Lake Champlain United - Forums

Any Info on the Alewife dying off on the Inland Sea..? is the rest of the Lake experiencing the same thing..?

Serious temperature change yesterday. Surface went from 62 to42 in 24 hours.

They've been dying off for at least 3 weeks ... and still more are dying. Some huge ones, too. I know we usually have some winter / early spring die off, but I don't remember it ever lasting this long into spring.

I think they are dieing of old age.., bunch of upside down swimmers. Seagulls were eating em last time out.

Just got back from a nice morning on the IS and the worst concentration of dying/dead floaters was on the east end of the Sandbar. Lots of debris, too. There were some in Keelers, but not bad. The bite was light, but we smelled fishy by the end. 3 barely legal silvers that get to grow another day. Shakedown went well. Light to no chop and saw only about 6 boats all day. Crazy Ivan Wonderbread was the busy lure.

I launched out of Westport today and there were lots of dying alewives there too. All different sizes, so I don't know about the old age theory, at least where I was. There seemed to be fewer the further up the narrows I went. No luck at all today, I am mostly a lake trout guy and for the first time in a few years I was completely skunked, not even a release, tried everything. Marked some fish but they were not interested. The fog did not help as it kept me from going to my favorite spot until almost 10 AM. I think the fish have gorged on these dying alewives, at least that is my excuse.

i was thinking the same thing about the Salmon gorging them self on the dying Alewives but I did manage a single Salmon 18" and gutted it out found it had absolutely nothing in it's stomach...
so now I'm a week later made another run to the lake on the 15th Convers Bay this time water Temp.
was warmer there in the mid 50's marked fish everywhere from the top to 30' bait balls everywhere
had no truble finding the bait, spent from 7:30am till 4:00pm trolling thru everything but the kitchen
sink at them and nothing not a hit all day pooring rain fog you name it and nota thing what's up with this fishery acting alot like last year to me, just down right piss poor fishing. maybe it's time to hit some of the smaller waters around home at least I might catch something to eat for the cost of the trip....don't get me wrong I like to fish but I like to catch them also...I got 30 miles of river if I want a boat ride...! LOL