| Lake Champlain Fish Species
in the waters surrounding the Lake House Vacation Rental
Property
Yellow Perch - Crappie
- Sunfish - Rock Bass - White Perch - Smelt - Smallmouth
Bass - Largemouth Bass - Northern Pike - Pickerel -
Muskellunge - Atlantic Salmon - Walleye - Lake Trout
- Brown Trout - Rainbow Trout - Sucker - Carp - Catfish
- Bullhead - Bowfin - Burbot - Sheep head - Gar - Sturgeon
Spring, Summer, Fall & Winter
Fishing Tips:
Ice Fishing: Additionally,
this bay has a huge ice fishing and shanty community
that sets up every year in January and February. It
is just mere minutes away by ATV or vehicle.
All locations mentioned
in these excerpts are within 5 lake miles from the vacation
property.
The sixth Great Lake as it is often called is of course,
Lake Champlain, which is even great enough to have her
own sea serpent, known as Champ. The locals even hold
parades to honor him, her, it, whatever, I'm trying
to be politically correct. Are sea serpents political?
I'll have to check.
If you're ever out on the lake and see what appears
to be three or four humps moving across the lake, well,
who's to say. I know that on a foggy morning, I've done
some second guessing, and kept a lookout over my shoulder.
There is a Large bay on this
lake, know as Bulwaggon Bay (Bull-Wagon), just behind
Crown Point Fort where the Spring & Fall fishing
is just incredible. We are located just across Lake
Champlain on the Vermont side. I thought half of the
fish in the world had to be under my boats keel. Every
where I went there were more fish. I thought I must
have died and gone to fishermen's heaven.
Let me tell you about a recent
trip to a place called Otter Creek, which is next to
Little Otter Creek and should not be confused with each
other, because they are two distinct and different tributaries
of Lake Champlain. I love Vermont. It's a great state!
Any place that has more cows then people has to be OK.
There seemed to be several different patterns that the
fish were on during this week-long trip to Champlain.
It depended on the species. The Largemouth Bass were
hiding in the weeds near the shorelines and were hitting
surface lures - not just any lure but a small Pop R.
It was the only thing that they would chase. The shorelines
where we found them were not very far from deep water.
They weren't way in the back of the coves.
The Smallmouth Bass were starting
to school. Which is the pattern that they usually don’t
start until well into Fall and the advent of colder
weather? Maybe they were trying to tell us something.
They were bunched up on points and were hitting Gitzits.
They preferred brown ones. We started to find them as
we worked our way north between the Otters and on points
above Little Otter, (which is the larger one, but shorter).
Some of the points around Thompson's Point are near
depths down to 288 feet. This is the beginning, or the
deepest part, of the lake.
The lower end of Lake Champlain
looks more like a muddy river than like the continuation
of one of the clearest lakes in the Northeast. Actually,
from the directions of the compass this is not the lower
end of the lake, it's the top. This lake flows North
into the St. Lawrence Seaway and out into the Atlantic.
There is also a way out of the upper or Southern end
into the Champlain Canal and eventually, on into the
Hudson River.
Remember, the water flows North.
That fact matters, because after the rains come, the
water in the creeks are flowing hardest along the Northern
side of the creek mouths and the bait fish and their
predators will favor that side. All the channels as
they run out into the lake turn North.
As you go South, from the Champlain bridge at Port Henry,
New York, the bottom changes from rocks and sand and
an occasional weed line to that of a muddy bottom with
large weed beds. Also, the width, from one side to the
other, varies from several miles North of the bridge
to less then a mile in this Southern section. The change
in the lake's environment is extreme and fast. Just
in the width of the bridge you can see the difference.
As you go even further down the lake you reach the section
called the Narrows, where it is precarious for two boats
to navigate side by side.
You will find some of the best Largemouth Bass fishing
is in this murkier water. The tournament fishermen who
travel the length of the lake in pursuit of a limit
of winning fish have caused the gene pool from the North
to spread all the way South. Hence, making fishing in
our area fantastic.
Schooling Fish Appear to Be a Key Pattern Smallmouth
Bass like to school, bunch up, in small compacted groups
in the Fall. Well, here at Champlain, there is a remarkable
phenomenon in the way Largemouth will also school up
and stay in very close tight schools. But with the Largemouth
this happens all season long, not just in Fall conditions.
This is very unusual for mature Largemouth, and matter
of fact, is mostly unheard of. These behemoths are usually
loners. In other lakes, the bigger they are, usually
the less they like company. So, If you start to fish
around a cove or shoreline and you may find that when
you locate one fish, you could have found 10, 20, or
even 30 fish in one spot. I mean one spot the size of
your boat. It can be like fishing in a bucket. Every
cast must be almost in the same exact spot.
Some fishermen have tried to
explain this fin-nomenon in many different ways. One
old timer, said it has to do with the under water springs,
bubbling up from the bottom, which attract small bait
fish. So the predators stay close by. That sounds plausible.
Another theory that is put forth by a local fishing
authority is the possibility that the schooling is caused
by the White Perch. The most common bait fish in this
lake are the White Perch, which only travel in schools.
The Largemouth may be staying near these schools of
Perch.
After careful investigation, I don't think these theories
quite pan out. The spring idea doesn't work, because
the fish are not always schooled up in the same exact
spot. Sometimes the fish may be in the one spot for
a week at a time, then gone. And a spot that is good
for a time may not be consistent for a couple of years
or a decade. Also the Perch story doesn't seem to work,
because the Perch schools are always on the move and
would take their predators with them.
Hunting in schools, for schools of bait is very common
and many fresh water species use this method, and it's
very successful. I have come to believe in the minnow
school theory, but not in the White Perch one. I think
it involves smaller bait. I've seen clouds of small
minnows, about the size of a garbage can, just sitting
there rotating. It looks like a cloud of black mud,
just rotating and pulsing if anything comes near. But
what I think happens is that the bigger fish surround
one of these small minnow clouds and keep them in check
while they slowly consume the entire school over a few
days. The doomed school just sits there in a pile of
weeds and awaits their destiny. If you come along and
drop a lure into the school, a predator will grab it,
one after another. Many a tournament has been won by
some lucky guy who stumbles onto one of these phenomena.
A similar situation happens at the end of the spawn
in June. The tiny minnows after hatching out will leave
the nest and their father will accompany the small cloud
of babies. If you flip a white lure, such as white tube
bait into the tiny school, their protector will grab
it. This is a well known fact and often leads to many
a young male Bass getting an unscheduled ride in a bass
boat to a weigh in. On Champlain the spawn of many of
the Bass occurs in the creeks that empty into the lake.
So watch the mouth of these tributaries and if you see
a splash on the surface or a school of one these spawns,
just throw a lure their way. The strike is swift and
immediate when the lure hits the water.
Finding the Right Weeds
I don't know the scientific name
for a particular dark weed that seems to hold Largemouth
in this lower section, but when you locate it, you will
never forget what it looks like. I call it "Black
Weed". It looks like a small, fine needled, dark
Christmas tree. You will find one plant standing in
the middle of a weed bed and it's in that one bush that
most of the fish in that weed bed are located. Fish
them very hard. It's amazing what you will find living
under and in them.
Now for the Details
That takes care of some of the
general information about fishing this section, now
for some specifics. Under the bridge on the Vermont
side is a weed bed that starts there and continues down
the shore line for several hundred yards to another
small bridge. This weed bed is great. I swim a white
four inch grub that is rigged Texas, with a one thirty
second or one sixteenth bullet sinker, over the top.
The bass will explode on it, and so will the Northerns.
This is the first place I encountered the Largemouth
schooling phenomena. It was during a tournament and
for an hour and a half under a hot noon day sun every
cast yielded a two or three pound bass. The good news
was that I won that tournament. The bad news was, I
had a heart attack. That's right. I felt the chest pains
and numbness in my left arm with every retrieve of a
fish. After weigh in I drove home and had my wife take
me to the hospital. That was ten years ago. My heart
keeps on ticking and I keep hauling them in.
The mouth of the river across from the Ticonderoga Fort
is good, all the way out to the drop. Actually, the
shore line from the ferry to the river mouth is great.
Back off and fish the weed line out off the shore line.
It's a 1/2 mile of good fishing. I'd try a Green worm
or Watermelon grub in the weed pockets.
If you want to be successful down here in the lower
section, you have to master fishing in the Water Chestnut.
This stuff is a thick mat of green vegetation. There
are a couple of ways to go after it. You can flip a
half ounce jig along the edge (black or green, with
matching pig). Or you can take the same jig, or maybe
an even heavier one, and throw it on top of the weeds
and drag it back across the top. The fish will blow
up through the canopy for it. A White rat or mouse works
great. Add rattles. Many of the strikes will miss.
The best way to fish this stuff is to fish as a team.
One guy drags a lure around on top, the other guy just
stands and waits and after the fish reveals their location,
they throw a one ounce jig and pig into the opening
that the fish makes. Just let it drop and jiggle. Sometimes
a White Five inch grub works. Down under the thick canopy
it's not as thick and the fish move around quite freely.
Throw a White rat into any openings or clear areas around
the edges.
Excerpts from Dale D. Brown |
