Archive for September, 2007
Posted on Thursday, September 20th, 2007 by Maine Sportsman
Although another general law open water fishing season is drawing to a close, there still is time to enjoy the remainder of a productive season and get ready for some fall action on selected waters. With surface waters cooling down, salmon, trout, and togue are coming to the surface and providing some good top-water action. Anglers have reported good action for salmon on East Grand Lake, Pleasant Pond and Cold Stream Pond. Both salmon and splake have been very active in Seboeis Lake. Baxter State Park waters are very productive for brook trout during this part of the season.
Don’t put the fish poles away yet. There are two categories of waters open during the extended fall season. First are waters with a special S-23 designation. These waters are open to fishing from October 1 – October 31 using artificial lures only and all fish caught must be released alive at once. This regulation generally applies to coldwater lakes that are stocked with salmon or trout and allows an angler to fish for these species through October. Some good Penobscot Regional waters are West Lake, Pleasant Lake, Deering Lake, Millinocket Lake, Millinocket Stream (in T1 R8 andT3 IP, from Millinocket Lake Dam downstream to the town line) and the Pemadumcook Chain of Lakes.
The other category is S-24, in which the waters are open from October 1 – November 30. In these waters all trout, salmon togue and bass must be released alive but an angler may keep perch and pickerel. These are generally warmwater lakes and ponds that have good perch and pickerel populations that are productive through the fall season. Some Region F waters in this category are Seboeis Lake, South Branch Pond, Saponac Pond and the Penobscot River from Medway to the Veazie Dam.
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Tags: Penobscot Valley Fishing Report • Categories: General
Posted on Thursday, September 20th, 2007 by Maine Sportsman
Fall fishing is well underway and we have had good reports from most of our major river fisheries in the region. We were able to crack the gate at First Roach a few more inches last Friday, which means the flow has increased from around 160 to 240 cfs. That should translate into some excellent trout and salmon fishing for the next two weeks. The weather forecast is perfect for the rest of the week, so get out and enjoy the best time of the year to fish.
This will be the last weekly fishing report until sometime in December. We have had a great fishing year in the Moosehead Lake Region. The winter got off to a slow start with the poor ice conditions but the fishing was very good for the remainder of the season. We checked some very handsome fish on Chamberlain Lake. We spent quite a bit of time on our brook trout telemetry study on the Chamberlain system last winter and this spring. The Natural Resource Education Center in Greenville will be sponsoring a presentation in Greenville and possibly the Bangor area this winter to discuss the results. The Greenville meeting will be the evening of Dec 7th.
There were numerous reports of big brookies from Moosehead Lake this summer. The salmon fishing was also pretty good by most accounts. The river fisheries, in particular the East Outlet, were very good this summer according to anglers. Lake trout still appear to be abundant but we should thin them down in the near future with the new regulations starting in January. The hatches on the trout ponds were a little sporadic. We did hear the hex hatch was slow to get started, probably from the cool spring, but it did extend late into the summer on some ponds. You shoulda’ been there! September can be hit or miss with trout ponds. There are good midge hatches this time of year and streamers can be effective at catching pre-spawn trout some days, but other days the fish seem to be sulking and can’t be coaxed to the rod. October can offer some great pond fishing as hatchery trout and salmon become aggressive and take streamers and lures quite well. Many of our best hatchery waters are open during the extended season, but few anglers take advantage of the extra month. I suspect most have put away the rod and picked up the shotgun.
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Tags: Moosehead Region Fishing Report • Categories: General
Posted on Thursday, September 20th, 2007 by Maine Sportsman
With the appearance of red and golden leaves and threats of frost comes a drop in water temperatures, which has already sent trout and salmon on their way towards the spawning grounds. Although they won’t be dropping their eggs until October, they make prespawning runs triggered by shorter days and colder water temperatures. If that doesn’t do it, a good flush of water from a rainstorm will. And so it is that we have reports of nice trout being caught in the Rapid, Magalloway, and Kennebago rivers; presumably others as well. There’s also good fishing in lakes and ponds the last week of September.
We’ve pretty much completed our summer work of sampling lakes and streams. Dave Boucher and several fishery consultants have been working on the bass problem on the Rapid River and on the Dead Cambridge River as of late. We completed several stream restoration projects in western Maine this summer, including an experimental technique called “chop and drop”, in which tree stems are added to stream channels to slow the rate of runoff and to trap organic nutrients.
With the help of volunteers, we recently completed the annual monitoring of our stream restoration projects. It is in that regard that we sadly note the passing of a longtime and enthusiastic stream volunteer from Rangeley. Patty Silvia helped survey the Magalloway River, South Bog Stream, Bemis Stream, Cupsuptic River, South Branch of the Dead River, and Allagash Stream. She also helped every year with the monitoring of stream restoration work on the Cupsuptic River, South Bog Stream, and the Sandy River. Anyone who knew Patty also knew how much she enjoyed the outdoors and how much fun she was to have around. Our condolences to her family.
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Tags: Western Mountains Fishing Report • Categories: General
Posted on Thursday, September 20th, 2007 by Maine Sportsman
Surface water temperatures have cooled down to around 60 degrees and soon will be in the mid 50′s, which is perfect to summon trout and salmon back to the surface. As these fish feed on the surface and near shore, its spring fishing all over again, except that most anglers will have lakes and ponds all to themselves and also be able to enjoy the spectacular fall colors.
I recommend trolling brightly colored streamers and lures for landlocked salmon such as the Montreal, Barnes Special, Cathance Special, Marabou Muddler and the orange beaded Gray Ghost for flies and the chartreuse, orange and silver Rapalas in sizes 5 and 7 as well as the purple and silver and the rainbow colored Yozori Pin Minnow in the 3 inch size for lures.
Best lakes for salmon this fall are: West Grand Lake — Grand Lake Stream, Cathance Lake – Cooper, Pocumcus Lake — T 6 ND, Phillips Lake – Dedham, Gardner’s Lake — East Machias and Long Pond — Mount Desert.
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Tags: Downeast Fishing Report • Categories: General
Posted on Thursday, September 20th, 2007 by Maine Sportsman
The beautifully warm sunny days followed by progressively cooler nights we’ve experienced lately will result in increased opportunities for fishing for cold water fish species over the coming weeks. It is the perfect time to get out and enjoy some of the season’s best fishing for these species.
Over the past week, I’ve received several calls asking ‘why’ the fishing for trout and salmon seems to get ‘better’ in the fall. The answer is relatively simple — the water is cooling with the season, making it more of it much more to the liking of these species.
As the summer progresses, our lakes and ponds receive an increasing amount of sunlight. Most of that sunlight is received from a high sun-angle. The more shallow depths warm the most, of course. As a result, in many cases the water tends to form layers called thermal strata. Trout and salmon, being adapted to cooler water conditions, tend to gravitate to the layer that best suits their requirements for temperature and oxygen levels. Often the height of this layer is only one or two feet vertically. Many other species prefer the cool water layer too, so salmon and trout tend to forage there for the most part. They do move in and out of the preferred layer, but this is often of short duration.
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Tags: Central Maine Fishing Report • Categories: General
