BlueDaksi

I've kayak fish for salmon nearshore in the dark using glow in the dark spoons, and have also trolled for them out to three miles from shore using a Dipsy Diver.  I wouldn't recommend the offshore trolling unless you have a very capable, watertight sit on top kayak.

I kayak fishing for just about everything.  

We have a fairly active group of guys with the Western New York Kayak Fishing Association - search for us on Facebook.  Also, we have a new tournament series for New York Kayak Anglers this season...

http://www.lakeontariounited.com/fishing-hunting/topic/50317-new-york-kayak-bass-fishing-series/

I honestly don't understand what the DEC crew did to warrant such ramp rage. You've outlined 8-9 minutes of delay, and I know it can be very aggravating to wait on hangups (and slow, inconsiderate boaters) at a launch, but in my opinion what you've described here hardly warrants the threat of violent confrontation that you admit to making. Also, getting into a fight at the launch would not have gotten you on the water any quicker, and I'm sure that any boaters waiting in line behind you were not appreciative of the extra delay due to your attempt to confront the crew.

You have every right to call and complain if you feel you have a legitimate gripe. However, I agree that calling in and using the same tone of anger and insults that you've posted here will likely not result in a productive outcome for you.

Paul, this is very nice small mouth BASS! Congrats!

Wish I was caught that size on same day as you did. But I did caught three smallmouth but they didn't reach that big like as yours. big one probably around 15 inches or so.

p.s. yeah, this lake give me great impressions with landscrape. It made me want to come there during spring season. should be blast time out there.

Mark, thanks! It is beautiful scenery out there. That is where I most often kayak fish.

That's awesome! I you are where I think you are, I live just a few miles from there. I'd definitely be able to join you some evening. Lot's of fun!

I usually concentrate on catching panfish & trout when ice fishing, but was very happy with my trip to a local Finger Lake about 10 miles from my house last Saturday morning.

I was targeting yellow perch and had a tip from a friend about where I could get into a few good ones. Turns out, I was fishing in the wrong spot, but I was happy with the results and can't wait to kayak fish this spot after ice-out in a couple of months!

First smallie was this nice 3lber...

...followed shortly by this Super Bowl worthy PIG of a football...

Both were caught using a Rapala Jigging Rap tipped with a small fathead minnow in about 20 fow.

Nice Paul! Congrats on the catch - I happen to be a fellow RIT alumni myself. I had no idea they had a "Bass Club" there. In typical RIT fashion (always thinking outside the box), I see the "bass club" is great at Pike fishing

Thanks! I'm just the club advisor. RIT bass club members compete in the FLW Collegiate Bass Series and other tournaments. In fact, the Club President, Corey Smith, took 1st place in the bass category at a catch-photograph-release benefit kayak fishing tournament last Saturday

http://www.lakeontariounited.com/fishing/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=20349

The club works to advance the sport of fishing for members regardless of their experience level or angling interests. We had one student who had never picked up a fishing pole in their life catch their first bass last spring - lots of good fun. They also are using kayaks as a budget-minded way to get on the water and develop this method of fishing into a competitive collegiate sport:

http://kayakanglerfishingclub.net/features/136-competitive-kayak-angling-graduates.html

This was one of two Northern Pike that I caught before dark on Lake Ontario last evening when I went kayak fishing with a couple members of the RIT Bass Club and my friend Andrew instead of staying home in bed with my cough - I'm paying for it today... CoUgH!

It was still fun though I caught them fishing at a creek mouth on a glow-in-the-dark 2/5 oz. Little Cleo while fishing for trout and salmon. Andrew caught a 7-8lb steelie

I put 12.75 miles on my kayak this afternoon/evening out of Sandy. Same slow fishing for me. I marked fish on the bottom in the 100 to 110 foot range. I managed to land one laker in 110 FOW. Water temp on the bottom measured 58 degrees at 110'. My arms and shoulders are tired from paddling. Maybe it is time for some rest !!

Way to grit it out in the slow fishing to pick up at least one fish. I came very close to say to heck with it and going out there with you. Alan has upgraded to a bigger kayak and we took it out on Canadice and caught a few bass and pickerel while he got adjusted to it. I also have a slightly longer kayak on the way that should be faster and a bit easier to paddle the long distances in Lake Ontario - can't wait until the water sets up better and the big fish are in closer!

Wow! Holy cow! Nice fish!

Pike, I like.

Trout will make you shout.

Salmon are slammin'.

But BASS, are a kick in the -ss!

I decided to take a break from the trolling in Lake Ontario for trout and salmon due to unpredictable weather and to catch up on some of the bass fishing that I missed earlier in the season. I had a fun time fishing two very different bodies of water. First was a wetland/pond complex and fished topwater - Spro frog and caught a number of bass in the slop. I also caught an evening bite at a beautiful Finger Lake fishing tubes in deeper water on the bottom - 30 ft - off of points and coves with great success. Here are some of the highlights of both trips.

I capped the evening off with this nice smallmouth. It was a neat experience fishing two completely different bodies of water on back-to-back trips, one eutrophic and the other oligotrophic to mesotrophic, and which required drastically different approaches to catch fish.

WTG. My hat's off to you guys.

Please be carefull out there. The little guys generally come up & fight near the surface, sometimes jumping, but the bigger ones will generally come up to the boat then dig right for the bottom.

Tom B.

(LongLine)

ps. that king was stocked.

You could be hard to see on the water if it is rough, best of luck, hope no one runs over you!

While this is new kind of fishing to us, this is not stretching the capabilities of the sit-on-top fishing kayaks that we have, which were designed and have been used for the past few years in blue-water applications. Believe it or not, I have friends who have caught fish weighing into the hundreds of pounds from kayaks similar to ours. I can stand on mine and have a lot of mobility to move around on the deck. If I take water over the top, it runs out through scupper holes instead of swamping. I'd get wet, but stay afloat. If I fall off, I can also climb back on. This kind of fishing is definitely not safe for sit-inside recreation kayaks though - once you get swamped or dumped in open water, there is really no way to recover.

I share the concern about visibility, and we are taking all the precautions that we can by having the proper safety equipment and by taking care to watch for other boaters. We have Visi-poles and brightly colored kayaks to help others see us. Our top cruising speed in these kayaks is around 5mph or just over 4.3 knots - trolling at 2.2-2.5 mph is right in our sweet spot.

We've found that once we are out a ways, we really had no problem watching out for the larger boats and trying to respectfully cooperatively troll through shared fishing areas. Folks seemed to be able to see us. The boaters that make us the most nervous are the pleasure craft that speed along the shoreline...

I know that some are out there trying to run a business and the last thing we want to do is interfere with a great day out on the water due to our ignorance. Any tips on ways that we can safely share the water would be welcomed.

The folks I've interacted with here and out on the boat ramps with bigger boats have all been great. Since I moved up here from Oklahoma 7 years ago, it's been fantastic to learn about experience the incredible fisheries that exist in Western NY. It truly is a treasure and by far, most of the folks I've met out on the water have been first-rate.

you guys are my heros, i have no boat. Wish i had a kayak!

That's awesome

Thanks! I'm always happy to share the sport of kayak fishing with other anglers. You can get into a very capable sit-on-top fishing kayak for under $1000. Gas is cheap too!

I gotta ask a silly question. If you are a few miles out in Lake Ontario and mother nature calls what do you do? It's not like you can get back into shore real quick or anything. Actually I think this question is better to ponder than to give an answer, but it was just something that came to mind.

Nice fish keep up the good work. I can wait to hear the report when you catch a 30 lber out there!

When u gotta go, just let it go!!!!

LOL, Our mobility and ability to move around on top of our kayaks would surprise you and so we have no problem taking care of our need much in the same manner that anybody would in any small watercraft.

Way to go!

you guys are gonna have fun in sept, trust me............

Thanks! Can't wait to catch my first really big one from a kayak like Chinooker (Sending pm soon) - wow!

Fishing Report

Your Name / Boat Name:

Paul Shipman / Stealth 14 by Malibu Kayaks

==============

TRIP OVERVIEW

==============

Date(s): 30-31 July

Time on Water: 10 counting both days

Weather/Temp: 70s

Wind Speed/Direction: 10 mph NW on Friday, steady out of the East on Saturday

Waves: 1-2 ft

Surface Temp: 72-74

Location: 1.5 - 2.0 miles off of Sandy Creek

LAT/LONG (GPS Cords):

===============

FISHING RESULTS

===============

Total Hits: 9

Total Boated: 5

Species Breakdown: 3 kings, 1 rainbow, 1 brown

Hot Lure: Northern King spoons

Trolling Speed: 2.2 mph

Down Speed:

Boat Depth: 100 - 150 ft

Lure Depth: 70 - 100 ft

====================

SUMMARY & FURTHER DETAILS

====================

I was prepared to chalk up my first success at trolling for trout and salmon on Lake Ontario a few days ago as beginners luck. However, Jude and I went out Friday for just under four hours and had some success during mid-day and reportedly slow fishing conditions. I caught another king salmon - a bit larger than my last, but not much. Jude caught a nice rainbow trout.

We caught these both about 2.25 miles out in the lake north of Sandy Creek in 150 feet of water. We were using 001 Dipsy Divers trolling 100 ft down with Northern King 4-in spoons.

Nice rainbow trout that Jude caught.

Another small king salmon - I'm told the big ones will be showing up soon...

We went out again early morning yesterday. Jude caught two similar-sized king salmon right off the bat about 2 miles out. I didn't catch anything until we were about to head in and had paddled over 10 miles. I was happy to pull in this nice brown trout after all that work in rough water and steady easterly winds. I love to paddle and fight powerful fish. I'm finding this type of fishing to be challenging and a heck of a lot of fun.

Thanks everyone. I have no idea what I'm doing, but I'll have fun figuring it out - lots of great info here. I plan on going out again tomorrow morning. I added a temperature/depth gauge and a new Daiwa Accudepth Linecounter combo to my equipment. In addition, I reorganized and my tackle and go rid of unnecessary items to streamline and simplify the deck. I'm still unsure about trolling with two rods at a time. I think I'll stick with one until I'm a bit more competent with what I'm doing.

Fishing Report

Your Name / Boat Name:

Paul Shipman / Malibu Kayaks Stealth 14

==============

TRIP OVERVIEW

Since I got my Malibu Kayaks Stealth 14 last year and had a plastic vessel capable of going onto big water, I've been eager to take it out into open water to deep-troll for some of the salmon and trout species that are abundant in Lake Ontario. I got my chance yesterday when a couple of my fellow Western NY Kayak Fishing Association friends, Andrew and Jude, caught the trolling bug with me. Andrew and Jude had gone out on charters the week previous and had a general idea of recent reports about where the fish were.

Other than what I have read about trolling in Lake Ontario, I had no experience or idea what to set up or how to set it up. So, I took an old Quantum baitcast Bill Dance catfish combo that I had laying around and converted it into a trolling rig. I put a detachable line counter on the rod and spooled it up with 200 yards of 40# Sufix Performance Braid, tied on 001 Luhr Jensen Dipsy Diver, added a snubber with a 6-ft 8# fluorocarbon leader, and tied on a 4-in dimpled trolling spoon by Northern King Lures. I made sure that I brought along my fish finder and gps unit so I could pay attention to depth and speed.

Jude was already out on the water when I launched from Sandy Creek at about 5:30pm and joined him about 1.5 miles out in 60-100 ft of water. Andrew joined us soon after and we soon commenced to trolling side-by-side in a half-fast manner.

The first thing I noticed, to my amazement, was that I could actually see the thermoclines on my beat-up old Humminbird PiranhaMax 160 fish finder. I really had no idea about how deep my Dipsy Diver would go with braided line, but I had read about a general rule of thumb to let out three times the amount of line as the depth you want to go. So, I let out 180 ft of line, set the drag, and commenced to paddling. We spotted baitfish and marked some fish 60 ft down in about 80 fow. After a couple of ~300-yd passes in 80-100 fow, I felt a tug and my drag started letting out. I grabbed the rod, popped the Dipsy, and reeled in to find that my 8# leader had been snipped off clean. This time, I tied on a 20# Yozuri Hybrid leader and a new lure and trolled about 100 yds before I got the next hit.

Despite my general skepticism about having any success on my first time out, I had a fish on and managed to boat a King Salmon. It was a dink, but legal (barely), and my first salmon ever. What a beautiful and brilliantly colored fish! Jude told me that it appeared to be a wild-bred fish because all of the stocked fish have their adipose fins clipped. I released it after Jude photographed us.

My first Lake Ontario King Salmon.

I set back up and trolled halfway through my second pass before I got another hit. This time, I could tell it was something bigger. This fish was a bit more of a fighter and I was surprised to see that I had a lake trout. Not my first lake trout, but what a strong fish! I must have been trolling deeper than I thought, because these guys are generally found closer to the bottom.

Lake Ontario Lake Trout.

We wanted to get back to shore before dark, and while I had a couple of what I thought were hits on the way back, I reeled up nothing else. Though I spent about 3.5 hrs on the water, time spent actually fishing was much less and I am very pleased with the success of my first attempt to do this type of fishing. I love to paddle, and I found that I could easily keep my trolling speed between 2.2-2.5 mph that I've been told is ideal. I can't wait to get out and try again!

==============

Date(s):

28 JUN 2010

Time on Water:

3.5 hrs

Weather/Temp:

Nice, sunny, 75 F

Wind Speed/Direction:

South 5 mph

Waves:

Calm

Surface Temp:

70 F

Location:

North of Sandy Creek

LAT/LONG (GPS Cords):

===============

FISHING RESULTS

===============

Total Hits:

5

Total Boated:

2

Species Breakdown:

1 King, 1 Laker

Hot Lure:

Northern King

Trolling Speed: 2.2 mph

Down Speed:

Boat Depth:

80-90 ft

Lure Depth:

60-70ft

Hey Mark! Glad to see you here!

I left right before the last session. It looks like I missed some excitement. I wrote a very brief summary on my blog at fishgator.com. Here is what I wrote...

"My son, Alan, and I attended the 2010 State of The Lake (Ontario) Meeting at the RIT campus last night as representatives of the Western NY Kayak Fishing Association. What transpired was a flurry of well-articulated 5-10 minute reports (overwhelmingly about salmon and trout) a la PowerPoint from fisheries biologists and staff from the NYDEC and the USGS. Each presentation was followed by a brief question and answer session. I was impressed with the professionalism, preparedness, and knowledge of all of the presenters.

The reports covered topics ranging from outlining recent research efforts to determine the relative amounts of recruitment into salmon populations due to natural reproduction, pen-rearing to increase survivorship and return of salmon, sample and creel reports about the status of fisheries and forage fish population (including a study of Irondoquoit and Sodus bays), invasive species (although they were not referred to as such), deepwater cisco reintroduction program, and a brief talk about the warmwater fisheries with a focus on smallmouth bass.

Here is a rundown of some of the take-home messages:

-There is some natural reproduction of Chinook Salmon occurring and recent marking studies will help to quantify the relative proportion of wild stock in the next couple of years.

-Atlantic salmon, steelhead, and brown trout populations in Lake Ontario appear to be doing well.

-Lake trout population remains depressed in Lake Ontario, but that there are hopes for improvement after the USFWS Allegheny Hatchery comes back online in 2011.

-Forage fish populations appear to be stable with Alewife being most abundant, followed by rainbow smelt.

-FOR THE FIRST TIME EVER, after many years of observed year-to-year population increase, the round goby was found to decrease in number. Reasons discussed for this were that the population may have overshot carrying capacity and is dropping due to density dependent factors (disease, competition for food…) or even the possibility that another invasive species, cormorants, may have shifted their diet from young bass to the round goby. No matter, the fact that this prolific species may have hit the ceiling and may now be somewhat stabilizing is good news.

-Sea Lamprey populations appear to be holding at or near targets due to control efforts. Unfortunately, a recent source population was discovered at Sandy Creek, and control efforts are now planned for this tributary.

-The recreational fisheries studies showed that both Irondoquoit and Sodus bays are intensively fished, but maintain high catch rates of nearly 1 fish per angler hour – much higher than the statewide norm of 0.25 fish per angler hour. Also (to my surprise), catch and release appears to be practiced by the vast majority of anglers for bass at a rate of around 96% for Sodus and 98% for Irondoquoit. Also, while surveys showed an abundance of walleye and northern pike at both of these bays, they are being “underutilized†because not many anglers target them relative to their abundances.

-Finally, the presenters admitted that smallmouth bass receive very little attention and the populations are poorly studied in Lake Ontario. What little data exist, corroborates angler observations that there has been a decline in angling success since 2003. However, this has not corresponded with a decrease in survey numbers for gill net surveys and reports that anglers who changed their tactics since 2003 continued to enjoy high catch rates. In other words, gill net surveys do not seem to indicate a population decline and the change in angling success may be due to a shift in the behavior habitat use of smallmouth bass.

There was much more discussed, but these were the highlights that Alan and I found most interesting. Salmon and Trout rule with respect the the attention and resources applied to maintain stock, and bass are largely ignored. Overall though, things are looking pretty good in Lake Ontario for both salmonids, black bass, and their prey in the near future. All of the information reported in the meeting can be found in various recent or pending reports and if you are interested in knowing more, do not hesitate to contact your regional NYDEC office."

I forgot to mention that the deepwater sculpin, once thought to be extirpated, has reappeared and increasing in surveys over the past few years. I wrote this all from memory, so this summary is based upon my best recollection. If anybody who was there disagreed with anything that I report here, please help me to clarify.

I and other members of the Western NY Kayak Fishing Association plan to be there.

I'm relatively new to the Northeast. Does Seneca Lake stay open all year - even close to shore/boat launches? I kayak fish and am gearing up to start doing more trolling for trout on the lakes using copper a line setup. I will also be getting properly equipped for cold-water kayak fishing next year.

Nice iced largemouth!

Anyone still got a pic I live 5 min from those lakes and want to help out.

I happened to save them on the day that they were posted because I figured they would be removed quickly from that forum...

In the fridge, and as much as you can fit in a quart jar with one small sweet onion, then fill the rest with the brine and the spice. Killed um again tonight, pics and story tomorow.

Sounds delicious! Almost like ceviche - I'd probably add some cilantro and lemon juice to that recipe...

Looks like you found brookie and pike fishin' heaven!

Gorgeous, both the fish and the location!