Fish Sniffer On Demand Digital Edition Issue 3824 Nov 8-22 | Page 3

Up-To-Date and Published Locally... By Sportsmen... For Sportsmen! 37 Years Serving Sportsmen Monterey Bay Map Feature MADE IN U.S.A See Page 14 November 8 - 22, 2019 Vol. 38 - ISS.24 Our 37th Year A Since 1982 “The Magazine for West Coast Sportsmen!” Go Light and Shallow for Sonoma Coast Rockfish quick snap of the rod tip sent my small swimbait toward its target. Letting the bait fall through the water column, I methodically counted it down to 35 feet before closing the bail on my reel and starting a slow steady retrieve. About half way back to the boat, I could feel the tell tale sign of a strike. I kept reeling as my rod began to load. A few quick turns of the handle and the fight was on. The fish pulled like a bulldog, making several strong spirited runs before I could get it aboard the boat and into the fish box. Yes, I did say fish box. If you were thinking this is about freshwater black bass, it’s not, this is shallow water light tackle rockfishing. Hard pulling, good eating, water less than 75’, light tackle, this is about as good as it gets. I have come to really enjoy pursuing rockfish and lingcod using standard finesse black bass tackle. Beyond just the tackle and lures, this type of rockfishing shares so many similarities to freshwater bassin’. Large schools of Blue, Black and Olive Rockfish have a habit of suspending up in the water column. Once you are able to determine where they are holding, it is simply a matter of getting your bait to them. When this happens, a small swimbait can be lights out. Pay attention because these fish move fast, oftentimes you can see pods of fish following a hooked fish back to the boat. In these instances, the rockfish act just like a wolf pack of spotted Fong, Fish Sniffer Staffer, shows off a bass. Have your fishing Mark beautiful vermilion rockfish that he caught while buddy drop a bait to them and see fishing light tackle in shallow water with Captain what happens. Jeff Caramella of Fish On Charters out of Bodega Bay. When the conditions are right, Photo by MARK FONG, Fish Sniffer Staff. I like to target lingcod by fishing deeper in the water column and working my swimbait just off the bottom. on light tackle. There is really nothing quite like a big ling As I mentioned, I make use of my GONE FISHING by Mark Fong CONTINUED ON PG 16 The Shasta Fall Trout Derby – and The Big One That Got Away T and Dave Barsi of Oak Run. We launched the Fish Sniffer Rogue Jet 21 Coastal and parked it in the slip below the cabins. As the sun set and the night cooled, we barbequed steaks and had cocktails and cigars overlooking the beautiful Sacramento River arm of Shasta Lake. Friday morning, heading down the Sacramento River arm of the lake about 6:45 am. The water temperature was 66 degrees. Al Fiske had run his thermometer down deep the day before – it was still 66 degrees at 92 feet! The trout could be almost anywhere! The north wind was blowing about 15 mph, but heading south it was just pushing us along. We were exploring to determine where we weren’t going to fish on derby Steve Fistler of Clear Lake shows off a fat 20 inch rainbow that hit a red dot frog Speedy Shiner 20 feet days. We tried several different deep at Lake Shasta. areas all around the lake. We saw he 19th Annual Shasta Lake Fall Trout derby took place on the weekend of October 12 and 13. The lake was in excellent shape, very clear and only down about 40 feet from the top! John Brassfield and I arrived at Sugarloaf Cottages in Lakehead and were joined by Bruce Wicks and Al Fiske of Foresthill, lots of bait balls, from the surface down to 80 feet deep. We also saw lots of big “marks” on the Lowrance XD9, but every time we dropped a lure down to them, we ended up catching bass. We caught a trout here and there, but never found a concentration of fish until we visited Waters Gulch off the mouth of the Sacramento Arm. We trolled into the back of the bay and in the calm water saw fish rising all around the area. We trolled through twice and never had a hit. Were they all bass? We decided to stop the boat and do some casting. I put on a small Kastmaster, and John found a Steel Shad lure on my dashboard that I got as a sample at the ICAST show in Orlando. He made a couple casts and on the third one was into a very nice trout! He caught several other trout and bass on the Steelshad. I got nothing on the Kastmaster, and by the time I changed to a Steelshad the trout had stopped and all I caught were bass! Friday evening, we had dinner at the WHAT’S HOT by Paul Kneeland Photo by DAVE BARSI, Oak Run. F ish S niffer T IP OF THE W EEK Fall trout feed heavily on baitfish at most lakes as they pack away calories for the lean days of winter looming just around the corner. Spoons and minnow plugs do a good job of imitating baitfish, but if you want to show the trout something they don’t see as often as Rapalas and Kastmasters, rig up with a trolling fly. Trolling flies offer up a big meaty profile in a package that can be trolled slowly or quickly. The Fish Sniffer’s own Cal Kellogg is a big advocate of trolling flies because they catch big trout. To check out Cal’s full line of trolling flies and other trout gear go to WWW.FishHuntShoot.Com and click the Tackle Store icon. CONTINUED ON PG 20 Special Section KAYAK Fishing: pgs 10 INSIDE Area Reports FRESHWATER REPORTS Almanor/Bucks Lakes - American River.................4 Berryessa Lake - Collins Lake................................7 Davis Lake - East Delta...................................... 8-9 Eastern Sierra - Klamath/Trinity River .................11 Los Vaqueros Reservoir - Rancho Seco Lake............................... 12-13 Ressing - Sacramento Area................................. 17 San Pablo Reservoir - Tahoe.......................... 18-19 West Delta............................................................ 21 SALTWATER REPORTS Baja Roundup........................................................... 26 Berkeley - Half Moon Bay...................................24-25 Monterey Bay......................................................26 FEATURES Where...When...How... BULLETIN BOARD.....................................................3 CATCH & RELEASE - FLY FISHING: Cal Kellogg............7 FISH SNIFFER COUNTRY: Dan Bacher...................27 GO FOR IT: Staff.........................................................5 HOW-TO: Cal Kellogg................................................6 KAYAK FISHING SPOTLIGHT: Cal ..........................10 MAP FEATURE: Dan Bacher...............................14-15 SPOTLIGHT ON CONSERVATION: Dan Bacher......22 STAFF TACKLE What We’re Using Paul Kneeland - fished the Shasta Lake Trout Derby with John Brassfield of Trucksmart stores in the Fish Sniffer 21’ Rogue Jet Coastal. They caught rainbow trout to 4 pounds, using a Okuma 9’ light action Kokanee Black Rod with a Daiwa Lexa 100 line counter reel loaded with 8 lb test Yozuri Topknot Flourocarbon line.. They trolled small white Phoebe and shad pattern Humdinger spoons on the surface and off the Canon Downriggers at 10 to 21 feet deep and 2.4 mph. Cal Kellogg - fished Lake Almanor from his 18’ Gone Fishin’ Marine Duckworth Advantage Sport with his wife Gena. For trolling worms, flies and spoons Cal used two of his signature series leadcore trolling rods matched with Abu Garcia 5500 line counter reels spooled with his Hybrid Leadcore system. Using these rigs Cal and Gena landed rainbow trout to 5 plus pounds! Dan Bacher - fished for rainbow trout at Sugar Pine Lake. He used a Berkley Ugly Stick GX2 6’ 6” medium action spinning rod, teamed up with a Shakespeare GX235 spinning reel filled with 6 lb. test P-Line CX Premium Fluorocarbon Coated Line. He fished with rainbow Berkley PowerBait, 1/8 oz. gold and black Panther Martins and 2/5 oz. gold/red stripe Little Cleos. Dan coated his baits and lures with Bloody Tuna scent Pro-Cure Super Gel.