Cold Water Fishing

Featured species in the cold water fisheries of the Finger Lakes include brown trout, rainbow trout, Atlantic salmon, and lake trout. Lake trout is the "bread and butter" species in most of the lakes' coldwater fisheries and may be caught in Skaneateles, Owasco, Cayuga, Seneca, Keuka, Canandaigua, Canadice and Hemlock Lakes. Skaneateles and Keuka Lakes host natural reproducing lake trout. Rainbow trout are very abundant in Skaneateles lake, and also available in Owasco, Cayuga, Seneca, Keuka, Canandaigua, Canadice, and Hemlock Lakes. Although elusive in many of the lake fisheries, they avail themselves to anglers during the spring tributary fishing in Naples Creek, Catharine Creek, Grout Brook, Cayuga Inlet, Owasco Inlet, Cold Brook Stream (Keuka Lake Inlet), and Springwater Creek. Rainbow trout have become naturalized in Cayuga, Skaneateles, Owasco, Seneca, Keuka Hemlock, and Canandaigua Lakes with natural reproduction supplemented by stocking. Brown trout can be found in all the Finger Lakes except Conesus and Honeoye Lakes. Try shore fishing or surface trolling in the spring for browns. Atlantic salmon can be found in Skaneateles, Cayuga, Seneca, Keuka, and Hemlock Lakes.