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Pike and perch in the lower, and pike, perch and Lakers in the upper.
If you like to catch dink perch chateaugay is the lake for you. NNYice summed it up. It's loaded with perch it's impossible to get skunked you can fill a 5 gallon bucket in a couple hours but very little size to them. sometimes if you get lucky and get in a school with some size to them but for the most part you catch a ton of 6-8" perch. Decent amount of pike just don't plan on catching many in the double digits. There are lake trout just not a lot. Decent bass fishing in the summer though.
Sounds like Chateaugay could use a stocking of walleyes. Walleyes do extremely well in lakes loaded with dink perch. It's probably their favorite thing to gorge on.
You ain't kidding. We have speculated that a lot. I honestly think walleyes would thrive in Chateaugay. Especially in the upper. From what I hear it used to be a great trout lake way back in the day, before pike arrived. Pike apparently weren't native there. Maybe that's true, maybe not. I don't know! But I do think walleyes would do great.
Does chauteagay see a lot of wind and/or current? Walleye need current going over gravel bottom to spawn. They like to run up creeks and spawn there too. They will spawn near creek mouths and wind swept shoals as well. Does chauteagay have smelt? Cause if it does you can rule out any natural reproduction from walleye. Smelt love to eat walleye fry.
nnyice: do you worry about the propane freezing up? I've read lots of issues with that. If you are keeping it in a shanty, then its okay. I haven't bought a power auger and think the propane ones are the way to go but worry about the reports I have read about them freezing up.
Congrats on the new auger!I'm not real familiar with that auger, but is there any adjustment for the throttle at all?
There are only two true natives to the Adirondacks, whitefish and brook trout. This is proven due to the fact they are the only two species that survived the last ice age. There has been some skepticism over perch. They recently found traces of perch in lake sediment that carbon dates back to before the ice age.
Got cold last night!!
Colder tonight! I'm drilling holes and fishing tomorrow.
Friendly wager on the first northern?