Monday, March 5, 2007

Up Comming fishing season

There are a few things that I try to keep track off so that I have a feel for what is happening with our fishery. one tried and true indicator is how many small jack salmon follow the mature salmon into the river during the fall run. The more small jacks that run in the fall the more mature salmon there will be next year and last fall there were a lot of small jacks returning to the hatchery so this years mature salmon should be plentiful. One of the most important things that I watch is how well are bait fish are doing. There are a couple of trawlers on the lake run by the Federal Fish and Wildlife and the State Department of Environmental Conservation and their job is to sample the bait fish and report on how well the bait are doing. At the present time there are at least two good year classes of alewives which are the primary bait fish in Lake Ontario. I have saved the best for last. The round goby is a small perch like fish that was introduced in to the lake by Ships from Europe. They are being preyed upon by Cormorants. With the abundance of gobies in the northeastern end of the lake the cormorants are not flying down to Mexico Bay to eat our small trout and salmon like they were. The result is more and bigger trout for us to catch.
Barbara and I are looking forward to seeing all of our old friends again this year and we are hoping to make some new friends as well.
If you wish to contact us give us a call at 1(800)368-4467 or e-mail at luckydutch @earthlink.net
Catch you later. Capt. Bill