“You should’ve been here last year.”

We’ve all heard that one, right?

Well, this time it happens to be true. In 2004, it was truly a bonanza year for salmon in Lake Ontario. The chinook salmon comeback was even more remarkable because, just two years previously, fishermen reported one of the poorest seasons on record, harking back to the early days of the salmon introduction program. It is significant that fishermen set a new catch-rate record in 2003 and then broke it again last year.

Now, the $64 million question on everyone’s mind: Is there a trend here?

A quick look at exactly what happened last year — where and when fish were caught — will yield a few hints about the future, as will a review of the changing lake ecology, scientific studies and stocking trends.

The salmonid turnaround was due to the estimated 51,443 chinooks, also called kings, boated on the Department of Environmental Conservation’s fishing boat survey during the period of April through September 2004. Most important, the catch translated to 0.889 chinooks per boat trip, blasting the previous record of 0.657, set in 2003. The total salmon-trout harvest rate was 1.51 per boat trip. That’s red-hot fishing, indeed, for the 57,872 trips that targeted salmon and trout. An additional 26,799 boat trips targeted other species, mainly smallmouth bass, in the survey that has been conducted for 19 years.

“Chinook fishing was never better; it was a fabulous season,” commented Steve LaPan, a DEC fisheries biologist who compiled the survey at the Lake Ontario Unit stationed at Cape Vincent.

“Most fishermen prefer to catch chinooks,” LaPan explained, “and that was what made it so special,” The chinook fishing was most dramatic in the eastern region of Lake Ontario, he reported, because it started in the spring and carried on throughout the summer months. Usually, chinooks are concentrated in western basin waters during the spring and early summer, with alewives and salmon appearing in the shallower waters of the eastern end during late summer and fall.

“We don’t know the reason why, but alewives were also in the east end all season last year and the salmon were there feeding on them,” LaPan said. “We’ve always known, of course, that salmon prefer alewives if they’re available — they must taste like cheeseburgers to chinooks.”

Fisheries managers are still mystified about the change in behavior that gave eastern fishermen a special bonus, as they remain puzzled over the 2002 season, the year the catch of all salmonids plummeted.

“We told everyone back then that the fish were out there, but they didn’t show up in catch reports until the next year,” LaPan said. “All you can say is, that’s fishing!”

Another encouraging report is that some real wallhangers were reported in the chinook catch last year, according to Dan Bishop, DEC fisheries manager stationed in Cortland.

“From preliminary reports, we know that several salmon weighing over 30 pounds were taken,” he reported. Informal reports indicate that a lot of 20-pound-plus were boated, and both two-year and three-year fish, which make up the large majority of the chinook catch, appeared fat and healthy. This is a definite improvement over the 2003 survey, which included some of the skinniest salmon researchers had seen.

The western basin is the traditional hotspot for spring salmon, and both fishermen and charter captains are expecting another great year, building on the past two record seasons, according to Bill Hilts, sport-fishing coordinator for Niagara County.

“Our spring chinook fishery started as usual with a bang in April, and never stopped until September, when unseasonably warm weather seemed to put salmon runs on hold for a few weeks,” he reported. “The spring salmon fishing was easily the best we’ve had in 15 years, and the rest of the season wasn’t far behind.”

An unusually large number of one-year chinooks were taken in this area of the lake, and Hilts believes this bodes well for the upcoming season. Also, while the spotlight was on chinooks last year, a lot of coho salmon and trout were given a free pass, so to speak, which could mean those species will be more numerous and larger this year.