Seneca fishing captain: 'Worst in 36 years'

SENECA LAKE--As the summer winds down, many anglers are looking to enjoy their final fishing opportunities before the season ends. While results vary from place to place, not all fishermen and women have had a good year when it comes to reeling in the big one. Seneca Charters Captain Paul Schaufelberger said the fishing on Seneca Lake this season has been "terrible" for lake trout, rainbow trout, brown trout and landlocked salmon.
"This is the worst year I have ever seen in 36 years of fishing," Schaufelberger said.
Schaufelberger attributes this summer's poor fishing to both the frequent rain storms washing out into the lake, along with an increased amount of bait for the fish to feed on.
"I think it is because the storms trashed the lake," Schaufelberger said. "There is a lot of crud and mud and trees in the lake for one thing, and the other thing is there is way too much bait in the lake."
Schaufelberger added he does most of his fishing on the bottom half of Seneca Lake. He said he has not had many successful days this year, noting he used to be able to go out and catch 30 fish in six hours. This year, however, Schaufelberger said he is lucky if he can catch one or two now. Schaufelberger mentioned he is not the only person who is struggling, adding many of the other charter captains he has talked to are having similar results.
"It's terrible," Schaufelberger said. "There is just way too much bait, and you can't compete with the real thing. [...] It's not that the fish aren't there, they are just filled up and full of bait. It hasn't been a good year for anybody."
Captain Nicholas Overacker with REEL STORIES Fishing Charter said it has definitely been a slower year on the southern end of Seneca Lake than it has been in the past. He added last year he would catch between 20 and 30 fish on an average trip, while this year it was between 10 and 15 fish early in the season. Overacker noted it has dropped to around five fish on average in the past month.
"I think a lot of it has to do with the way the winter was," Overacker said. "The lake never really set up like it did in the past."
Overacker noted he will generally travel 10 miles north from Watkins Glen before he starts fishing. He said he was primarily catching salmon and brown trout in the spring, which then switched to rainbow and lake trout later in the summer. Overacker mentioned the fish tend to be in the three to six pound range, with some getting up to around 15 pounds.
He said catches can often vary from location to location, adding a person a mile away from his boat may be struggling while he is having more success.
"That's fishing," Overacker said.
The REEL STORIES captain said lakes tend to have cycles, noting Cayuga Lake struggled last year, but is currently a good fishing location. He also agreed there is an overabundance of bait for the fish where he fishes, adding it is not necessarily a bad thing for the fish in the lake, but leads to less catches.
"If it was this way for two years in a row, then I might start to worry," Overacker said.
Shawn Hourihan of Catherine Valley Outfitters agreed it has been an off year for fishing on Seneca Lake, attributing it to both the cold winter and the runoff into the lake. He noted the weather early on stayed cold, adding the lake itself was around a month behind where it was last year.
Hourihan said with the rain and flooding this summer, it filled the lake with additional nutrients which contributed to algal blooms that are not normally seen on Seneca Lake. With the additional algae, he noted this created more food for the bait fish, which in turn leads to more food for trout and salmon. Hourihan said both of these reasons have contributed to it being an off year for fishing on Seneca Lake.
The fishing success varies from lake to lake however, as the action on Keuka Lake appears to be more spirited. Gerald Pease, owner of Fishy Business at 3737 Pepper Road in Bluff Point, said he has done well this summer when he is out on Keuka Lake.
"Smallmouth bass [have] been excellent this summer," Pease said. "People are catching them using live bait or artificial lures."
Pease said he averages about six to eight fish on a four hour trip. He noted some people have not had as much success as he had, adding fish do not hit much of anything during the latter part of July and the first part of August.
Pease noted he tends to do the best trolling for trout by the bluff.
"During the summer, the lake trout have been good for me off and on," Pease said.
However, he noted there are only a few areas to choose from when fishing the shore such as the parks in Penn Yan and the Keuka Lake State Park. Pease said his shop's best sellers this summer have been trout lures, bass lures and fishing poles.