It's October now and starting to feel a little more like trib time even if the weather is still on the warm side! The weather folks tell us that September was one of the warmest Septembers ever on record. And by how the salmon "run" has started slowly so far I'd believe that! Trib water temps, especially the Oak, still feel bath water warm to me. There's a slow cool-down afoot though and the forecast is for a cool front passing thru this mid-week period with another chance of precipitation and colder weather yet after that next week.
On the water flow side, the tribs are in pretty good moderate - medium flow condition thanks to recent quarter inch or so of rain seemingly each week combined with the supplemental Erie Canal water feed from the Fall Fishing Program. Fishing pressure only building slowly just like the salmon numbers, although there were a few more guys around this past weekend. On the Oak, most of the action has been at the Waterport dam and Rivermouth at Point Breeze. There are a few reports too of staging salmon action for the casting or skein crowd like in the middle reaches of the Oak or some of the most upstream slower water. That action seems to be mirrored now too at the estuary reaches of the smaller tribs. Check out the nice big green King in the pic below as evidence of that.
The beginning of this week revealed good numbers of crashing Kings at the Oak Rivermouth with some hook ups Monday early AM. Still, mostly clear water out there from do nothing winds so the crashing Kings and hook ups are usually an O-dark thirty bite. Before dusk and after dawn most fish are sliding back to the security of deeper water in the Lake. A few brave fish choose the commitment of the southern route upstream and contribute to the building upstream numbers of fish.
