taken on an Abu Garcia Ambassadeur reel I bought this winter off Craigslist for $20. It is the second reel of that make I have and it seems ideal for jigging: smooth bearings and drag, very reliable. There are a million of them out there to buy used for peanuts. As a fly fisherman of long standing, I think how you can buy 15 used Ambassadeur reels for the price of one quality fly reel! So we jigged the rest of our trip, landing 19 fish total. Ray wanted to stick it out until we had 20, but I was tired. As warm as the day was, we stayed bundled the whole time out there - that 42 degree water keeps things chilly. Which makes an amusing contrast as you motor into the Geneva launch. You walk back to your truck dressed like a dogsled musher while joggers and dogwalkers pass you in shorts and tank tops. We saw maybe 3 other boats all day and one wasn't even fishing. Finger Lakes fishing makes you feel like the world is your oyster! Pete Collin http://www.pcforestry.com

Glad you got out this weekend, Brett. Very strong start to the season! Pete

Tom, Whenever you are ready. i am looking forward to it. I have never fished hemlock. Pete

I had a topline out in case any were around, but none. While playing one fish, the topline rod twitched, but the fish came off before I could get to it.

Hello All, I often make my first trip of the year alone, so my friends don't have to put up with me as I sort out the kinks. And kinks I did have, but still caught a nice bunch of fish today. There was a threat of fog, but the ceiling didn't drop until I was already out there. It was wierd, enshrouded in my little 50 yard bubble. Without a compass or GPS, my depth was the only thing that gave a clue as to where I was. Without wind or apparent location of the sun, there was nothing at all to fix on for navigation. I had to look behind me to tell if the boat was pointed straight. Hoo boy. My one year old kicker didn't cooperate either. It started right away, ran choppily for an hour or so, and died without a cough for the rest of the day. Had to use the main motor to rescue my trip. Good thing I have the trolling plate. Sucked that 4 dollar gas pretty hard though! Despite these troubles, the fish were present and lit up the graph everywhere along the 130-190 foot contour. Landed 10-12 up to 28 inches. Many lamprey hits on the fish, and had to stomp on one eel to get it off the fish I just landed. They're getting pretty bad. Missed several more. Despite the calm and bright sun, they were still biting steady when I quit at 1:00. I was getting tired and hungry, and had a 2 hour drive home. Felt funny driving right past Canandaigua and Keuka on my way to Severne, but Seneca is usually worth the extra distance. Lots of perch fishermen out there. No idea how they did. Perch guys aren't chatty at the launch the way lake trout fishermen are. At least they pointed my way back to the launch. When the fog cleared, I couldn't see the Dresden stacks or the Navy Barge, so I was glad to get a point-out. Lesson learned. I will keep a compass in my boat from now on! Pete Collin http://www.pcforestry.com

They had a unique riseform. They didn't show any part of themselves above the surface, but it was obvious when a bigger fish rose. The biggest walleye we caught that way were pushing 3 pounds.

Alex, You reminded me of 2 more species i forgot on my list. Tiger trout and rock bass. That' an impressive list for a young guy like yourself. Did you eat the cisco? I might remember hearing they were a food fish. Never got one before. There is also an ocean fish called a sculpin I have caught several times. they are ugly bottom dwellers, not very memorable when compiling a list like this. Pete www.pcforestry.com

DF, I wrote a short article about fly fishing for gar years ago. Here's an excerpt: I thought I would write down some conclusions I have reached about gar fishing. They are: 1. The rig – 9 foot 8 weight. Don’t worry about the reel drag. Gar don’t make runs. 6 foot level leader of 10 pound trilene XT. 6 inch shock tippet of 25 pound Maxima chameleon. 2. The articles you read about gar fishing say to use a 6 inch fly or bigger. The fish I cast to ranged from 17 inches to maybe 30 inches. A six inch fly seemed too big. Since I got many strikes on bunny buggers, I made gar flies the same size as them – 3 or 4 inches long. When you examine a gar, its mouth opening is really not all that big, so I don’t believe they swallow baby ducks or anything like that. 3. Gar flies are so easy to make, they might encourage conspicuous consumption. Save the flies that you have caught fish on. The more fish you catch on them, the tanglier they get. 4. You will miss many strikes, particularly when they are not aggressive and hit lightly. This is to be expected with any hookless fly, I suppose. 5. As tricky as they can be to get tangled in the frayed rope, gar are equally tough to get untangled once they are caught. 6. The danger of dealing with a gar’s teeth offsets the safety of fishing with a hookless fly. And vice versa. 7. Getting bit by a gar hurts even worse than you would think. 8. Gar are day feeders. Forget about morning and evening. 9. Gar are easy to locate. They seem to live their life within a yard of the surface, and their constant gulping of air into their swim bladders gives them away at a hundred yards. 10. Sight fishing is by far the best way to go about gar fishing. You must manipulate the retrieve and tighten upon a strike according to how you see the fish reacting. You are usually casting to the limit of your range, so as not to spook them with your boat, arm movement, or upright form. 11. Canoes are lousey gar boats. Most of the time you want to stand to cast. 12. Gar don’t fight all that well. Their slim physique of scales, beak and bone doesn’t leave much room for muscle. When entangled, gar will swim right at the boat and thrash a little at boatside. They will patiently lie very still in the bottom of the canoe while you photograph them. This is probably because they can breathe through their swim bladders so they aren’t suffocating. Although they just might be dimly pondering whether this, after a 250 million year procrastination, might be a good time to evolve. 13. The all important strike: They didn’t smash explosively like pike. Most of the time gar just sidle up and deftly snip the frayed rope fly. After hitting, gar just sit there. Let them. They will either shake their head or take a run, and this will help getting themselves snarled up. Apply tension slowly after a little while – you will either have them or you will lose them. 14. I learned that eels are caught the same way as gar, with hookless lures. 15. Fly color is less important than varying color. After casting to a pod for a while, they get wise to you and cool off. Changing fly color might turn them on again. 16. Action usually occurs in spurts throughout the day. Even if the gar are listless and inattentive, keep at ‘em. 17. Gar flies pose an interesting problem of how to mount them in a fly box. Clips and crinkle foam are useless. 18. Gar smell kinda funny. 19. It’s fun to watch the reaction of passing boaters. 20. Gar fishing is wide open to creating new angler jargon. (suggestion: “We sure did tweak some beak!â€)

DF, I got the sheephead mostly in Irodequoit bay. The bigger ones were like 6 pounds and fought nice. The cats came also from irondequoit, and and also a friend's private pond. I got the eastern whitefish in Maine and Quebec. The western whitefish in British columbia, Montana, and Alaska. Never caught a burbot or bowfin. I have seen some big bowfin in Oak Orchard creek while fishing for.... GAR!!! Forgot to list longnose gar! Pete

I knew I'd forget one or 2! I have caught walleye many times, but don't get to target them too often nowadays. Want to go out in erie for that someday. The only musky i ever got was about 8 inches long in Canadohta Lake in PA. Didn't think that counted, at least it shouldn't! Pete www.pcforestry.com

Hello All, The recent thread about favorite species got me to thinking about how many species of fish have I caught. Here's a list of all i can think of: Brook Trout Brown Trout Rainbow Trout Cutthroat Trout lake Trout Palomino Trout Bull Trout Arctic Grayling Western Whitefish Eastern Whitefish Pike Pickerel Largemouth Bass Smallmouth Bass Spotted Bass Black Crappie Bullhead Channel Cat carp Grass Carp sheephead Atlantic Salmon Chinook Salmon Coho Salmon bluegill pumpkinseed yellow perch white perch white bass redhorse sucker quillback sucker white sucker fallfish chub SALTWATER Striped Bass mackerel harbor pollock flounder bluefish If I have "bucket list" species, i have never been shad fishing, and have never successfully netted smelt. Would be really fun to get into a heavy Alaskan run of Pink salmon, too! Pete Collin

Steve, I had no idea there were walleye in front of your house! That got me to wondering.... I have caught walleye on dry flies in Canada during a Hexadenia hatch. Have you ever gotten them on top during the heavy hatches? Pete

Heck, phone up Sutton in Naples and they will mail you whatever you need.

Mike and Tom, Thanks again for a really fun trip. For some reason on this trip, the fish seemed of secondary importance. I just enjoyed spending the morning gabbing with a couple other hardcore fishermen, in an extremely cushy craft. We'll definitely have to arrange some trips next year! Pete

Hello All, It seems like the Sanders bulletin boards have gone down for good. They've been out a week or more, long enough that folks may not bother going back. It has been declining for a year or so -fewer and few people were posting, and the site was getting glitchier. Maybe John Sanders figured he sold all the books he was going to sell, and decided not to pay for the upkeep of the site anymore. Anyway, it's a shame. I took up Finger Lakes fishing in 2006, and have had a tremendous amount of fun learning the ropes. The Sanders guide is where I started learning about jigging for lakers, and hooked up with several members for some fun trips. It seemed like the jiggers favored the Sanders site, and the trollers liked it here. Maybe now this site will see increased traffic. Besides learning new stuff, I like to come to the web boards and fish vicariously though all of you when I can't make it out. Pete Collin http://www.pcforestry.com

ac, I feel your pain about losing the big one. Thursday I lost the laker of a lifetime on Canandaigua. It refused to budge off the bottom. I had to reassure myself that it wasn't a snag, but the big headshakes told me otherwise. Broke me off. If it was any shallower I would have dove down after it. Pete Collin www.pcforestry.com

Hello All, Made it out with my buddy Curtis on what was probably the last warm day of the year! Fished noon to suppertime. We had to don raingear at the end and packed it in when the driving rain made us ask ourselves , "What are we, nuts?" Ran two seth greens, two leadcores and one topline. Way more weeds than seemed normal for the fall. Got 3 big lakers that shook off boatside so no pictures. Two rainbows, the biggest of which was 17 inches. Curtis kept it because I had been bragging to him about how delicious canandaigua rainbows are. The real trophy of the trip came on the leadcore with a little rapala : a honking 4.5 pound smallmouth. Get out there if you can. The fish are biting and the lake will be all yours. Pete Collin http://www.pcforestry.com

Mike, You guys are gluttons for punishment! I had to work Sunday and we saw snow where I was. Glad you got some nice fish to reward your braving the elements. Pete

I'm in western NY

Hi. I need spin doctor flashers, or a similar type. Color not important. If you have a good sized batch you want to get rid, of, I will buy them all. Pete

Hello All, I must admit I was confident as I head to Woodville this morning. It is my favorite time of year on that lake, I knew where the fish were, and the weather conditions were perfect - slight south wind and partial overcast. threat of rain that never came while I was out there. I have been banging at rainbow trout, but didn't want to miss out on the lake trout bonanza. So I ran two bottom bumping rigs and a lead core with a rapala to start. I figured i would troll my way along a contour until I reached the big rainbow spot and then switch to a rainbow trout program. My first fish came quickly and led to a small disaster. The tiptop of that rod is a roller guide that needs replacing. The line got pinched between the roller and frame as I went to land the fish, and it caused a breakoff of the 1 pound meatball plus my last spin doctor. Poor fish is down there dragging around a ball and chain. Re-rigging a Seth Green setup takes a long time and isn't fun while piloting a boat. The leadcore fired with a dink brownie. Since there were no more spin doctors to use, I rummaged a big paddle-type flasher to put ahead of my fly. The fly was kind of special. A relative of my Mom's was a commercial fly tier. When I was nine, he gave my brothers and me a big pile of flies, among which were some tandem hooked trolling flies. I have a few of them still. This was one of very few times I trolled with them. I hoped the paddle would work as well as a spin doctor. Next fish was a lovely 18 inch rainbow. Aha - catch a laker, and I will have my very first grand slam. Next fish was another brown - a bit bigger, maybe 16 inches. I can count on one hand the number of brown trout I caught on Canandaigua before, so that was kind of cool. So here I am targetting lake trout and 3 of my first 4 fish are browns and rainbows! I quickly trolled my way into a big group of lakers, and the action began. They were all big - 20 to 26 inches, and hungry. I had a double at one point. It's a wierd kind of triage, deciding which rod has the bigger fish to reel in first! Nearing one big point, i hooked one and cut the wheel deeper to concentrate on the battle. Right after that release, came the BIG BITE out in deep water. It hit that antique fly from my childhood (what am I saying?) and we had some give-and-take with the drag. It was a 26 ich rainbow, a tie for my biggest in the finger lakes, that hit the BOTTOM leader, 60 foot down. I can't get over how fat they are this year! I went back to the concentration of lakers and tried jigging. They weren't that responsive, but I did get a 26 inch laker that really swallowed the lure. I went back to trolling through the same pod, and got 3 fish before making it out the other side. I quit around 1:30. I expect no sympathy whatsoever when i tell you that I caught so many they threw my back out. Pretty hunched up and sore right now. I landed 12 fish and lost several others. That's a lot of times to lean way over the gunwales, pulling those heavy rods out of the holders with thrashing fish. No wonder it hasn't happened before, tweaking my spine like this. Still, one of my best days ever on Canandaigua. I bet they would have kept on biting until dark. So there was one last really cool thing to happen today. i see jumping fish on the fingers all the time. Most often, they don't show themselves and you wonder what it was that made the boil. Every so often I will see a small salmon or rainbow jump clear of the surface. On my way in, while under full throttle, a big rainbow, maybe 5 pounds, did a fantastic "Free Willy" style of arcing jump, two feet high, right in front of me. What a show! Pete Collin http://www.pcforestry.com

Choo-choo, Is this Steve R. who took me on an awesome drift down the Deleware? I haven't seen you since Stothard's funeral! How is everything? Pete

Hello All, I was going to launch yesterday at sunrise, but when the alarm went off, I couldn't get roused. Saturday my wife and I went down to help her brother, who lives near Owego, clean up after having been flooded. His street looked like a smaller version of Hurricane Katrina. Anyway, I was too exhausted to wake up at 4 AM. Launched in Woodville at noon. Woodville is pretty busy now that they are the only public access to the whole lake. Many pleasure boaters out and about. I wanted to target the rainbows because they have been biting so well lately. Ran a two leadcore and one downrigger program. Got a bite right away from a 16 inch rainbow on an orange Mooselook Wobbler. Wanted to test the "bright day, bright lure" motto. Went some time without another strike. Got to the spot where we hosed them last weekend and had another hit on the same leadcore rig. He came off halfway to the boat. I had a couple of taps that didn't stay on, when I made a discovery about my new kicker motor. It has a small internal tank. When trolling lakers, I can put-put along all morning at a mile an hour from just that little bit of gas. So I got in the habit of leaving the external tank home to save space. Well there is a big difference in fuel consumption when you are going 2.5 MPH for rainbows! So I was a little suprised when she dried up and stalled after a couple of hours. My main motor is a fuel hog, so I opted to jig for a while. While bringing in the lines, I discovered a very dead baby rainbow that I had been dragging around. Pity. It seems like all the lakers have come in along the 55-70 foot contour. Just about anywhere on the lake you will find bottom-hugging blips at that depth. This is typical for fall on Canandaigua. Makes finding the lakers much easier. I got chases and taps, but couldn't connect, save for a spunky smallmouth bass that hit when I came in a bit shallow. Lakers hate calm cloudless weather, and I didn't have much confidence or patience. It is a lot of work keeping your boat in that narrow corridor. So i went back to fast trolling, off the main motor this time. got quite a few hits that came off. The downrigger was very active this time. Had a dalmatian spin doctor with a "Grey Ghost" fly behind it. (Mike, if you are reading this, a Grey Ghost was in that packet of flies I gave you. Google it for a picture. It is a popular pattern.) Finally got a very fat 18 inch rainbow, then a real nice 21 incher that zoomed all over the place and ripped drag. I was ready for a big rally, and the action just quit. With so many other kinds of fishing, you get a big burst of action right as the sun goes down. With Finger lakes trout, they never seem to do much once the sun comes off the water. Strange. So I didn't get the huge rainbows everybody else seems to be getting, but that's OK. For so long I targetted the lake trout, so it's a bit quaint to catch the prettier and harder fighting rainbows. It's refreshing to use something other than Seth Green rigs for a while, too. There's plenty of fall left! Pete Collin http://www.pcforestry.com

Brett, You sure know how to get the rainbows! Pete