Legacy

I have 4 diver setups w/ 30# Blood Run wire that have gotten a serious work out on Lake Ontario kings for 2 years now. great product, great customer service. 2 other recommendations i would make to diver setups is to add twili tips to your diver rods and completely eliminate the use of crimps to attached your swivels and tie them on instead. These 2 things will eliminate the majority of problems.

Copper will be a great addition to your boat because it simply catches fish! I have Blood Run copper setups ranging from 200' to 450' on the boat and on Lake Ontario last year, my 300' coppers were my best producers.

As for brand of wire... check out Blood Run Tackles 7 stand ss wire you wont be disapointed. You need a quality line counter reel that will hold 1000' of wire. Currently im running Okuma Convector 30s for my wire reels but they are going to see an upgrade this year to Okuma Catalinas 30s. As for rods... Im running Okuma classic pro glt diver rods w/ twilli tips. Twilli tips are not a must but long term youll be glad you have them.

1) What pound test and type of mono? 50# Blood Run fluorocarbon 2) What length has been your boats most consistent producer? for 8" Spinnies I have stuff tied from 17" to 28" but 22"-24" is a great place to start 3) Once done, what is the best way to store them? I leave proven flasher/fly setups together and store them in a DW flasher file bulk fly bodies just get stored in a clear plastic plano box 4) Single or treble hook? tournament tie 3/0 octopus w/ #1 treble

welcome to the site Dave!

What a difference a week makes? That tough transition phase bite seems to have Sandy Creek in its grip. Sat AM Great screen 60- 140 fow. Plenty of hooks to fish and an amazing amount of bait everywhere you turn. We have been wondering all year where all the bait has been well, the wind on friday blew it all off the beach and out to deeper water and it was everywhere. I mean everywhere. Tough to compete with all that bait around? Not sure but either way tough bite out there. 8 bites total for us all morning with 7 to the net. Mix of steelhead and lakers sharing the same waters. We pounded the water with flasher/ flies early and had some luck with both a 200 diver pulling a Green Halo spinny and halo fly and a 450 copper pulling a Capt valium spinny and green killer fly. But today all these fish wanted were spoons. Halo, mixed veggie, Hammer, to name a few. Riggers and 10 color leadcore were the winners today. Monday AM Sat down in 40 fow with plans to fish Brownies. Surface temp 57 and bottom temp 51 degrees. Pulled a few little kings in 50-55 fow in the first hour or so and slowly pulled out. The bait had almost disappeared entirely next to what we saw on Saturday. We spent the majority of the day 80-100 fow targeting the zooming fish that were 20-40' off the bottom. 13 total bites for us with little Kings and Lake Trout dominating the day. These fish only wanted DW SS spoons and so as the day would prove, every bite came from a super slim. super glow, halo, mixed veggie, moon cricket, and a few others. 10 color leadcores, deep divers 150-200, and deep riggers took all of our fish.

The great fishing from Sandy Creek continues. Certainly we are well into a transition period at this point. 58.8 degrees on surface with bottom temps in the high 40s and as much as 14 degrees different at times. Seems like an endless supply of green water too. We may be through our June transition before June even gets here. Some bait even began to show up out there. Friday morning... Weve done well in 100-125 fow water for the past week or two so there was no question of where we would start looking on Friday morning. Great pick of fish all morning long, straight out front in 100-115 fow from the pump house to Cowsucker creek. Our catch was a bit Laker heavy with about 1/3 of the catch Kings. A very similar set to last weekends... 300' Blood Run copper off the big board w/ a Capt Valium Spin Doctor and a "Green Killer" fly 300' Blood Run copper off the big board w/ a Capt Valium Spin Doctor and a "Green Killer" fly 200' Blood run wire diver pulling a "Green Halo" Spin Doctor and a "Green Halo" fly 240' Blood run wire diver pulling a "Green Halo" Spin Doctor and a "Green Halo" fly 70-90' rigger w/ Stinger "glow gator" 90-105' rigger w/ Stinger "glow gator" 55-70' rigger w/ grn dot Spin Doctor and a "Legacy" fly (early am) 55-70' rigger w/ DW SS frog 45-60' rigger w/ mupped Stinger hammers 450' Blood Run copper down the chute w/ a Capt Valium Spin Doctor and a "Green Killer" fly We totaled 36 bites for the day with 28 making it to the net. Big fish for the day were 3 lakers over 15# and 19# King. Only 1 double all day. The opposite of last weekend, we had a larger class of Lakers and a smaller class of Kings (most under 10#). Saturday evening... Took a boat trip Saturday evening on a recon mission for Sunday morning. The only consistent thing I found is what we fished on friday. We quickly boated multiple Lake trout including 1 over 16# on rigger Spoons and Blood Run coppers pulling DW Spinnys. Took a look out to 200 and never saw a screen that i liked so we headed south and the fish showed up again inside of 120 fow with the best screen of the night in 80 fow. Sunday morning... We left the dock and fearing heavy boat traffic we headed west to Devils Nose in 85 fow looking for a screen to fish. Very consistent Laker bite w/ an occasional King mixed in 90-120 fow. Once again we left fish and headed north again looking for a better King bite. Besides a couple of fish in 176', we never really found what we had hoped and 2 hours later we returned to our 110' depth and it was game on. Dbl on Kings followed by a triple on fat Lakers (17#, 15# and 12#), followed by another dbl. A very similar set to fridays... 300' Blood Run copper off the big board w/ a Capt Valium Spin Doctor and a "Green Killer" fly 300' Blood Run copper off the big board w/a Capt Valium Spin Doctor and a "Green Killer" fly 190' Blood run wire diver pulling a "Green Halo" Spin Doctor and a "Green Halo" fly 160' Blood run wire diver pulling an Atommik chrome killer Spin Doctor and a hammer fly 70-90' rigger w/ Stinger "glow gator" (early am) 70-90' rigger w/ Stinger mixed veggie (late am) 90-105' rigger w/ Stinger "glow gator" (early am) 90-105'' rigger w/ Stinger mixed veggie (late am) 55-70' rigger w/ grn dot Spin Doctor and a "Legacy" fly (early am) 55-70' rigger w/ Stinger NBK (late am) 45-60' rigger w/ mupped Stinger confusions 450' Blood Run copper down the chute w/a Capt Valium Spin Doctor and a "Green Killer" fly A stellar bite had us fighting 28 fish for the day with 20 making it to the net. Our catch was 60% Lake Trout and the other 40% was Kings, a coho, and a Steelhead

Mothers Day PM With all the reports of incredible fishing on the lake this weekend its tough not to be out there. Once the mother's day festivities were over, we headed to the boat for a quick evening trip. Dead flat calm lake... (Amazing how a lake that big is able to do that). With waypoints from the day before it gave us a start point in 100 fow straight off the creek. Before all the rods would get set... Wire diver would fire with 20# king. A start to a great evening out. Just like the day before flasher/ flies would dominate our set and we would run a strict King set. Our set consisted of... 300' Blood Run copper off the big board w/ a Capt Valium Spin Doctor and a "Green Killer" fly 300' Blood Run copper off the big board w/a Green Dot Spin Doctor and a "Green Halo" fly 200' Blood run wire diver pulling a "Green Halo" Spin Doctor and a "Green Halo" fly 240' Blood run wire diver pulling a "Green Halo" Spin Doctor and a "Green Halo" fly 90' rigger w/ Stinger "glow gator" 105' rigger w/ Stinger "glow gator" 70' rigger w/ grn dot Spin Doctor and a "Legacy" fly 45-60' rigger w/ mupped Stinger NBKs 450' Blood Run copper down the chute w/a Green Halo Spin Doctor and a "Green Halo" fly By the time our night was over we would have 26 bites with 21 making it to the net. Multiple doubles. Majority of it was Kings w/ the occasional small Laker mixed in. Once again Kings of all year classes w/ 3 around the 20# mark but the majority 8-14#.

A scouting mission on Friday afternoon gave me a starting point off Hamlin Beach on Saturday morning in 100 fow and before the day was over we would see water 90-160' from RT237 all the way to the "can". We took a shot at a strict King set in the water and we were rewarded with an absolute great early May King bite off the waters of Sandy Creek. Our set consisted of... 300' Blood Run copper off the big board w/ a Capt Valium Spin Doctor and a "Green Killer" fly 300' Blood Run copper off the big board w/a Gator Spin Doctor and a "Green Killer" fly 200' Blood run wire diver pulling a "Green Halo" Spin Doctor and a "Green Halo" fly 175' Blood run wire diver pulling a "Green Halo" Spin Doctor and a "Green Halo" fly 90' rigger w/ Stinger "mixed veggie" 105' rigger w/ Stinger "mixed veggie" 70' rigger w/ green dot Spin Doctor and a "Legacy" fly 45-60' rigger w/ DW ss "glow frog" note: We also ran a chute rod the entire day and it produced zero hits for us. (450' copper, 5 color core, 10 color core) We started the morning with alot of dropped fish and at one point we had a landing percentage of less then 40% but as the day went on this greatly improved . By days end we had almost 30 bites w/ a catch of mostly Kings. The Lakers were there but only about 20-25% of our catch. Strange to think that there were no other species were boated. Kings of all year classes with the biggest pushing 18-19# but the majority were in that 8-14# range.

Better late then never? Saturday morning we decided to stay off the beach and try to run a King program. After a couple of unsuccessful hours searching the mid waters (30-65') we decided to seek out 20' of water and fish for browns. As we hit 25 fow a rigger fires w/ 12#10oz Brown attached to the opposite end. One for the LOC board. We continued to pick away at browns over the next couple of hours and ended the day before noon with 11 bites in 20-25 fow. Our 5 rod set consisted of DW ss Caramel dolphins off the high riggers (12' + 15') ,1 Stinger NBK dragging the bottom was our hot riggers set along with two 4 color leadcore off the boards pulling NBKs, and everything loaded with Blood Run fluoro leaders. Sunday with the reports of heavy Laker catches again in the deeper water, we left the dock with the plan to head to yesterdays eastern waypoint and fish it west till we ran out of fish. Great pick all morning of browns w/ 1 teens king and 1 small laker in the mix. DW ss caramel dolphins off the high riggers, DW ss super glows off the deep riggers, NBKs and GHDs off the 4 color leadcores, orange bellied sticks (w/ 2 split shot) off the boards, and everything loaded with Blood Run fluoro leaders.

Very similar report if not the same report as last weekend. If your reading the south shore reports, then you would know that the fishing is just good out there. Browns, browns , and more browns. Most of them being cookie cutters but occasionally a decent one. And although we have had a lack of rain and run off, the shoreline is full of good colored watered out there to fish. 43.5-44.5 surface temp in 8- 15 fow. We put fish in the boat with the usual mix of sticks off the boards (which eventually became dominate with orange sticks) along with DW SS caramel dolphins off the riggers. Its always nice to get my kid out on the boat with us. It was his first trip out this year. It gave him a chance to fight some brownies and put his first fish of 2012 in the boat.

snell

Cold and rainy. For everyone out on the lake today, what a perfectly named day...April Fools day. Although I have spent a few weeks getting the boat ready for the season, I never have been a fan of shakedown cruises unless of course everything goes well. But the boat ran great, the equipment is working well, and everything looks good so that certainly made the trip out, a good one. It has been a long winter but we are ready to fish 2012. After a quick boat ride, we shut down between the pump house and Newmans Point. With nothing ready to go, we tied fluoro leaders on everything, and we slowly got lines in. We wrestled getting lines in the water for about 3 hours and rarely had more than 3 in at one time (until days end). Solid pick of Brownies from creek to the woods. Mostly cookie cutters and nothing over 9#. A mix of sticks off the boards put half of the fish in the boat and DW ss caramel dolphins off the riggers (5 down and 25+40' back) put the other half in. Great shoreline water color with random spots of chocolate milk on both east and west sides of the creek and thats where we found the fish. 8- 15 fow.

I hope so!

It does matter and probably more than we would like it to. There have been days where chrome or glow divers have out performed others. Because they are so close to the money end they will act like an attractor or the complete opposite. Sunny days i may run chrome divers and on days when glow is the ticket I may run glow divers but for the most part I run black divers. It probably works out to be 98% of the time. My thoughts on running black divers is i believe it takes the color out of the equation. It provides "stealth" to your non stealthy set up and fish spend less time paying attention to it and more on whats at the end of it. In the end we spend less time trying to come up with a diver and lure combo that should be spent on just the lure itself.

Blood Run is all I run. Super copper is more pliable and more user friendly than standard copper lines. Customer service is second to none!

I have to disagree with your post. I am currently a committee member of the Sandy Creek Shootout which is fished out of the port of Sandy Creek in Hamlin, NY. One of my biggest pushes is for donations from manufactures for the "Captain's bags". Captain's bags, I believe, are a win for everyone participating and those who donate to them. Captain's bags put product directly in the hands of those who compete, providing great advertisement for the sponsors. Rather than one team reaping the rewards of a prize pack or cash payout from a sponsor, all teams participating see the reward. For a team who didnt finish in the cash, it gives them an opportunity to not to go home empty handed. Which could prove to be a big deal to some. It may not provide the biggest exposure to a company name, as maybe a big cash sponsor would. It gives a team a chance to try a product without experiencing it and it provides companies with product exposure. Most of the teams fishing our event consist of an average of 4 team members. So by multiplying the team members by the number of teams the ripple affect can be felt longer and in the end providing more exposure for these companies.

I assume the rods you are talking about are the Classic Pro GLT Rod (model CP-CL-862M). I bought them last year and i love them for leadcore and cores. But for wire no. I would consider the Classic Pro GLT Rod (model CP-DD-1002M). They are specifically designed for divers. I have had great luck with these rods for MAG divers and no need for a twilly tip (the guides handle the wire just fine). Okuma has all the specs for their rods and reels on their site. http://www.okumafishing.com/

Lure Overload? Chasing Trout and Salmon on Lake Ontario can be a daunting task and as fishermen, we have a tendency to complicate absolutely everything. Beyond the boat, the tackle, and all of the equipment; the lures that go in the water everyday seem to define us. No one would ever think that they could possibly have too many spoons, plugs, or flies in their arsenal. Could having an excessive amount of lures actually make you less successful? Some of you may think these words may be spoken a little too easy from a captain who has, admittingly, too much tackle on his boat. Having too many options, may cause us to over think our spread and makes us constantly second guess our lure selections. This confusion that occurs above the water often results in mass confusion under the water. This is a common problem that exists and it can simply be called “lure overload”. Simply put, lure selection should be made easy by basing it off of past success and rarely ever about emotion. It has never made sense to me to change a lure, which has put fish in the boat all morning, just because it hasn’t taken a fish in the past hour. When fish become negative the worse thing we can do is to take our most productive baits of the day out of the water and start replacing them with unproven soldiers. Confidence in bait selection and in your spread might be the single most important factor to consider, when the bite has slowed and the fish have become inactive. I’m certainly not against changing unproductive lures or experimenting with new ones. However, during the lull of the day we should remain the most patient, believe in our spread, and stick with what we are confident in. Although we may have been taught otherwise or think otherwise, the best time to experiment with colors or patterns is not when we aren’t catching fish, but when we are. When we are not catching fish, is the ideal time to lock down and keep our most productive lures fishing. I know we all have been guilty of changing lures too often as the bite slows down. We reset our rods and tirelessly rummage through the tackle box in search for that “magic” spoon; but the decision to do so tends to keep lines out of the water, ultimately resulting in less fish in the boat. The overabundance of choices makes us mix manufacturers, colors, sizes, and designs without taking a minute to think about how they run together as a whole. Big water trolling should always be looked at as a team sport and decisions should not be made about an individual lure, but instead with the entire “team” in mind. It is important to recognize the symbiotic relationship that exists under your boat, because every lure is only as good as the one its next to. As we all know, the faster we learn patterns, the more successful and consistent fishermen we can become. So if we stored six, seven, or eight lures together because we had previous success collectively fishing them, it would certainly help us on our next trip out. As time goes on, we begin to realize the importance of speed, the location in our spread, and the appropriate depth in the water column, for every one of our lures. Eventually, we will be able to identify these conditions and confidently fill the voids in our spreads using a stable of “go to” lures in which we have developed from our past victories on the water. Lure selection may be dictated by conditions, species, and time of year, but understanding why we make our decisions will make us all more successful. Knowing the fundamentals and using your past experiences will increase the possibilities of a successful day out on the Lake Ontario. Chatter on the radio tends to create a lot of unnecessary confusion. Hearing about what’s working (and what’s not) for others, greatly influences our decisions and ultimately also our spreads. No one ever wants to miss the action but trying to duplicate someone else’s success on the water, can create more problems then its worth. Learning how to make subtle changes rather than “crow barring” things into your spread, will prove to be a better approach. The fish will tell you more then your best friend fishing 2.5 miles away; you just have to be willing to listen. If you ask 10 charter captains what their 10 favorite lures are they would probably give you 10 completely different answers, but the thing they all have in common is presentation. The importance of presentation is often lost in a sea of spoons and flashers, as fishermen tend to place too much emphasis on lure selection. While color and patterns are often looked at first; speed, deployment, and location in the spread, are all things that should be considered, before making the correct lure selection. I would take the “wrong” spoon fished well, over the “right” spoon fished badly any day. Yet people blindly pick lures all the time and then spend the entire day figuring out how to fish them. Trout and salmon fishing on Lake Ontario can be a challenge in itself and making “smart” choices rather than relying on “luck”, will certainly make us more successful. With all these things considered, it may be tough to take advice on “Lure Overload”, from a charter captain with a thousand spoons on his boat. Captain Rob Westcott is a licensed charter captain and NYS guide operating out of western New York. www.legacysportfishing.com. He is an avid outdoorsman who enjoys everything from fly tying to duck hunting. He has a lifetime passion for the outdoors, especially fishing. You can contact him at 585-703-969 or e-mail him at [email protected] Published in Lake Ontario Outdoors magazine http://www.lakeontariooutdoors.com/stories/news-story/lure-overload/

pretty awesome stuff!

The past couple of weeks we have pounded the shallows in search of staging matures out front. We have targeted 7-15 fow with plugs (red headed silver bullets, green glow, and chart) and also big firetiger Thundersticks off the shallow riggers, 2-3 color cores, and flatlining off the big boards.

Left the dock Saturday and headed west. We shut down and setup around Bald Eagle and trolled west. Great picture in 60-80 fow all day but it took us a little bit to get them figured out. A few shots off spin doctors and flies but for the most part it was a spoon bite. Divers w/ green halo Spin Doctor/ flies 120 & 144. Blood Run 300' copper w/ white double crush Smartfish. 10 color cores and riggers loaded with a mix of spoons. Ended up 12 for 15 w/ some small kings, a few matures and an 11# Brown for our efforts. Woke up to thunderstorms and high winds on Sunday morning which kept us dockside till about 7. We headed west again today but stopped at Devils nose and setup. We were hoping to find our screen from the day before but we all know how things change overnight. We had a tough time the first half of the morning finding a fishable screen, cold water ,or active fish. It wasnt until 1100 the winds died, the lake layed down and we had some cold water start to roll in. 105 fow was the best screen we found all morning and quickly started to pull mature Kings and steelhead from it. Flasher/fly bite was on today. Green dot SD, Green Halo SD, green/ crush on green Smartfish, and white dbl crush Smartfish all with a mix of flies deployed off Blood Run 300' coppers, 200 & 250 divers, 75' rigger. The only spoon to fire for us was a glow gator stingray off the 90 rigger which fired 4 times. After the worst early morning start of the season were ended up with 10 bites with the big fish of the day 20# and 21# Kings.

My thought on this is the same i feel about divers. My favorite colors are black, black, and black. My belief is that black creates a "stealthier" look to your setup and takes the ball (or diver) more so out of the equation then color or crome. For me, its sole purpose is deployment and not attraction. What i put on the end of that line is to catch fish. Simplifying will give you one less thing you have to worry about and more time making adjustments at the end of your line. Do i think colors have there day? of course they do. im sure everyday you can find a color that works better then black but the time spent searching for the right combo between downrigger ball and bait i feel is wasted fishing time. It seems to be easier to concentrate more on what your feeding them then some magic combo between the two. Start with black, it should always be your mainstay.

30# is fine until you get into bigger lengths of copper (300' +).

With the Sandy Creek Shootout planned for Saturday, I headed down to the boat late in the afternoon on friday to get the boat ready. I wasnt planning on fishing but I was inspired by the amount of activity in Sandy Creek on a friday afternoon. From dockside I saw alot of guys, that were fishing in the tourny, headed out or headed in from prefishing. So we left port and headed out to "spot" check some water. We motored to Devil's Nose and setup in 50fow and trolled north in search of a screen. We found some active fish, a mix of bait, good hooks in 90- 120, and a down temp break in 130 fow and so we knew what our starting spot would be saturday morning. Plan A. We headed north looking for a deeper screen and found it between 180- 240fow. Some fish and zero bait but either way we had a Plan B. We tested a few baits in the process of looking at water and couldnt keep the 300' Blood Run copper with a Spin Doctor and a martini fly in the water. Saturday morning we left the dock at 445, headed to our water, setup, and trolled it west to Eagle Creek. The screen was almost void of big hooks and bait but we worked what we did have for half the morning. Not till the sun came up did the action improve. Fighting through the dinks on the riggers (loaded with NK mag Spoons), we did managed to put a couple of fish in the box including an 11#+ Steelhead (fish #1) and a couple of small Kings. 140' divers and 300' coppers with SD/fly. The lack of big fish forced us out to look at different and deeper water. 220 fow (fish #2) and 185 fow (fish #3) both put teen Kings in the cooler for us but the choice to pound waypoints proved again to be a mistake. A concistant big fish bite was no where to be found for us. Late morning I made the decision to move back in and drop in the shallow water again for another look. We could maximize our fishing time, hopefully find our screen from the night before, and take advantage of the late morning bite. We managed to find our best screen of the day in 85- 100 fow and pulled a 27# King (fish #4) from that water. Spin Doctor and flies were the ticket for us today. The BR 300' coppers were both pulling gator SD w/ Martini flies. The diver were pulling Captain Valium SDs with Legacy Flies. The riggers took 3 good hits (which I personally dumped) off the riggers off a NK mag green/ glow alewife along with a few Steelhead and alot of dinks. We had 35-40 total hits so the fishing for the most part was great. The weigh in resulted in Team Legacy in third place (with 70# of fish and 110.5 points) following Team Yankee Troller in 2nd and Team Trout-n-About in 1st. Team Legacy Atommic Big Salmon winner 26.9# King .