Upstate and Western New York Fishing Report – October 10, 2019

Greater Niagara Region

Bill Hilts, Jr.

If you are looking for salmon, the best area in Niagara Falls USA would have to be Olcott. Karen Evarts at The Boat Doctors in Olcott reports some fish being caught off the piers by spoon chuckers. A few have been caught on J13 Rapalas, rattle baits (like Rat-L-Traps) and spinners. Drifting egg skein is also a good approach. You can do the same thing from small boats and other watercraft in the harbor and up 18 Mile Creek. Trolling, casting or still fishing in some of the deeper holes.
 

At the dam, there was good brown trout action over the weekend, with some salmon and steelhead being caught. However, things have slowed back down again with the warmer weather this week. That could all change with the cold front coming through this weekend. Egg sacs were working best at the dam, with pink being a hot color. If we get some rain, you can look for salmon at Wilson, too. A total of 10,000 kings were put into pens in 2017 and some of those fish could be returning early as 2 year olds. There should also be browns and steelhead around.

Warm water fish like bass and northern pike should also be in both Wilson and Olcott harbors. Out in the lake, some boaters have pounded the piers with limited success. Better luck for salmon and trout has been out deep, but no specific details are available.

In the lower Niagara River, salmon action has been poor in the Devil’s Hole area. Very few fish are being caught from shore or from boats. There are fish available, but in limited numbers. Water temperatures are still warm, in the mid-60s, and that could be impacting the run a bit. There are a few browns and steelhead around.

Mike Rzucidlo of Niagara Falls caught a musky (on a No. 3 spinner) and a walleye off the NYPA Fishing Platform this week. No salmon.

Bass fishing has been good according to Lisa Drabczyk with Creek Road Bait and Tackle in Lewiston, especially by Fort Niagara using crabs, shiners, and tubes. In the upper river, Capt. Chris Cinelli of Grand Island is reporting some of the best smallmouth bass fishing of the year on big minnows.

This coming weekend, Oct. 12-13 is the youth pheasant hunt for Western NY. Also, Oct. 12-14, Columbus Day Weekend, is the Youth Big Game Hunt in the Southern Zone. To check out more information on these youth hunts. Check out www.dec.ny.gov.

Oswego County

Mary Ellen Barbeau of the Oswego County Department of Community Development, Tourism and Planning.

Lake Ontario/Oswego River Report

Lake Ontario Report
The lake fishing report has ended for the season.

Oswego River Report
Monday afternoon the river flow spiked to nearly 7,000 cfs. It has been flowing between about 4,000 and 6,000 cfs since then. This morning it is running at 4,920 cfs with a water temperature between 60 and 61 degrees. With the higher water flow and the water temperature continuing to drop, conditions should be good for fishing action this holiday weekend. Anglers have been finding salmon off the wall using skein under slip floats and deep diving thundersticks. Egg sacs, beads, soft plastic eggs, marabou jigs, and skein have all been used to catch salmon at the dam lately.

According to Capt. Andy Bliss of Chasin’ Tail Adventures:
We have been working for them for sure the last few days but capturing a few every day. Making lots of smiles!

According to Oz Angling Tackle:
The action last weekend for our salmon tournament was not hot and heavy with the steady south wind and sunny conditions but most teams managed to post 2 or 3 fish on the board with 28 anglers participating.

Notice: The bridge to Leto Island is closed, and there are mandatory personal flotation device (PFD) zones on the river. For more information, visit our website at visitoswegocounty.com and click on the Fishing Report along the top bar on the home page. The Oswego Fire Department offers loaner life jackets at no charge through its “Loaner for Life” program. For more information contact the fire station, 35 E. Cayuga St., at 315-343-2161.

Salmon River Report:

According to Whitaker’s Sport Shop & Motel:
Over the last couple of days anglers in the mid to upper end of the river reported getting into kings in the Papermill, Sportsman Pool, Pineville, Trestle Pool, Schoolhouse Pool and the Upper & Lower Fly Fishing Zone. With the recent rain anglers also reported getting into some kings in some of the smaller local tributaries. Once again the key to success has been covering lots of water and making adjustments. The most productive patterns have been estaz eggs, sucker spawn, glo-bugs, hot stones, egg sucking leeches, comets, muddlers, zonkers and woolly buggers.

According to the Douglaston Salmon Run:
Fishing has diminished throughout the past couple of days. There are still anglers coming up with fish but there has been little presence of any fresh fish coming into the system. Most being taken are the fish that are in “spawning mode”. There has been sporadic movement down throughout the entire run. In the mix has been some steelhead and browns, with primarily kings. On Tuesday as the river patrol came off the water they reported good numbers of fish showing up in the estuary so hopefully they will begin moving into the river. “Slow but productive” is the way to characterize yesterday.

According to Capt. Troy Creasy of High Adventure Sportfishing:
After eating bananas and taking a beating on day one our client recovered nicely and landed a few browns, kings and a beautiful diamond bright steelhead on Sunday. It was his day on the Douglaston Salmon Run with no bananas! Our clients from Colorado found a tough bite with little to no movement Tuesday morning. We hung a few and landed two nice clean fish and they were happy with the results. They had beautiful sunny skies, a scenic river, nice people to fish around and they can cross another fish off of their bucket list.

Oneida Lake Report:

With the cooler temperatures the night walleye bite has picked up. Casting stickbaits from shore just before and after dark is a suggested application for walleye this time of year. If you are still interested in fishing the deeper waters for them, worm harnesses, blade baits, and stickbaits are suggested baits to try. For bass, keep an eye out for bird activity or for fish breaking on the surface. This species can provide some exciting fishing.

Sandy Pond Report:

Activity is quiet on the pond which is typical for this time of year.

Wayne County Fishing Update

Chris Kenyon

Lake Ontario

Out of Hughes’ Marina in 50 feet of water, down 30 feet there was some late season kings caught with spoons. Good fish for smoking.
All the professional charters have pulled their boats for the season and what a season it was…kings, browns, steelhead, and lakers were all the bite from April till September.

Another record year for Lake Ontario fishing.

Streams

Recent rainfall has left a better flow in Maxwell Creek, however fishing the creek has not been very productive. There has been some luck at the mouth, casting out in the lake, however they haven’t really started to enter Maxwell.

Bays

Bass fishing continues to be fantastic on Sodus Bay. There was a contest last weekend with the boats launching at Margaretta Road.

Fish the docks, weedlines or off the points in the bay.

Perch fishing Wayne County bays in autumn has always been the main angling attraction. The word is the fish are in Port and Sodus bays.

They are schooling off the drop-offs in Port Bay and are biting-on small jigs, or two-inch emerald shiner rubber bait.

The docks at Margaretta Road launch are now finished. They are 60 X 60-foot poly deck dock.

All launch sites are open in Wayne County.

If you need tackle Bay Bridge Sport Shop and Davenports at the south end of Sodus Bay are always opened. B-E Fishing in Ontario has everything you need to put you on the water.

Check out the rest of the Wayne County Tourism web page for the locations and hours of local bait and tackle shops. waynecountytourism.com.

Erie Canal

The canal will official close October 16th for boat traffic, however that won’t interfere with fishing certain sections.

Widewaters is not drained, and you can launch at the ramp until the canal freezes.

Currently the bass are hitting near the shallower south section of canal waters. Throw out spinnerbaits or plastic worms. The largemouth are in the five-plus pound range.

Orleans County

Orleans County Tourism and Capt. John Oravec, Tight Lines Charters

Salmon migrations remain mostly spread out in small to medium pods of fish that are not always revealing themselves moving out of Lake Ontario and/or the downriver staging spots. They are mostly stealthily trucking right through. More fish are likely still moving out from the Lake. The salmon movements in the Oak are adding up to pretty good numbers at or near the dam. The downstream fast water stretches, of course, see those movements of fish sometime, and so far the Kings are not holding all that well in those areas but are moving straight upstream through.

Each day that brings another cool night and drop in the tributary water temps, there should be more fish hanging around gravel spawning spots. I wouldn’t doubt that all of a sudden in some near future time we’ll see most of the Kings go to gravel.

Downstream frog water areas are reported to have some fish boiling and massing while just upstream at say the Archers it can be pretty quiet for fish movement – at least during daylight. There’s a few brown trout around and most serious trout anglers will look more toward the end of October through November and beginning of December for that best action.

Water flows in the Oak are low to moderate and pretty clear and that’s even with the confirmed 24/7 Erie Canal feed. Flows say from the Archers and below are backed up from consistent east winds and high lake levels.

Anglers might consider the waters upstream or downstream of the Archers for fish prospecting before declaring there’s no fish around. Also float/indicator techniques or cast and retrieve/swing techniques might yield better chances at hook ups then old school bottom bouncing in the sluggish drift areas. Other area small tributaries have mostly low and clear flows and scattered numbers of fish in the upstream reaches with more salmon still coming in and through the estuary waters. Casters and pier head guys should still look for hard striking King action and maybe some cohos or browns or rainbows/steelhead.