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Posted by Lpbassman on 09-01-2003 12:33 AM:

Lake Zoar 8/30/3

Those of you who have fished here should find this report most interesting. I went there for the first time this year with fellow Outcast member Topgun, (formally Doug...we really have to get him a nickname). First of all, this lake has been closed since April as the CT DEP was doing a lot of work on upgrading the launch area.
They have paved Lee's Farm road (no I do not own a farm there) all the way to the launch. It used to be a dirt road leading to a dirt parking lot. There is now a beautifully PAVED parking lot there with parking spaces for about 40 vehicles with trailers. There is a staging area where you can ready your boat for launching. The ramp itself seems to have been repaved and made a bit wider. There is also a small wooden floating dock that you can tie up to. I do think that they intend to increase the size of the dock as most of the floatation is still on land. I was told by the DEP that the ramp would open in late July although all of the work has not been completed as of this date. Still is not complete as of Aug 30.
It is still very shallow at the ramp (maybe 2-2.5 feet of water). I was hoping that it would have been dredged out a bit to make it deeper, but launching even a 20' bass boat is not a problem.

Doug and I hit a few of my better spots and quickly started to nail a few fish. A nice smallie about 1.5 lbs for Doug and a bunch of sunfish for me on topwater not too far from the ramp. I hate when that happens. LOL We did manage to get a few more keeper smallies on top including another nicer 2lber from Doug. Moving down the lake a bit I switched over to a shad rap and Doug to plastics. The shad rap paid off soon enough with a fat LMB a bit better than 2lbs. After giving one of my shad raps to Doug he nailed a LMB about 2.5 lbs. God I hate when that happens. LOL Switching over to my go to bait...the dreaded SLIDER WORM, I proceded to better Dougs fish with a very nice 2.75 LMB. Doug hates when THAT happens. LOL. We continued to fish a weed line we had found and continued catching a few more.
LMB's SMB's sunfish, a rock bass and even a nice perch.
Eventually, Doug switched over to a tube on another one of my special spots and I heard him say....."Leigh, get the net!" He hooked into a really nice 3+lb fish which turned out to be the fish of the day. Yo Dougie....cold day in hell til I take you out again. LOL Doug and I both had a decent limit of fish with Dougs being just a bit heavier. (I really hate when that happens) but I did win the award for best variety for the day. Water temps were about 77-79 degress and the water was a bit stained with a greenish tint. All in all we had some fun and caught some fish. Check out the new ramp area...very nice.

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Posted by Wild Bill on 09-01-2003 12:59 AM:

Nice report Leigh....

glad to hear that you caught some fish today....
You know I would NEVER catch a fish bigger than yours as your backseater....LOL!!!! yeah, right.....don't believe that for a second, if I could, I would...LMAO

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Posted by TVal on 09-01-2003 01:31 PM:

Hey Leigh, you OLD dude. After you brought that Enron Blackout virus back from California, I thought the Ct. state police would stop you at the border. Guess you snuck thru.LOL
Glad to hear you could launch your boat. A couple of guys I know have been to the new launch and implied that it was too shallow to launch their boat.
Sounds like the fishing was decent also.
Tight lines.
Tim

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Posted by Lpbassman on 09-01-2003 03:38 PM:

Tim,
It was on OK day, tougher than I expected. I saw plenty of guys with some 17-19 foot Skeeters and Nitros on the water and they did not seem to have a problem with the launch.

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Posted by joe p on 09-01-2003 05:13 PM:

nice report, Leigh

Havent been to Zoar, so I intend to fish it someday soon....

Sounds like a good day on the water....

Joe

Posted by Lpbassman on 09-02-2003 09:11 AM:

Another Thing About Zoar

I completely forgot to mention that all of the fish we caught, in all species were free of any kind of open sores. They all looked pretty healthy to Doug & me.

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Posted by chin814 on 09-05-2003 11:29 PM:

Hey guys,
Does anyone have directions to the Lake Zoar ramp? I'll be going there for my first time this weekend. you can e-mail them to me at chin814@yahoo.com . thanks - Pete

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Posted by Lpbassman on 09-08-2003 11:35 AM:

COming from the NY City area, take rte 684 to rte 84 in CT.
Get off at exit 14, follow the exit ramp to the light. Make a right at the light and stay to the right. (There is a fork in the road) You will see a BROWN boat launch sign pointing the way. Take this road up about 2 miles or so until you cme to LEES FARM Road.
(no I do not own a farm there). You will see a sign that says no trucks or trailers there.....go up about another 100 feet and you will see LEES FARM road AGAIN. Make a right turn there and follow it to the lake...maybe about another mile.

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Posted by CHRIS BOOZE on 09-09-2003 06:28 PM:

We gave doug a nick name "Doug-E-Fresh" How many times you have to change his diapers?

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Posted by Bass Rat on 09-09-2003 08:47 PM:

quote:

Originally posted by CHRIS BOOZE
We gave doug a nick name "Doug-E-Fresh" How many times you have to change his diapers?

Easy "Old Man"

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Posted by Lpbassman on 09-10-2003 09:11 AM:

FYI: On this site he is known as Topgun although I really liked
"Doug-we really got to get him a nickname"

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Posted by TVal on 09-11-2003 12:42 PM:

Nice ramp

Had to measure a job in Newtown today. Got done near lunch time, so I stopped and grabbed a sandwich to go. Will sometimes find a park or senic view to have a peaceful break. Then I thought that since I wasn't far from the new Zoar launch, I could swing by and check it out. Very impressive project. Beautiful parking lot and ramp. Glad to see a few of our tax dollars being spent on such a nice job. Really need to put a rod and tackle bag back in my van. Could have done a little shore fishing.
And on a serious note, God bless all those who died 2 years ago.
May their friends and families remember the good times they shared.
Tim

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Posted by JOHN G on 09-11-2003 08:13 PM:

Leigh: that was an excellent report, well written and you guys did pretty darn good over there....

I have never fished Zoar yet, will have to soon....

isn't it basically the same water that then flows into Lilli???

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Posted by TVal on 09-11-2003 08:37 PM:

Got you lakes backwards Doc.
Lilly flows into Zoar, then Zoar into Lake Housatonic. After the Derby dam it's then into the dreaded "Tidal Zone"
Tim

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Posted by yar on 09-14-2003 11:26 PM:

i'm hitting zoar for the 1st time in a few weeks. does it fish like lilly. is the fishing better at the dam of else where. any pointers would be helpful. thanks.

Posted by Lpbassman on 09-15-2003 04:35 PM:

Well, here I am at the set up for the Norwalk show and still finding the time to get to the forums.
Yar, Zoar fishes a bit better than Lily, Try throwing a shad rap up to the rocky shore lines. Doug and I had a few good fish on them. Also fish on the left side of the dam as there is a weed bed there.

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Posted by Jon Puhalski on 09-18-2003 03:35 PM:

Lake Zoar

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Did a fifteen boat Club T at Zoar Sunday morning from 7 to 3pm. Let me say first, CONGRADULATIONS!!! to the state of CT for the fine job they did remodeling the ramp and parking area. Lots of paved parking and a triple ramp.

It seemed that most competitors got onto a good shallow bite in the morning, working the various weed beds in 4 to 5 feet of water. My partner Mike and I hit the weed bed in front of the Monroe ramp first and got a couple of 15" largemouth on Brush Hogs. We then moved across the bay to hit a small weed bed on a little gravel flat along the deep bank. We got one short largemouth and I then dropped a decent largemouth when I didn't recognise the bite soon enough. Our previous fish were "no bite" fish. You would just see the line ever so slowly start moving, almost as if the wind was slowly moving your line. Anyhow, I missed this fish with too much slack in my line on the hook set.

Off to the weed beds around the 84 bridge. A couple of other boats were on the spot I wanted to try, so we moved to just north of the bridge on the other side of the incoming river. Mike got another 15" largemouth in the shallow weeds on a Baby Brush Hog. As we moved out towards the channel following a rock outcropping, my Brush Hog seemd to be sinking for a long time. Suspecting that I missed another bite on the fall, I crnked the line slowly till I felt weight, then swung on a 14.5" smallie. Suprisingly, with the long delay in the hook set, the smallie was only hooked in the jaw. Figured for sure this was going to be a "menace" fish.

The boats that were south of the bridge had moved off and we moved in only to find the majority of weed in this area to be more in 3 feet of water rather than the 4 to 5 feet we were in previously. As the sun was getting higher, we hi-tailed it out of this area and went to work a steep rocky bank across from the Oxford ramp. I was throwing a deep crankbait and beating bottom pretty well when Mike hooked another 15" smallie on a green pumpkin tube. We worked this bank for awhile with no more to show. Just as we were getting ready to move across the river to the Oxford ramp, another boat pulled in on the nice little gravel point at the mouth of the cove. Oh well, off to the dam area just before the mouth of the long cove.

Here we found a nice little weed point with a deeper hole in the middle of it. Mike threw that Baby Brush Hog onto the inner edge and another 14.5" smallie hit it on the fall. As I neded a good line clearing cast from all the pitching, I decided to throw my watermelon red flake B Hog out into 40' of water and work it back in. About half way through my retrieve, I cranked it back to the boat only to be chased up by a fat looking 3 lb smallie. Dang! I should have worked that bait all the way back as we only had 6 of our 8 fish limit and only 1.5 hrs to go. Oh well.

We explored the mouth of the large cove a bit and found some nice looking wood out in deep water though. No bass, but it would probably be a good crappie spot. Off to the weed bed were we started in the morning. We only worked this spot about 15 minutes and with no bites we moved again back across the cove to the small point on the opposite side. Another spot with no bites and time is down to about a 1/2 hr now before we've got to check in at the ramp.

Mike had a hunch to work a steep bank for a big fish. At this point in the game with only 6 in the well and time running out it seemed like the best way to go. Many times, a little bit of luck will out do a lot of skill, and this was one of those times we needed a bit of luck to be anywhere near the top of the winners column. We settled on the bank opposite Kettletown and started working south. I was having a lot of activity earlier on a smoke/pepper 5" Kalins grub but had that snapped off earlier and didn't retie. I picked up a tube bait and found a nice knick in the line about a foot away from the bait. Either spinning rig I had out would need to be retied, so I pulled out a green pumpkin 4" Zoom Fat Albert grub and started working the bank.

Time was really running short now as it was nearly 2:45pm. Just a short way ahead of us, the bank changed from rubble rock to large boulder/ledge type rock. I skipped the grub up under a Hemlock tree and the rod got heavy almost immedietly. I set the hook on the grub and knew I had a good fish. I was expecting a smallie but after several deep hard pulls, a nice 3.5# Largemouth came swimming into the net. I quickly freed up my partner to allow him to keep fishing while I got mine put into the livewell. OH MY GOD!!! The livewell only has 8 inches of water in it! I felt the outlet pipe and knew the pump was running with no water coming in. I quickly threw Mike his life jacket and told him to put it on but stay on the front deck. I put mine on and started the outboard, and hit reverse. Sure enough, water started flowing with no problem. Man! that sucks, but has been known to happen in nearly all boats. All the fish appeared to be no worse for the wear, but it certaintly put a scare into me. I'm one of those guys that run their livewell pumps on continuos all day. Wish more people did.

We now had about 8 minutes left to get back to the ramp and had a couple minute drive, so we were down to the last couple of casts. In front of us about 60 feet was two very old tress lying on the bank leading into the water. I told Mike to hit the trolling motor to high and hit those trees. We got up there and Mike threw the big Mad Man Craw to the shallower portion of the trees - nothing. "One more cast Mike, and we've got to go". This cast was going to come acrros both trees in deeper water, but never made it before I saw the rod load up and Mike said, "Get The Net". I've seen the Mad Man Craw in action before, and know that this bait does not catch small fish. Such was the case this time also as our biggest of the day came into the net weighing 4.11 pounds. "All right,let's get out of here!"

Off to the ramp and the scales. It seemed that most folks did pretty well but no one team tore it up except for my good freind Bill Slavis and his partner Pete. I talked to him on the water and he asked me if I could beat 20 pounds. "No Way!" I knew he was doing good. Their bag hit the scales at better than 18 and a half pounds for an 8 bass limit. They would go on to capture first place. As our turn came to weigh in, we had to beat 14.90 for third and 15.44 pounds for second. I wasn't to confident especially as we had one dead largemouth from being gut hooked. But the last two fish we got in the last ten minutes probably weighed better than 7.5 pounds. Our fish hit the scales at 16.86 pounds (16.62 after our dead fish penalty) a little better than I figured.

Tony "Postman" was in third place with a 6 fish limit going 15.44 pounds by himself. His regular partner couldn't make it, so he fished solo. With one more boat to weigh in, it was looking good for the solo guy, which is always a good thing, but, sure enough, the last boat to weigh had 6 bass for 15.55 pounds. Tony was going to get lunker though with his 4.89 pound largemouth. A very nice accomplishment.

We took second with our two fish, weighing 7 1/2 pounds, in the last ten minutes. Every tournament fishermens fantasy.

Most everyone reported getting their fish shallow, and more deep as the day went along. Guys got their fish on the Brush Hog, jig & pig, grub, 4'worm, and a spinnerbait. Surface waters are startin to cool as we had about 74 degrees.

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pskisanglingadventures.com

Posted by JOHN G on 09-18-2003 10:27 PM:

JON: I was there WED morning, following your show, and I didn't get a water temp up to 70 degrees, until about 2 PM.....

unusual, 8 fish limit? never heard of that......is it 5 fish per man??

was there a current flow along the shoreline that day for you?

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Posted by JPBass on 09-19-2003 06:49 AM:

quote:

Originally posted by JOHN G
unusual, 8 fish limit? never heard of that......is it 5 fish per man??

I believe in Connecticut, by law each angler is allowed to keep 6 fish. Most clubs will set their limits a little lower. Helps keep the livewell less crowded.

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Posted by Bass Rat on 09-19-2003 07:24 AM:

CT is a 6 fish limit. A couple years back we changed our club rules to a 5 fish in CT because the CT DEP stated that if you have 6 in the livewell then catch another to cull you then have possession (however temporary) of 7 fish and would be in violation. I guess the same would apply to NY's 5 fish limit but we didn't want to sacrifice having the 5 fish rule.

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Posted by Jon Puhalski on 09-19-2003 08:58 AM:

8 fish is our TEAM limit., with two anglers per boat.
No water movement that I saw on the day of our event.

Posted by Bass Rat on 09-19-2003 09:58 AM:

John, IMHO that is the most thorough report I have ever seen posted here. Thank you.
Nick

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Posted by JPBass on 09-19-2003 12:19 PM:

quote:

Originally posted by Bass Rat
I guess the same would apply to NY's 5 fish limit but we didn't want to sacrifice having the 5 fish rule.

Actually that was a topic of discussion a few years back. N.Y. has a special rule for tournaments where you're allowed to continue fishing and cull your sixth fish.

I wonder how many dollars and hours of political debate were spent in Albany coming to that almighty decision??...LOL

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Posted by JOHN G on 09-19-2003 05:38 PM:

thanks JP and Nicky......

by the way, Nick, Jon puts up reports like that regularly on BFHP, in the CT forum, I have been reading his excellent reports for many years....he puts in MANY days and hours on the water...

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