Fish Sniffer On Demand Digital Edition Issue 3617 August 4-18 2017 | Page 3
Up-To-Date and Published Locally... By Sportsmen... For Sportsmen!
Alpine Lake Map Feature
MADE IN U.S.A
See Page 14
Vol. 36 - ISS.17
Our
35th
Year
Since 1982
Aug 4 - 18, 2017
“The Magazine for West Coast Sportsmen!”
Wild Rainbows, Mothballs, Peanut Brittle And
Grumbling Outdoor Writers…
S
ome of my earliest and fondest child-
hood memories are of visiting my
grandfather’s house.
In the garage, he had a collection of
dried and varnished pike and
muskie heads bristling with
needle like teeth from his
fishing trips to Minnesota.
The wall of his back bed-
room was home to a mounted
antelope head. The hall closet
smelled of mothballs and
that’s where he stashed a big
can of yummy peanut brittle.
Yet to my young mind all of
this was secondary.
My main focus was the
small wooden magazine rack
that sat next to grandpa’s
chair. That’s where he kept
the outdoor magazines that
were a source of limitless
fascination for me.
Grandpa was an avid
angler and sometimes hunter. Coming from
the Midwest he wasn’t a trout or striper guy
like my dad and dad’s buddies. It was pike,
which he called “northerns,” walleye, bass
and perch that grandpa loved
to pursue, but he loved reading
about all types of fishing.
Grandpa subscribed to the
“Big Three” outdoor
magazines of that era,
Outdoor Life, Field
& Stream and Sports
Afield. In his maga-
zine rack, there were
always the most cur-
rent issues along with
several back issues. When Cal Kellogg and Robert Weese hit the Sacramento River with
Every time I’d visit John Higley and Bill Adelman there were laughs and stories aplenty. As
his house I’d stretch you can see here, Bill wore two hats on the trip. It was unclear whether
out on the living room Adelman was making a fashion statement, fears large birds or just takes
carpet and pour over sun protection really seriously!
Photo by CAL KELLOGG, Fish Sniffer Staff.
those magazines.
Early on I’d just look
driving me to become an outdoor writer.
at the photos but when I started
These days print media of all sorts is
reading I’d do my best to read
feeling sickly in the shadow of Facebook
the articles by Jack O’Connor,
and other electronic information outlets,
Ted Trueblood, Gene Hill, Pat-
most of the guys I grew up reading have
rick F. McManus and of course
long since passed over the divide, Sports
H.G. Tapply and his column, Tap’s Tips…
Afield is dead and both Outdoor Life and
I didn’t know it at the time, but those
Field & Stream are thin shadows of their
sessions with grandpa’s magazines ignited
former selves CONTINUED ON PAGE 16
a spark that ultimately shaped my future,
WHAT’S
HOT
by
Cal Kellogg
(925) 428-1103 www.dragonsportfishing.com
New Potential World Record Sevengill Shark
Boated In San Francisco Bay
C
hris King of Los Molinos was
fishing with John McGhee,
owner of Legal Limit Sportfishing out
of Berkeley, when he landed a pending
new world record 342 lb. sevengill
shark (Notorynchus cepedianus) in San
Francisco Bay on July 2, 2017.
That fish would eclipse the 308 lb.
current world record and the
previous state record if 276
pounds set by Cliff Brewer
in Humboldt Bay on October
17, 1996.
King
hooked the
shark while fishing
a salmon head in
San Francisco Bay at
110 feet deep. He was
using a 908 Black Diamond
Phenix rod with a Boss
Dauntless 400 reel with 65
lb. test extreme braided line.
“It was a group of
buddies that were on the
trip,” said McGhee. “On that
same trip, we also landed
four limits of leopard sharks, along with
keeping four other sevengills. We also lost
two big sharks.”
They were fishing South San Francisco
Bay at 50 feet deep when the pending
record fish hit. They hooked leopard
sharks averaging 40 to 50 inches while
using salmon and squid. “The big fish
took 25 minutes to get in,”
McGhee said
After landing the shark,
they had a hard time finding
a certified scale that big.
“We had to take it to the
Recycle Zone to weigh it,”
said McGhee. “We also took
it to the CDFW and are now
filling out the paperwork to
get it designated as a state
and IGFA record.”
The fish featured a girth
of 55 inches and length of
113 inches. “On a previous
trip, we lost four fish and
landed one sevengill over
300 pounds, but that big fish
wasn’t quite as fat as this
one,” he stated.
McGhee fishes for shark and halibut
in the bay, as well as going out for
king salmon and albacore tuna. He also
anchor fishes for sturgeon in Suisun Bay
GONE
FISHING
by
Dan Bacher
John Mcgee (left) boated this massive 342 pound S.F.
Bay sevengill shark this July. The fish was weighed on a
certified scale and will likely be certified as a new world
record.
Photo courtesy of LEGAL LIMIT SPORTFISH-
ING, East Bay.
35 Years
Serving
Sportsmen
CONTINUED ON PAGE 13
Did Interior Appointee Bernhardt Keep
Lobbying For Westlands Water District?
Brown Administration Approves
Environmental Documents
for Delta Tunnels
See Page 22
SEE OUR NEW BAJA
ROUNDUP SECTION ON
PAGE 26-27
INSIDE
Area Reports
FRESHWATER REPORTS
Almanor/Bucks Lakes - American River. ...............4
Lake Berryessa - Carson Pass..............................7
Clear Lake - Don Pedro Reservoir.................... 8-9
Eagle Lake - Lake Oroville.............................10-11
Lake Pardee - Santa Clara Valley Lakes....... 12-13
Shadow Cliffs Lake - Trinity Lakes.......................17
West Delta - Wildhorse Lake...............................18
SALTWATER REPORTS
Berkeley/Emeryville - Half Moon Bay.............. 20-21
Monterey Bay - Peninsula Shoreline.............. 24-25
FEATURES
Where...When...How...
BAJA ROUNDUP...............................................26-27
BULLETIN BOARD................................................... 4
COOKIN’ YER CATCH - Paulette Kenyon............... 21
FISH SNIFFER HOW-TO: Cal Kellogg..................... 7
GO FOR IT: Staff....................................................... 5
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR...................................... 3
MAP FEATURE: Dan Bacher.............................14-15
SALTY TIPS Steve “Hippo” Lau.............................. 26
SPOTLIGHT ON CONSERVATION - Dan Bacher.... 19
WHAT’S HOT SALTWATER - Cal Kellogg.............. 24
STAFF
TACKLE
What We’re Using
Cal Kellogg - Fished for
trout in Tehama County’s
Deer Creek. Cal caught more
than 25 brown, brook and
rainbow trout from 4 inches
to 2 pounds while fishing a No. 12 Humpy
dry fly. Cal fished the fly using a Lamiglas
GP 906 rod paired with a Pflueger 1495
fly reel. Cal linked the fly to his floating fly
line via a Sportsman’s Warehouse 9 foot
tapered leader.
Paul Kneeland - fished Hell
Hole Reservoir with Bridget
Looney in the Fish Sniffer
21’ Rogue Jet Coastal. They
caught limits of kokanee to
16 inches, and rainbow trout to 15 inches,
using an 8’ Phenix Reaper composite trig-
gerstick kokanee rod with a Team Daiwa Z
ultra light reel loaded with 6 pound Yozuri
TopKnot fluorocarbon line. They trolled pink
and white Dick Nite spoons and pink, blue
and white Sockeye Slammers with corn be-
hind Vance’s cannonball flashers 50 to 60
feet deep off the Cannon Downriggers at 1.4
mph.
Dan Bacher - fished for rain-
bow trout on the North Fork of
the Stanislaus River. He used
a Berkley Ugly Stick GX2 6’
6” medium action spinning
rod, teamed up with a Shake-
speare GX235 spinning reel filled with 6 lb.
test P-Line CX Premium Flourocarbon Coat-
ed Line. He found great rainbow trout action
at dark while tosssing out 1/8 oz. Yakima
Bait Rooster Tails in Brown Trout, Fire Tiger
and Rainbow color patterns and 1/8 oz. gold
and black Panther Martins.