Sk8man

Well put Sea IV

I think John was referring to "in general" because in the absence of major egg predation factors perch and bluegills and sunfish do have high rates of successful reproduction because they lay a lot of eggs but they have to because many other things eat them (alewives, other fish like the sunfish etc.). The thing I was getting at earlier was that since the influx of the Zebras and perhaps the Quaggas (deeper water) the bottom is literally covered with them probably interfering with reproduction and the alewives when in shallow devour they eggs in the reduced number places the perch spawn

Yes last couple years I've been getting the Empire Pass so I don't have to worry about having the money with me etc. I think I pretty much get my money's worth considering all the launches I go to etc.

Ed I think the parks (Sampson and Seneca lake at least) haven't historically started charging until some time in May near Memorial Day but given the condition of the roads in those parks and the docks at Sampson they may have to re-evaluate that process but on the other hand the distribution of funds received by the state seldom follows logical distribution . I noticed the other day that they were repairing some of the docks in the marina at Seneca. The fishing has been permitted in both parks until some time in April when the boats start mooring there and I've been told by a number of the workers in those parks over the years that the NO Fishing signs are intended to help the moored boat owners keep their privacy and security rather than being aimed at the prop/line issue.

LakerTaker that is exactly the mentality I was talking about.... pretty short sighted....

I think they selected 70 khz frequency on the Fishhawk to avoid this on both Humminbird and Lowrance transducers. It is highly probable that the problem lies in the position of your HDI transducer and it may need to be positioned exactly according to the installation instructions. My hunch is that it is up too high from the bottom of the boat. It should be approximately 1/16 below the boat bottom parallel to the ground NOT the boat bottom, and you may need to tilt the angle of it until you lose the interference. Turbulence can appear very much like electrical interference on the screen and losing bottom is often having the wrong angle position of the transducer.

Bomber Long A gold with orange bottom

Time for a commentary regarding the perch fishing there. I've fished out there for over 50 years through good times and not so good times. For about 18 or 20 years there was about a dozen or so locals and top notch old timers that knew about the perch fishing there. Before limits were imposed (50 perch now) people used to catch huge garbage bags full of beautiful perch and although a lot of perch were caught most of the guys threw back the large female "spawners" and kept the 10 -12 inchers this practice perpetuated the cycle of returning spawners which kept the life cycle going since perch have a relatively long life span. For the past few years VERY intense fishing pressure has occurred at that particular place most of which has been targeting the perch especially the "jumbos" which are usually the females ripe with eggs. Human behavior is nearly always puzzling in one regard because we humans seem to often think in "magical" terms regarding numbers attached to resources....always thinking or believing that we are dealing with INFINITE quantities of things especially in nature. It is as though these things (e.g. fish)are coming out of a hole in unlimited quantities and will be "replaced" overnight so we return to the same spot day after day and in the meantime bring our "select" friends along and then down the road we wonder what has happened to that resource....must have been the Zebras or Quaggas, or the fleas, or pollution.etc. when in fact the problem is US. We fail to comprehend that it takes YEARS for some species to get up to size. Yes there are many perch in that large lake but there are limited spawning areas nearly all of which have been gravely compromised by the Zebra invasion and egg predation by alewives. I fished my usual spot through the ice onlly once this year but with well over a hundred guys there in that limited area i left disgusted in about an hour people starting up gas augers with only 3 ft or so of water, people using a hole that you had drilled a few minutes before without asking etc. Last week I arrived at 6 AM to find boats lined up to launch and a dozen or so folks already fishing from shore. I counted 47 boats that launched while I was there in the AM and 32 of them were all lined up out in front of the breakwall about 50 ft from each other anchored and not suprisingly I didn't see anything much caught by anyone there. If this kind of pressure continues with folks keeping the spawners etc. there will be nothing left there in a very short time. Pretty sad to see......especially when there are literally hundreds of great perch spots within 5 minutes of the launch...but the herd mentality has taken over as well as greed (keeping the spawners).

Priceless!

You earned your fish in this weather

Might also want to check the inflation on the tires -

Looks like North end of Keuka fish to me.