# Lake Ontario last weekend



## Lundy (Apr 5, 2004)

We went to Point Breeze for four days.

Picked up Fishslim at 5 AM on Thursday and had a blowout on a trailer tire in NY. Got on the water around 3 PM.

Thursday afternoon - Started straight out in 120 FOW and trolled North, good water temp, 50 deg, 50 down. Very hot 91 degs, light breeze from the west. Took on teenager salmon around 4PM and had one other knockoff in 170 ft. Nothing after that so I trolled west almost 2 miles and we started to get some hits as the sun started dropping. Late evening it was on!. Everything was firing in 95 &#8211; 135 FOW. Moonglow Happy Meal on the riggers, 55, 60, 66 and wire divers, 2 setting 165, 180. We kept 5 a few over 20 and lost multiple fish. All fish on a West troll, nothing east. 3.2 SOG, 2.5-2.7 down speed. Green flies.

Friday morning &#8211; got started around 6 AM and it was on as soon as we set up in the same area west. Light wind, temp still same, 50 down 50, Bunches of fish with multiple over 20, same basic setup on riggers and divers. Bite died around 8 AM, our cooler was full so we cleaned fish and headed in.

Friday evening, same area, same temp, same hot bite, same spoons and flies. Once the sun would start to get low on the horizon it would be a fire drill with non stop action right up until dark. 

Saturday morning, got a earlier start, we were on the water before 5 AM, setting up in the dark, same area, same water temp, light winds, same spoons and flasher flies, same amazing action. The only change is we ran everything a little higher, riggers at 50, 55, 60, divers at 140-150 on a 2 setting. 7 big kings in the box and it was full. Started cleaning fish at 8 AM as we trolled back to the East towards home. Pulled rods as they would get hit. Caught a couple small kings and broke off two screamers by the time we finished cleaning the fish.

Saturday afternoon &#8211; went on a afternoon charter, wind had increased quite a bit from the NE and really shut the fish down. 5 hrs and 3 hits, one small steelhead. It was hard to belive we were on the same lake as we were on the last few days. It was an Ok trip and did get to learn a few tricks.

Sunday morning &#8211; another 5 AM start, same area, but the NE wind had changed the water temp. It was now 55 down 60. The water was a little more mixed without that defined temp break. We ran everything deeper, 60-70-80 on the riggers, 180-200 on the divers. We were getting hits but from smaller fish. Put one teenager in right away and lost on in the 20 range close to the back of the boat, caught a bunch of little kings. The weather was moving in and we had to head home so we only fished until 7AM. I think we could have done well by just fishing a little deeper water 175-250 were the NE wind from the day before would not have messed up the temp break , but we didn&#8217;t have time to go look.


The obvious information the salmon gave us this trip. Go EARLY, be on the water setup by first light, if you don&#8217;t need a flashlight to setup you are late.

The last hr bite is just as insane as the first 2 hrs of the morning bite. You don&#8217;t get much sleep on these trips except during the middle of the day. You are in bed at midnight from the evening trip and up at 4 AM to hit the morning bite. The only thing that allows me to survive is that we were off the lake no later than 9-10 every morning, The cooler would be full and the bite would slow by then.

They love spin doctors on wire with green flies. Josh can provide more detail on the exact flasher fly combos but everything he would put down worked. The majority of our big kings came on the divers.

They love the Moonglow Happy Meal on the deep middle rigger with a flasher fly on the rigger next to it and above five ft. The Happy Meal was the go to spoon again this year early and late.

Keep your speed up at the ball, the currents can be pretty strong, trolling direction can make the difference between a great day and no fish.

Take your time bring these things in, they can run off 200-300 ft of line in a big hurry, you only have time to reel in so many during the morning or evening bite, they take forever to get in so make them count so you don&#8217;t waste all of that time during the hot bite. We had a couple of doubles, with 20+ kings, that was fun and we got them in.

Check your line and retie everything often! The action was so fast with no down time in the mornings and evenings that you don't pay attention the way you normally would. It cost us some equipment and some screamers that should not have happened if we made ourselves take the time to do what we KNEW we should be doing.

If you don&#8217;t have speed and temp listen to the radio for the local charters , you will get info quickly on rigger depths and wire line out lengths. Watch them for trolling directions if you can&#8217;t figure it out on your own. Stay way clear of the packs and charters, lots of long copper and leadcores out the back. We stayed a couple miles West of the charters had very little boat traffic.

Always a fun trip with Josh and Troy. Josh really has the sets down to a science and Troy is coming on fast now that he has joined us for a few years. Bunches of kings 18-25.5, heard some up to 28 caught but we didn&#8217;t get any that big.

Sorry for such a long post.



















Check out Troy's outfit!!


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## Torch (Feb 10, 2007)

Very nice report Lundy, will be going 8-17 for a long weekend. hope the fishing stays as hot as I have been reading. Can I ask a few questions what weights are your down rigger balls. I have used 10lbs over the years and just don't think I have enough weight when we fish NY. like you said there is some strong currents to deal with. direction of troll is everything. We also noticed early and late is the way to go. 

Thanks again very nice report.

Torch.


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## Big Joshy (Apr 26, 2004)

Early and late the moonshine 'happee meal " has by far been out best spoon for mature kings for several years. Its a smooth blank. with a silver cup, solid green glow with a green oil slick ladderback. They make sevral sizes, of moon glow spoons this is the standard size spoon, not the mags or the slightly smaller ones they are making now.

We have been running a flasher fly with a 10ft lead on the speed and temp rigger on the left side and keeping that near the 50 degree water break, then we run this spoon on a 15 ft lead 5-10 ft below the flasher and just off to the side. They are close enough that they got tangled a few times but its worth it. This setup has been money for us for the last several years trips.

the flys that were working best were,42nd, hammer flys, green krinkle, and green glow. Thats all we tried and they all worked well. Flashers same type of thing. 42nd, Green gator, black glow. basically any flasher with some glow, some silver and some green and black was money.

don't know if it mattered but we ran 8 ft leads off the diver to the flashers.

we have made the trip once a year for 15 years and it was by far the best fishing we have ever had. We lost quite a few big fish but it got to where it didnt matter because you would just reset the rod and try to take a drink of water before it would scream again. Just about every time we were bringing in a big fish, we would know to be prepared for another rod to pop and usually it was another big one. Fortunately we didn't have any tripples.
It was frantic fishing though. As soon as you netted a fish you had to get it unhooked fast because you knew another one would pop any second. 
We ended up with so much meat that after splitting it 3 ways we all still have to give alot away because it just too much for our freezers.

Usually these trolling trips you have time to shoot the breeze, talk about all kinds of things and do some male bonding while you wait for the fish to cooperate. This trip was non stop catching, setting, netting, cutting. Im exausted!


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## Lundy (Apr 5, 2004)

I am using 10 lb chrome sharks on two of the downriggers and a 15 lb black shark on the downrigger with the speed and temp probe.

The profile of these weights really helps with blowback when you have to go deep. It was really nice this weekend to have the temp where it was and not needing to go down 100' or more to get to fish.

I have always going over to Lake O during mid to late August every year for a lot of years. I got tired of reading how good the fishing was during July so last year I changed it up and went the 3rd week in July and had a very good trip. This year we went a week earlier and it was the best ever of any trip and I don't think I ever was more than 3 miles from the harbor. The other big thing we like is the fish are all still silver with very firm flesh, much, much better than the August kings. Boat traffic in July is very minimal as compared to August also.

The king in the video you can see the Happemeal spoon

Good luck, I wish I could go back


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## FISHIN 2 (Jun 22, 2005)

Is this legal in New, York? I guess ya could keep the mess on the water. Mike


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## Big Joshy (Apr 26, 2004)

yes as long as it is 100 ft from shore


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## K gonefishin (May 4, 2004)

Awesome fishing guys. My blood starting to boil as soon as I heard you message, first trip booked for weekend of august 3-5th, I pulled my shiny copper out yesterday.

Did you guy run any more rods (maybe junk rods off boards) due to the new rod limit? or just stick with 2 wires and your rigger set? 

I typically run 2 wires and 2 riggers (sometimes with sliders if fish are super deep) and one junk rod down the shoot) this year I'm running boards and running one copper or one lead or 2 coppers off boards plus my standard set. 

I love the fact that the same fly's and spinny's are always working. 

My best spoon is Carbon 14 early and late, can't say I've had a ton of luck on happee meal maybe that's JUST an oak spoon


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## Big Joshy (Apr 26, 2004)

we run 3 riggers and two divers. We tried 1 copper on a board for a bit one afternoon before the bite picked up and didnt have a hit. on it. More rods would have just been in the way the way the bite was for us. The rods that moved the most in order were, wire divers, deep center rigger with spoon, right side out and down with flasher fly set at 50degree water, and last the high rigger with spoon. We specifically didnt set any riggers higher than 50 ft deep so that we didnt have to deal with the steelhead. We were only after kings.


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## K gonefishin (May 4, 2004)

My spread is similar I try and target kings but when fishing is slow u do what u have to do to move rods. When temp is set up right you can't do no wrong. Did u guys pull any out of ice water?

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## Big Joshy (Apr 26, 2004)

I think the deep rigger was somewhere around 45 degrees at the coldest. the deepest we ran was 80ft sunday morning because the temp dropped 10 ft. No need to get too fancy the first set we tried was the set we ran 90 percent of the time. There were the usual vertical movements when the sun was low they were higher and they went deeper as the sun went up. we ran every bait from 50-80 all weekend with the 60-70 being the sweet spot. the divers on a 2 setting back 150-160 should have been hitting that same range and they were money also. just slid them back to 180 to 200 when the sun was higher.


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## Lundy (Apr 5, 2004)

Kevin,

As Josh stated we ran one 300 copper out in 175' for about 45 minutes on a board on Friday late afternoon during the dead time while waiting for the sun to start to drop and our move back into our 100-130 range for the evening action.

I ran it only because I bought for this trip just in case we needed it and since I invested the money I wanted to put it out for a while and see how the board and reel handled. Pulled it on a large Church board, worked great, I bought the Diawa saltist 50 and it is really nice, solid, great drag and 6.4:1 gear ratio. I'll need someday on one of these trips for sure.

We never put it out any other time, we would have not been able to handle any more rods than the 5 we were using. There was just no down time trying to keep just the 5 in the water.

I even took some meat and had it all brined and dyed blue, pretty stuff that was going to help us out if it was tough and we never ran it, didn't need it. Our normal go to spread was kicking from start to finish. If we would have had to fish during the late morning and middle of the day to get some fish we would have changed up a bunch of stuff. 

Some of the salmon coming on the 66 rigger the first few days were in water in the low 40's somewhere. We were fortunate to have the temp break you always hope you have every trip. Just doesn't get any better than those first few days.

I hope you catch a bunch of big ones when you go.


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## Torch (Feb 10, 2007)

Thanks lundy on the down rigger weights. What do you use to dye the meat rigs with?

Torch


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## Lundy (Apr 5, 2004)

Torch,

Search You Tube for Pautzke Nectar and you will see a couple of different brine videos

I used the one, reduced by 1/2, with some sugar in the recipe and used an entire bottle of the blue. I used cut herring strips from Erie Dearie bait and got the nectar at Cabelas. They turned out very nice to look at, have no idea if they would have caught fish or not.


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## Saugeyefisher (Jul 19, 2010)

Nice report! sounds like fun,and like you guys have it down! Very impresive imo to go and pull fish out of town,consistantly like that!


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## fishslim (Apr 28, 2005)

Was a awesome trip and am honored to be able to learn the science to catching these unreal powerul fish with Lundy and Josh!!! As mentioned it's hard to get any better then the first couple days were,just unbelievable the amount of 20# plus fish that were eager to wear us out. Trust what Lundy says the late bite right up to dark is fast and furious and if you have not stayed out late do try it. Still have alot to learn mainly netting skills with fish over 20#  i seem to like to try and knock them off but mangaed to not lose any though i tried real hard on Josh's 24#. Anyone who has not had the chance to experience the power of these fish make sure to do it you will never forget the scream of line and the aching of your arms as you fight a fish that just does not give up!! Thanks again guys for a fantastic trip.


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## Lundy (Apr 5, 2004)

By the way Troy did not know I was taking video of him fighting that fish. Looking at his attire that day you would have thought he knew he was going to on camera, but he really didn't , he likes styling I guess

I wish I would have taken some more video's but it was pretty hectic most of the time. I also found out that I don't have wide enough lens on that camera to get much in the frame, I can't drive the boat and get far enough away from them at the same time

I would have liked to have gotten the initial runs these fish make on tape, if you have never experienced them it is really hard to understand. Troy had the fish in the video back to under 200 ft a few times before he finally grew tired enough to come to the net. Josh had a fish Sunday morning that had him asking me how much line was on the reel, he was getting concerned. An initial run of 200-400 ft , really fast, is common, all you can do is hold on and wait for them to stop, then the work begins.

I guess I will look into one of those GoPro video cameras and a way to mount it if I want to video more in the future.


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## Toolman (Jun 8, 2004)

What a trip...looks like a blast!

Tim


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