Lake Champlain United - Forums

Just returned from a fantastic trip as a guest on Dave's boat "Reel Lucky" and Jan today. My first Fall trip in 13 years. Arrived the day after Labor day Tuesday afternoon and checked in at our cabin at Mike's Marina on the Little Salmon river for 4 days. Hit the water at 3:30 pm and motored out to 120-150 fow and began marking fish and bait on the bottom. Went 2 for 5 with Pro Trolls and flies and got the shakedown out of the way and felt really good about our chances for Wednesday morning our first full day of our trip. The next day we went down the river in the dark and got out there and setup by 6:30 am at sunrise. The day turned into one of those memorable Fall bite days going 12 for 17. Lots of fat big Coho's with some kings added in. The next day it was a bit slower catching only 1 Coho and getting blown off at 9:30 am after 2.5 hours. Friday was a blow day. Saturday was a bit rough this morning and after two days of west winds the temps were messed up and the fish scattered resulting in a big push of fish up the Salmon river. We fished 3 hours this morning and had one good rip on the dipsy. Decided to pull the plug at 9:30 am and head in and hit the road arriving home at 4:00 pm. Very pleased with our 15 salmon landed with 24 bites for 18 hours of trolling with the lines down our 3 days of fishing.

With a Spring and Fall Lake O trips in the books this year (45 landed Salmon for 6 days of fishing) memories of the poor year on Champlain salmon effort were in the rear view mirror driving home today. All I can say is what a fishery! Thanks Dave and Jan for some great teamwork on this 4 day trip.

Impressive keepers. Impressive waterspout. Glad you guys were able to conquer the Big O. Looks like they were well fed. Congrats.

Hope you
Didn't take that last pic while Trolling.

Nice looking fish!

That waterspout photo was taken at noon on Thursday. We bailed at 9:30 am when it was getting really rough. Notice how close that boat is to that "Spout".

I could be wrong but looking back at this photo this could be an Atlantic? You decide? I have sent this to Shawn Good and Ernie Lantigne (NY retired biologist) for review. The short mouth of a female and the hue and scales don't compare to the Coho's we caught. Atlantics planted in Lake Ontario are a bit different than Landlocks we have in this lake although they are similar in some respects. This fish weighed a little over 12 lbs on the scales we had. I have caught two last couple of springs at the Bar in the 8 lb. class. This would be a personal best if the ID was Atlantic. Majority of our catch was Coho's, but this one really looked different.

Thanks for your report Ron, these are beautiful fish.

Tough call. Looks like a coho to me. I released an 8 lb atlantic out of fairhaven in May and I thought it looked just like the silvers in Champlain, though my friend assumed it was another brown.

Likely a Coho.. Wishful thinking. No word from Ernie or Shawn Good yet.

awsome trip ron . great pics looks like you had a blast.

Count the number of rays in the vent fin. Each species of salmon have a specific range in number of rays. Or try having the pyloric cica counted in the stomach. There to is a range that each species has.
Black mouth would be considered a chinook. White gums would be consider a coho salmon by most.
Landlock with that coloring this time of year would prolly be an a female.
Looking at the photo. Which is hard to be certain. Looks coho from here.
Tight lines

Thanks Big Fish!