Moosehead Region Fishing Report: January 26, 2007

Ice conditions are improving, but not as fast as we would like. With last week’s cold weather ice thickness on our smaller ponds is likely over eight inches with as much as a foot in places. Despite last weeks cold temperatures anglers heading out onto larger lakes such as Sebec, Chamberlain, and Moosehead should still use caution.

In an attempt to get out and check anglers on Moosehead Lake this past weekend, I did venture out onto the southern part of the lake on Sunday. I only encountered 3 parties fishing and the folks I spoke to are still a bit reluctant to venture too far out onto the ice. In and around Greenville and Greenville Junction, the folks I spoke with said they had ice thickness ranging from 5 to 14 inches. The thickest ice is in East Cove inside of Mile Light, which has been buttoned up for about a month. At the Public Landing in Rockwood I spoke to a couple of parties that were fishing approximately 100 yards off shore and they had 4 to 8 inches of ice. One good thing is that this latest snowstorm didn’t drop the large amount of snow that was earlier forecasted and the strong northwest wind we had on Saturday and Sunday swept a lot of the snow to shore, so there isn’t a thick blanket of snow to insulate what ice we have. Lets hope for continued cold temperatures to help increase ice cover on these larger lakes.

We have been checking Chamberlain Lake, Telos Lake, and Round Pond this winter and have been finding that the few parties that we have interviewed were experiencing some nice catches of lake trout and brook trout. Traveling on and around the lake has slowly improved so that the guys were able to get around the lake safely. However, anglers going there for the first time still should use caution. In conducting our creel census work at Chamberlain, there has been a report of one of our radio tagged brook trout being caught. Upon catching the trout the angler noticed the external antenna and we are grateful to report that this fish was released and will continue to provide us with some very valuable information about brook trout in this system. We would continue to encourage anglers to release any tagged trout that they may encounter within the Chamberlain Lake System.

Reports from some of our smaller waters, which were stocked this past fall with 12-14 inch fall yearling brook trout have been very encouraging. Mt. View Pond and Prong Pond here in the Greenville area have been producing some good fishing. Harlow and Manhanock Ponds have seen lots of use this winter and have provided some enjoyable fishing for folks in the Guilford area. A few anglers making there way to Piper Pond in Abbott have reported some good splake fishing as well.