Fish'in friends...the bite goes on,

    The night work has been pleasant with unusually warm temperatures for late Oct. Oneida's surface temperature is still 61 degrees Fahrenheit. I checked with the Cornell research facility at Shackleton Point and they indicated that this puts the lake temperature back one month. They have been shocking the shoreline at night and have seen very few shad and pockets of walleyes rather than an even distribution.

    I can confirm the lack of shad. At this point I have cleaned 40 walleyes with only one walleye with any stomach content and that was this year's yellow perch. The shad are in the lake and simply staying deep. Typically they will not run shallow until the lake cools into the 50's. Despite the unpredictability of this fall's night fishery we are managing to catch fish when they show up. Here are some of the better catches:

    On Thurs., Oct. 18 John Brusa an engineer at Barton and Loguidice and his guests Jeremy Snyder, Stanley, NY, Jim Lynch,  Elmira, NY and Cory McDowell, Clay, NY found the walleyes and bass cooperative. The action didn't start until it was completely dark. We anchored in 4.5 feet along the shore and caught 10 walleyes with 9 keepers and 4 smallmouth.

    On Sat., Oct. 20 Eric Manning, Cicero, NY and friends, Joe Lamb, Governeur, NY, Rob Weismann, Rochester, NY and Todd Schaeber, Rochester, NY had they hands full of fish nor the night cast. They boated seven walleyes, one bass, and had a few manage to slip away. Again the lure of choice is the XPS Bass Pro Shops Nitro Suspend Minnow in the black/chrome, or blue/chrome holographic finish enhanced with Mustad's Activate spray pheromone.

    On Monday, Oct. 22, Pepper Beloin, Vice president of BioGenics, Utica and friends, Reid Porter and Don Zillioux also Utica, casted the shallows for a combined catch of smallmouth and walleyes. They boated five walleyes for four keepers and three smallmouths. Pepper's smallmouth measured 20 1/8 inches. The bass T-boned the 4 inch XPS minnow.

    I'll be fishing well into Nov. and as the water cools more walleyes should be visiting the shoreline. Last season I fished until Nov. 30. If you are interested in an outing, I can be reached at (315) 427-2278 or just email.

"Cod"  a go fish'in,

cap'n tony