VOL. 37 • ISS. 04

to launch.

“ Black bass offer the best action on Oroville now,” said Bob Boucke of Johnson’ s Bait and Tackle.“ I haven’ t heard any reports from anglers targeting king salmon lately.”

Boaters are using rip baits and drop shot rigs with Robo Worms to hook spotted bass, mostly fish in the 12 to 15 inch“ slot,” with an occasional larger fish.“ Most of the fish are holding at 20 to 30 feet deep,” noted Boucke.

The California Department of Fish and Wildlife( CDFW) stocked 25,000 salmon fingerlings in Oroville last May. The agency also planted 110,000 chinooks in the 6 to 9 inch range in November.

The lake is currently holding 1,299,043 acre-feet of water, 37 percent of capacity and 58 percent of average. The lake elevation is 705.75 feet in elevation, 194.25 feet from maximum pool.

- Dan Bacher

PYRAMID LAKE

The Cutthroat Story Remains The Same

RENO- The bite and the conditions have changed very little since the last report. The troll bite is consistently good for boater’ s top-lining with 4” Lyman Lures. Spoons like Kastmasters and Krocodiles can also work, but they are nowhere near as effective unless aided by the angler.

If spoons are used, the angler needs to hold the rod and impart some additional action by giving the rod a pull every once in a while. Lyman’ s work great because of the darting, dipping and side to side wobble of the plug. A spoon rhythmically wobbling side to side pales in comparison, hence the need for the angler to add additional action.

Adam Benoit of Vacaville landed and released this huge 44 pound striper while fishing the Sacramento River near Colusa this January. The fish grabbed a Hiroshima Custom Glide Bait.

Photo courtesy of FISHSNIFFER. COM.

Deep diving Mag Lip Flatfish also can work at times. These plugs will dive 15-20 plus feet depending on the set back, line diameter and speed they are pulled at.

The shore bite is still a waste of time, or difficult and a trial of patience with the occasional reward- depending on the day. Deep drop-off beaches like Spider Point and Blockhouse continue to produce fish for persistent anglers, but the shallow water fly rod bite has been very poor. If there is a silver lining to this gloomy report, it is the fact that shore anglers have seen an uptick in the size of the fish they have been catching.

The other big news in Western Nevada was the Topaz Lake opener. The lake fished well for rainbow and rainbow / cutthroat hybrids on the opener. In addition to beautiful orange meat and fat laden holdovers, fishermen reported landing some big planters over 5 pounds. The top offerings were the same things you might find in your grandpa’ s tackle box; sets of flashers trailed by a threaded night crawler on a baitholder hook produced very well.

- Mike McNeilly

CONTINUED ON PAGE 20

Feb 2- 16, 2018

And when Mom bought a wig to cover her rapidly thinning hair, she bought one the exact same shade as the dog’ s silky blonde

Now Mom was a stubborn old girl and she didn’ t mellow much with age. She especially didn’ t take kindly to suggestions voiced by me, her daughter. One of those suggestions was that she should leave the dog at home when we took a rockcod trip out of Bodega Bay, even though Mom was sure Toots would be just fine waiting for us in the van.“ Mom, that’ s eight hours without a bathroom break,” I argued.“ She’ ll be fine,” said Mom in a tone that ended the discussion.

The big day came. The sun shone brightly on the blue waters of the bay, and the flag at the Coast Guard station was flapping away. Beautiful. I was responsible for bringing the fishing rods and lures, while Mom had offered to bring lunch for us both. We lugged our stuff down to the boat and got ourselves squared away, and I never thought to ask about the dog. Out of sight, out of mind.

Other passengers came aboard and soon the deck was abustle as men rigged their lines with shrimpfly ganions and diamond jigs. I set Mom up with a shrimp-fly rig and tied a trusty Tady lure on my own

19

outfit. I chose a heavy one since the breeze looked like it would push us along at quite a clip.

And away we sailed, hitting a bit of a rough patch just as we cleared Bodega Head. The boat rode the swells like a mechanical bull, pitch and buck and spin, and passengers crowded into the cabin to avoid the spray that splattered the deck. Mom grabbed her tote bag containing

our sandwiches and stowed it under one of the tables. Was I a bit suspicious that the bag might hold more than lunch? Maybe, but why start an argument? After an hour, Mom was starting to look a bit green and queasy so I offered to sit with her outside on the deck. As I did, the captain’ s voice on the loudspeaker announced that we were turning around because the seas were rising. Just as we spun about, we hit one of those leadcore waves SMACK! Tackle boxes teetered. Someone’ s rod hit the deck. I heard crashes inside the cabin, and Mom let out an ear-shattering shriek.

My heart stopped. Down the deck tumbled that silky blonde fur ball, and I leaped after it, reaching out to try to prevent it from being swept through the scupper to certain death. But my suddenly athletic mother was ahead of me. Slipping down the deck, at the very last moment she plunged her hand into the salty surge and triumphantly pulled out – her wig.

Remembering the good times, I’ ll be looking for you on the banks. hooks and work the beads inside the hoochie’ s body.

Hoochies, with the exception of wiggle hoochie, have no built-in action. So, whether you are using a hoochie you’ ve rigged yourself or one that came out of a packager pre-rigged, you’ ll have to use a dodger to give the lures some action.

As a general rule, you’ ll want the hoochie to be 2.5 to 3 dodger lengths behind the rear of the blade. If you are using a 4-inch dodger that means you’ ll want your hoochie from 10 to 12 inches back. Rigged this way the dodger will give the hoochie a very seductive pulsing speed up and slow down motion.

When I’ m rigging hoochies for targeting king salmon and kokanee sometimes I want a little extra attraction such as when the fish are holding in deep water so I’ ll team my hoochies with E-Chips. I accomplish this by sliding an E-Chip on my leader instead of the beads. I smear a little Pro-Cure fish scent on the E-Chip to act as lubricant and then push it into the body of the hoochie. As the hoochie dips and darts behind the dodger the E-Chip puts out a steady stream of fish attracting electric pulses.

When I’ m fishing for kokanee I

naturally tip my hooks with corn. When coho or kings are on the menu I like to tip my hooks with little pieces of anchovy, herring or shad. I think the taste of real meat really encourages the salmon to get the lure well back into their mouths, resulting in better hookups and more fish landed.

I spend a lot of time rolling baitfish and pulling threaded worms when I’ m trolling and I regularly use hoochies to enhance both of these presentations. The next time you rig a shad or anchovy for rolling or thread a worm slide a hoochie down the leader after the bait is rigged. You want the hoochie draped over the end of the bait.

Teaming hoochies with natural baits is a real winner, but few freshwater anglers are doing it. Saltwater anglers have long known how effective this tactic is for species as diverse as salmon, halibut and even marlin.

Hoochies are a natural choice for spicing up spoons and crankbaits. With spoons simply slip a hoochie over the back hook. You’ ll need to use a fairly large spoon so that the hoochie doesn’ t ruin the action, but when you get the right combination the look is very seductive.

To apply a hoochie to the rear of a crankbait you’ ll need to work a little harder. Using a slit ring pliers remove the rear treble from the bait, slip a hoochie over the hook and then put the hook back on the bait. If you do this I guarantee that your Rapalas will stand apart from the Rapalas being pulled by everyone else you know.

I’ ve got a lot more to say and little space, so let’ s move on to the wiggle hoochie. The wiggle hoochie looks goofy and honestly, I avoided using them for a long time, but I’ ve got to admit that they are a deadly trout lure. I’ ve caught dozens of hefty rainbows on them and I’ ve watched Fish Sniffer Publisher Paul Kneeland catch dozens more.

We run our wiggle hoochies without the addition of dodgers and they work great. At times, I’ ll put wiggle hoochies on a 36 inch leader and slide them down a deep downrigger line as a dropper. While fishing for kokanee at Don Pedro, I had to stop using my wiggle hoochie dropper because I was catching so many rainbows that I wasn’ t able to keep my kokanee lure in the strike zone for any length of time.

What about hoochie color? For trout and kokanee, I usually go with bright pink or orange hoochies. For kings and coho I start out with baitfish colors. Hoochies are so economical

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