Pymatuning fishing report

[Invader24]

Im heading up tomarrow morning, it will be my first fishing the lake. Any advice as to where I should launch out of? Are hotntots the only real producer or should I pull some harness's as well, and can I have some direction as to how many colors of leadcore to let out and how lond of a mono leader should i use from the leadcore to the tot. Any help would be greatly appriciated.

[FishHawk]

You could catch fish on harnesses and bottom bouncers. Also you can catch them on shad raps. Hot-n-tots are a preferred lure at the lake, but there are other lures that will catch fish just like on any body of water. As far as how much leadcore line to let out, it really varies on the speed you are trolling. A rule of thumb that I follow is for every 5' one color if I'm say trolling at 2.0. Good luck and post your results.

[Invader24]

Does anyone have a report for this past weekend even though it was a rainy one? Went up on sat morning and no sooner did we pull in it started raining. Didn't bring the rain gear since it was not {forcasted} to start till the afternoon. Seen a decent amount of boats out even though it was raining. Thinking about heading up monday morning.

Caught 3 fish largest 23in, in 22 fow on wormharness and 1/2 oz snap weights. Lost a nice fish later in the day on a large wally diver. Fished in shallow Saturday night managed 15 perch ( right before dark ) 4 nice gills and 3 cat's, no real biguns. Had a nice fry last night, 1 side of that piggy fed 2 big pigs!! The fish was silver/whitesh looking but it was no doubt healthy and well fed. If they keep growing on this current pace there are going to be some 30 plus inch fish being caught in the next couple of years. I spoke with a nice gentleman that was checking the fish I caught that lives near the lake, and he said last year he lost a eye at the boat that was huge, so there's a few sumo's lurking. The fish I lost on the diver was heavy, and I couldnt budge it, may have been a musky. On another note, I noticed a fish bellyed ( decent size ) up as I passed by 50yards or so out from it, so after I got my lines in I motored over to where I seen the fish and it was gone?

Article taken from Pittsburgh Post Gazette.

Anglers complaining about walleye numbers on Pymatuning can blame Mother Nature, said Fish and Boat Commission biologist Craig Billingsley. The cold wet springs of the past three years hurt fry stocking survival and led to the dearth of young adults now.

"If plankton don't bloom, there's nothing for those little guys to eat and they perish," he said. To make matters worse, an alewife explosion the past two years has caused two problems. Alewives are competing with young walleye for food and they're making a meal of the young walleye. An extra 3.5 million walleye fry were planted last year and again this spring to compensate, said Billingsley, "but there's not a whole lot we can do. We have to play the hand we're dealt."

He suggests that anglers change tactics to target the 5 year-olds in the water now.

"Go to larger lures and choose an alewife patter," Billingsley said.

And hope that this fall's young of the year survey brings encouraging news.

[FishHawk]

Thats what I have heard also. Hope the stocking takes this year or else they should investigate other alternatives. Although I don't mind the size of the fish. I believe the 5 year old walleye are really chowing down on the alewives. Hopefully we have a hard winter to kill some of them off.

The 23 inch fish I caught had alwives/minnies about 2 to 2.5 spitting up. I also noticed at night there were a lot of fish feasting ontop of the water.

[Invader24]

I made if up monday and we got two, both nice fish 22 and 23. Both fish had alot of fat in them as well as bait fish. Got one on a crome and chart hot n tot back 150 and a black and silver ripshad back 160 in 20 to 22 fow. We went out of orchard and ended up heading south anyhow, is it best to launch out of snobgrass insted? Is the fishing better around snobgrass?

As the water warms the deeper water ( cooler temps ) is at the south end, which would make sense to launch at Snodgrass. I had no luck at Orchard and headed down towards Snodgrass and the dam. Note: There is a hump straight out and towards the left where the river channel splits, take caution when trolling, it sneaks up on you. As for better fishin, Ive Limited on eyes in the north end in the stumps in the dodg days of August? Sometimes the eyes dont play by the rules.