DurangoNY

Nice fish! Thanks for showing/explaining the rigging, too

Hmmm. Ok. Not sure what billc8081's point is here. I'm a bass fisherman so I'm not saying "bass fishermen are lowlifes"; I'm saying the people who introduced largemouth in substantial numbers to a wonderful smallmouth lake that had existed without largemouths for thousands of years are lowlifes. What would you call lawbreakers who deliberately introduce (without permits) invasive non-native species? Guess I'm just showing my "ignorance."

I first fished Oquaga Lake in 1976. It is the last lake made by the Finger Lakes glacier and perhaps the southeastern extremity of native lake trout habitat. Its water has always rated in the highest category of NY DEP evaluation. Some lowlife bass fishermen put largemouth in the lake about 1986; they have thrived and eliminated the sawbellies which had previously provided forage for a very healthy brown trout population and good laker growth. Stocking in the last twenty years has been mainly rainbows. Some survive to grow to good size, while others show why rainbow trout is one of the most effective Rapala models. The lake is indeed private, though poachers like to ice fish and keep the trout they catch even though ice fishing for trout on Oquaga is illegal. Others fish the lake and obey the law. Whitefish and cisco may no longer exist in the lake. Enjoy the lake and remember that a laker can live 40 years or more; the upper limit has not been determined.