I’m a born and bred Texan, and many of my major career highlights have taken place in the Lone Star State. But whenever people ask me about my favorite place to fish I tell them it’s upstate New York. Since the first time I came here early in my career, I’ve looked forward to the journey north each summer. Fishing was great back then, but surprisingly on most of the lakes and rivers in the region it somehow continues to get better.
Of course, our next two events are on Lake Champlain and the St. Lawrence River, and most of the Elite Series pros have had those stops circled on their calendars since the 2024 schedule was announced last year.
I’ve had multiple top finishes on each of them, and I look forward to them equally, but they may take different tactics to do well. That’s kind of surprising because the two fisheries are rather close as the crow flies, and they both produce big weights, but they fish really differently.
In the 1000 Islands region, the forage is heavily goby driven. It doesn’t matter whether you’re fishing shallow or deep, most of the fish are looking down.
On Champlain, by contrast, there are of course some bass feeding on the bottom, but most of them are looking up and chasing bait. You can catch them on topwaters and jerkbaits and around bait balls like last year.
The St. Lawrence has largemouth, and you might even be able to cash a check on them, but the smallmouth are simply too big to ignore. You have to target them if you want to hit that century mark – and even that might not be enough to win.
Champlain is a different story. I suspect that most of our guys will still chase smallmouth there, but plenty of tournaments get won on green fish. That could prove to be true this year, since with the high water conditions a lot of smaller events have been won on shallow largemouth. At the very least, you have to look at both options to keep them honest.
What both fisheries have in common is they’re expansive with lots of productive zones. While there may be some small groups, you’re unlikely to see 30 or 40 boats bunched up together like some of our other major venues. They’re vast, and they fish big.
I’m sure you’ll see lots of anglers using light tackle and finesse techniques at both lakes, but historically I’ve been most successful power fishing up there – crankbaits, jerkbaits, jigs and topwaters. The fish are more pressured than they used to be, but you still don’t have to reinvent the wheel to do well. If I can get away with baitcasting tackle, I certainly prefer that.
One of the hardest things for tournament anglers on both Champlain and the St. Lawrence is to leave biting fish when they’re not the right quality. Catching 30 or 40 fish in the 2 1/2-pound class isn’t going to do you much good at the scales. You’re better off getting seven or eight of the right bites.
If you’re an angler just looking to have fun, though, these are the perfect places to go, because you will get bites, and many of them will be good fish. In fact, there are very few better places to go if you want to learn a new technique or refine one that that’s not yet in your wheelhouse. It’s simply a great opportunity to dial things in until you get them right.
