Fish Sniffer On Demand Digital Edition 3808 Mar 29- Apr 12 2019 | Page 24

22 Mar 29 - Apr 12, 2019 FRESHWATER VOL.38 • ISS. 8 FRESHWATER REPORTS: CONTINUED FROM PG 21 SAN LUIS LAKE cont. fishing, San Luis Reservoir striper fishing is the top prospect for San Jose area anglers. “The water is somewhat clear in the big lake in spite of being nearly- filled, and most of our fishermen are working the banks with anchovies.,” said Anthony Lopez of Coyote Bait and Tackle in Morgan Hill. “The coves are flooded, and swimbaits or jerkbaits are effective in shad patterns, but the topwater bite has slowed down. “There haven’t been many boaters out there, but it seems that most boaters are drifting minnows along the rockwall close to Highway 152,” added Lopez. - Dave Hurley Rachel took a winter fishing adventure to Collins Lake recently and rounded up this chunky spotted bass. Photo courtesy of THE COLLINS LAKE RECREATION AREA, Oregon House. SAN PABLO RESERVOIR Catfish Pace The Catches EL SOBRANTE - Channel catfish are hitting worms at San Pablo Reservoir as they become active with the runoff into the lake from recent storms. Trout are another story. “We haven’t seen many trout being caught. The water conditions are muddy,” said Marcella Shoemaker of the Rocky Mountain Recreation Company. “We did not plant any trout this week.” The lake level is 311.9 feet above sea level and the surface water temperature is 54.6 degrees. Expect improving fishing conditions for trout, as well as largemouth and spotted bass, as the lake water clears and the weather warms. San Pablo Recreation area is open daily from 6:30 a.m. –6:00 p.m. Boats have to be off the water at 5:00 p.m. The café is open Friday, Saturday & Sunday from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. HOW TO the aspiring kokanee angler is a down- rigger and a powerful sonar unit that has a high pixel rating for identifying kokanee. Most downriggers come equipped with clips that have too much tension for kokanee trolling. Kokanee have soft mouths. The result of using a clip with too much tension is lost fish due to hooks pulling out. This being the case you’ll want to pick up a lightweight downrigger clip before hitting the lake. Several manufactures offer special light and ultra lightweight clips that are perfect for kokanee. The beauty of downriggers is that once a fish is hooked and the line is pulled from the clip the fish can be fought on light tackle without the interference of added weight. Most avid kokanee anglers prefer light action casting style rods from 7 to 8 feet in length. As I mentioned kokanee have a soft mouth and pull off the hook fairly easily. Back in the early days of kokanee trolling, anglers integrated rubber snubbers into their rigs to act as a cushion that minimized lost fish due to hooks being pulled out. These days snubbers are no longer needed, since anglers have access to soft slow action rods that provide all the cushion necessary to keep your hook imbedded in the mouth of the kokanee, right where it belongs. The rod should be teamed with a level wind high speed reel that has an excep- tionally smooth drag spooled with 8 or 10 pound test monofilament line. As with rods there are a great many excellent reels available to today’s aspiring kokanee angler. At the heart of the kokanee angler’s arsenal are lures, dodgers, and flashers. Since kokanee feed on plankton and mysis shrimp they likely don’t strike lures in an attempt to feed. Instead they strike as an act of aggression. No one can say for sure why kokanee choose to attack one lure over another, but it seems to be a combination of shape, color, vibration, By Cal Kellogg SHASTA Shasta 20 Feet From Maximum Pool, Bass & Trout Bite REDDING - According to Jeff Goodwin of Jeff Goodwin’s Guide Service the water quality is improving at Lake Shasta after the lake rapidly rose to within 20 feet of maximum pool. With the water temperature hovering in the high 40’s Goodwin predicts that the brown trout bite will really kick into gear once the TAHOE Kayakers & Big Boaters Crush Limits Of Macks! SOUTH LAKE TAHOE - Things are starting to get exiting at Lake Tahoe. Sure, CONTINUED ON PG 23 Come visit continued from page 6 and smell. Visibility and vibration are factors that strongly influence whether or not kokanee will strike. Vibration from lures, dodgers, and flashers draw fish close enough to see the lure. In terms of visibility, you don’t want a lure that is overly visible. Many times the fish will avoid an overly bright lure. In general, during bright conditions its best to use subdued colors such as gold and copper. Early and late in the day when light levels are low, silver and nickel are often the best choices. When you look into the tackle kit of most veteran kokanee trollers you’ll find many different lures and scores of dodgers, but what does the inspiring kokanee enthusiast need in the beginning? Spinners are extremely popular and productive offerings, but I’m not talking about the inline wire mounted type of spinners used by trout anglers. I’m talking about spinners like Mack’s Lure Wedding Rings that are rigged on a monofilament leader. For starters you’ll want about a half dozen spinners in colors hot pink, orange, green, gold, copper and chrome. Beyond spinners small spoons such as Dick Nites, Mack’s Lure Hum Dingers and Vance’s Tackle Sockeye Slammers in the same colors as mentioned for spinners are solid choices. The beginner’s lure selection is topped off with an assortment of small hoochies (plastic squid skirts) in a variety of basic kokanee fishing colors. In addition to lures you’ll also need some dodgers. A number of companies produce excellent 3,4 and 6 inch dodgers that are routinely employed by successful kokanee anglers. You don’t need a big selection to get started. If you had dodgers in chrome, brass, watermelon and pink or orange in both 4 and 6-inch sizes, you’d have your bases covered in most situations. The distance a lure is trolled behind the dodger is always a point of much discussion. The basic rule of thumb is temperature rises a little and the clarity improves a bit more. As of press time, trollers including Goodwin, were scoring both trout and spotted bass while pulling both spoons and minnow plugs from the surface to 30 feet deep. In terms of trout, rainbows to 3 pounds and browns to 6 pounds are up for grabs, but you’ve got to put in your time to hook up. The best strategy is to stay on the move chasing the clearest water you can find while working a variety of depths. On the bass fishing front, both spotted bass and largemouths are showing. The average bass are running from 1 to 2 pounds, but spots beyond 5 and largemouths beyond 8 are possible. Mother’s Finest Worms in 6 inch sizes worked on both drop shot rigs and split shot rigs are a solid choice as are Senkos and spider grubs rigged on quarter ounce darter heads. Soft plastics like these will produce a lot of fish in the 1 to 3-pound class in both the main lake and river arms. For a shot at a trophy class spot or largemouth, swimbaits in the 4 to 8-inch range are the way to go. You likely won’t get many strikes, but when the strikes do come the bass should be big. The big bass at Shasta tend to suspend off the bank and look toward the bank for prey. For this reason long near shore casts parallel to the bank are the method of choice for Shasta swimbaiters. LAKE SHASTA that during the early season, you can run at Lakehead on the your lures that have action of their own, Sacramento River arm such as spoons and spinners back 18 to 24 inches. This distance should gradually be shortened as the season progresses until the lures are only 8 to 10 inches back in late summer and early fall. Most kokanee anglers worth their salt wouldn’t think of trolling a lure without adding a kernel of shoe peg corn to the hook. Corn adds a pleasant scent to the • Fully equipped cabins with lure and acts as a target for the kokanee to strike. Corn can be used plain out of the decks overlooking the lake can or it can be doctored with scents such • Free Boat slips at private dock as Pro-Cure anise or Kokanee Special. Most knowledgeable kokanee anglers • Gameroom, volleyball, pool, will carry several small containers of horseshoes and more! corn with different scents added to each, (530)238-2575 allowing them to experiment until they www.tsasdiresort.us find the most effective combination. Once kokanee have been located with Great Food & the sonar unit, catching them is often a drinks, newly matter of experimentation. Kokanee can remodeled bar, be fickle, ignoring today what they loved outdoor patio, lots of fun! yesterday. For this reason the best anglers constantly vary their end tackle in terms (530)962-3050 of color, action, and scent until they find 3705 a combination that works. You should also vary the distance you trail the lure from the 3204 downrigger ball. I like to begin 20 5 hours feet back and then $ move closer to, or farther from the ball depending on the All Gear Provided water clarity and depth I’m fishing. If you haven’t given kokanee • Discounts for Cash • fishing a try, grab a • Large or Small Groups • little tackle and go Group Discounts • Gift Certificates get those salmon Over 50 Years Experience on The Lake this spring and P.O. Box 488 summer. I think you’ll enjoy the Carnelian Bay, CA 96140 E-mail: bigmack-2@att.net • www.mickeysbigmack.com experience! Fish Lake Tahoe! DaiLy Trips 90 (800) 877–1462 (530)546–4444