Submit
Report

Oroville Lake and Reports

Limit:
Click for interactive map

Thursday, December 29th, 2011

  • By

    Water Temp: 50

    Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

    Report: Took my son and daughter out about 3:30pm. Put in at Bidwell, the boat wouldnt start. #@$!, so we just started to fish along the dam side of the ramp working our way out. This was after 30 mineuts of trying to get the boat started. We worked in about 10 to 15' and everyone caught fish. My son was the first with a small coho and then my daughter picked up a 16.5" spot. I finaly got a 17" spot the next point down. We did catch several cohos but mostly small ones. The bass were in just under 10' and we caught them on chartruse grubs and worms on 1/8oz dart heads. The cohos were on the worms also. Lots of hits but think most were the small cohos. We did end up with 6 spots and 5 over the slot. We were of the water by 5:15.
    City: san jose

    Tips: Go have fun while we can. With no rain in site we are in a lot of trouble this year, I guess we used up our alotment last year. We did do well on chartuse worms and grubs but only cohos on drop shot, all in 10' or less.

Sunday, December 25th, 2011

  • By

    Water Temp: cold

    Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

    Report: Hey yall, joe daddy here with another fishing story. So I wake my step dad up with a call at 9:00am christmas day ('merry christmas let's go fishin'). All we been hearing is how's there's tons of coho planters being caught not to mention my buddys 21"er. So even i got to check this out. We get fishing at saddle dam at about 11:00. I got my bass pole and mt trout pole. Walking down the hill I tell my stepdad I came here to catch bass not trout. So I go on my way working the bank with my pink worm. About two coves over I get a good strike that surprizes me. Coho bass I don't know. In that cove I'm seeing the dead christmas trees and a flat leading to them next to deeper water. So I'm like alright since that's the only cover around. I cast into those trees and get snagged up for a second. Then my worm breaks loose into a downward free fall then BAM 16 1/2" largie looked like 2 pounder. Took picture threw it back. Also caught a planter after that, kicker fish. My stepdad would not be denied. Went back later got a coho on his foul reel. HO HO HO
    City: palermo

    Tips: Go get your own christmas instead of someone giving it to you.

Friday, December 2nd, 2011

  • By

    Water Clarity: Muddy (0-2 foot visibility)

    Report: Does anyone know the limit on trout on this lake? Also the limit on salmon and minumum size. How many trouts and salmons are allowed a day?
    City: san mateo

    Tips: I've been fishing oroville for many years and always wondered what the limit on these fish were. Once in a while I'll catch a salmon by accident and wondered if I should keep it. I always wodered if I should fish for salmon or trout. Just weren't sure of limit on salmon. I think the limit on trout is five. Wish I knew about the salmon.

Friday, November 25th, 2011

  • By

    Water Temp: 57-59.5

    Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

    Report: Day after Thanksgiving took my 6yr old son out with me. Slept in and hit it around 10am Started in the Bidwell creek arm of the mouth of the middle fork. Was slow till the fog lifted. Had a couple of unwanted small salmon on Roboworms. Moved back into the creek arm and found schools of small bait fish on the Lowrance running at 10-18 ft. in 25-35 ft. I texas rigged a Robo up front with my son on a dropshot, and we bagan to load up. 7 over the slot for the day. My sons being the largest at 18 3/4 inches. Hit close to 20 fish in 3 locations. Moved to the Dam boat ramp and landed 4 more keepers at 3pm till 415pm.
    2 were Smallmouth! Great day and my son was trooper all day. Fished it hard till the end. Slept all the way home!
    City: Olivehurst

    Tips: Went texas rigged insted of jig head or split shot. Dead sticked it a lot. The dropshot was dragged a little more aggresivly. $ 1/2 in on both worms. Oxblood on the texas all day, and Withces Tea on the Dropshot.. Actually used some old leftover Magic worms at st and Robo's later on. Look for and find Schools of bait. All our fish regergitated bait!

Sunday, November 13th, 2011

  • By

    Water Temp: 60-61

    Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

    Report: A dad and his 21 and 17 yr old sons asked me to show them how to better fish Oroville since they had struggled catching more than a few bass each trip. We started a little before 7 am and found the bite to be very tough early - fishing the main body. In spite of the previous report, I chose the middle fork to produce some fish and to be used as a learning experience. The sun was peeking through the clouds and the lake went flat and I thought we were dead! Well, more clouds came - bring a breeze - and the fish decided this was good!! I showed the guys many good areas and how to fish them and we had good success. Quality was excellent with a best limit well over 11 lbs - 6 over the slot. The big surprise was the 21 yr old (who was the hot stik!) landed a 2 1/2 lb largemouth way up the middle fork. THAT was a shock! They all caught bass - 13 1/2 of them (the 1/2 was a 4 incher!) and I caught 4, trying to find the best color Robo worms. Bass were fairly deep - from 20 to 40 feet.
    City: Yuba City

    Tips: With 4 in the boat, we didn't do any topwater or cranks. Drop-shotting seemed to outproduce split-shotting. We did catch some with a shakey-head. most of the time I had them fish a 6" worm with an inch or so bitten off. I like a thicker, shorter bait when the water cools. I was surprised that only one bass spit up any bait. I think the best lesson they learned was not to fish the boulder sections so much, but stay with the balder - chunk rock banks. Fun day on the water!!

Friday, November 11th, 2011

  • By

    Water Temp: 61

    Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

    Report: When did this Lake get so tough?? Fished 4 hours in the Middle Fork with honestly zero action except for a foul hooked 6" chinook. Lake looked perfect!!! Though tubes, grubs, senkos and even tried drop shot. Tought there might have been a rip bite. NOPE! Moved out, slowed down and changed colors. This week I will blame the full moon and use the "fish are gorged" defense. Still, a beautiful day on the lake.
    City: Oroville

    Tips: Try, try again!!!!!! Get back on the horse!
    See y'all back on the lake.

Sunday, October 16th, 2011

  • By

    Water Temp: 72

    Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

    Report: Fished here middle of last month and this Oct date. Last month, the bite was tough. Fish could be as deep as 70 feet, some found a few topwater fish, but not that much. 2 day event was won with 15 lb.

    this weekend, the topwater bite was marginally better. You gotta move around to find the fish and the bait, which were still relatively deep. Probably because it is still warm for October with high around low mid 80's this past week and sunny skies.
    City: Folsom

    Tips: Cover water and find the bait/fish. drop shot worked best for me. topwater not too good, yet.

Saturday, October 15th, 2011

  • By

    Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

    Report: went up the west branch fished mostly points and rock piles. fish were schooled up caught multiple fish each time i found them. started with crank baits couple smaller fish,noticed that they were spitting up little biat fish so switched to a minnow colored roboworm with little weight.bight was on after that. caught a couple of keeper size largies with a lot of fight in them the rest were slot size spots.had a lot of action all day.
    City: paradise

Sunday, October 9th, 2011

  • By

    Water Temp: 69

    Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

    Report: Slow fishing but the fish I found seemed to be active. I found most fish on grey rock in aroun 20-35ft of water. I caught my biggest of the day a 2.5 lb lg mouth on a crankbait,and the second biggest on top water. The rest of the dinks caught on a d-shot.
    City: Plumas Lake

    Tips: Small curly tail worms worked for a sure bite, bigger fish like reaction baits.

Friday, October 7th, 2011

  • By

    Water Temp: 70

    Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

    Report: Day after big storm and bluebird day. That's my excuse and sticking to it! Very tough bite. Stood in the middle fork and managed only a few small fish.
    Lake looks fantastic. The highlight of the day was a HUGE buck swimming across the widest part of the middle fork. Watched him for 20 minutes. He hit the shore running.
    City: Oroville

    Tips: Bring a camera!
    Caught on tubes, grubs and a few dinks on topwater (Rico).
    Should get better soon.

Thursday, September 29th, 2011

  • By

    Water Temp: 68-73

    Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

    Report: In the last couple of weeks the lake has produced some nice bass. With the cooler nights, the water temps have dropped and the slow down of traffic has brought the bass up to around 5-15 ft. down to 30ft. Top water has been off and on but the jig bite has been consistant for bigger bass. Worms, tubes, swim baits, swim jigs, drop shot and blades have all been producing well. Many of my clients have done well on these baits but the over all for numbers has been the drop shot.
    City: Paradise

    Tips: Points,walls,mud lines and shade lines and low light conditions have been the best patterns.

Saturday, September 24th, 2011

  • By

    Water Temp: 75

    Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

    Report: Weather was about ready to change for Basin Bassmasters tournament on Saturday. We all were hoping for a great bite but those little 12" and under were all over that lake. Not much on top water action, a few over 15" came in. The Junior bass club "Nor Cal Bass Ratz' had three bags of five, one weighing 2.30 lbs. all under 12". Most of the bass were cought on drop shot in the main body, crankin, darter heads and tubs.
    City: Rocklin

    Tips: fish in 10-30 ft slow drop shot, crank and a chatter bait.

Saturday, September 17th, 2011

  • By

    Water Temp: 70-75

    Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

    Report: This last week has been outstanding. The top water bite is getting better and better using spooks or vixons or whatever. Lots of 2 and 1/2 to 3+ coming from spooks, swim jigs, jigs, worm and worm/jigs and tubes and drop shots. The traffic has finally slowed down and the bass are feeding. Mud lines are producing with blades and crank baits. Numbers are up and so are to sizes.
    City: Paradise

    Tips: This is a great time to be on the water.

Saturday, August 13th, 2011

  • By

    Water Temp: 82

    Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

    Report: For once I wanted to go to a lake based on water quality and campground quality so went to Oroville, I wanted the truck and boat to be as clean when I took it out of the water as it was when I put it in :) Fishing was 3rd place for once but as it turned out it was a good choice, after my Son and 2 Daughters and my self got our fill of swimming and tubing, we tried our luck with the fish, we started off with robo worms on dart heads and my kids could not set the hook with their light rods, I landed 4 to about 16 inches and my son lost 3 at the boat, I then decided to put on mini crawlers for the kids and sure enough they caught one bluegill and bass after the other catching and releasing, I could not keep up but my kids had a wonderfull time, I could not fish I was to busy taking fish off hooks and tossing them back in !! My son has cought lots of bass and bluegill but never a catfish, I have tried and tried to catch them at Clear Lake but no luck with 3 dif kinds of cut bait and night crawlers but my son just before we left got a bite on his mini crawler, I kid you not the pc of worm on his tiny tiny hook was no bigger than 1/4 inch and sure enough he hooks onto a 3-4 lb channel cat way back up in the feather river arm, he fought that fish for what seamed like 10 minutes, I got it on video !!! He was the happiest kid this side of heaven.
    City: San Jose

    Tips: Take your kids fishing !! Its an awesome way to bond with them and don't forget to swim also :)
    Oh, and use morning dawn robo's if you want to use artificials and crawlers if you have little one's that you want to make sure they catch some fish.

Sunday, July 17th, 2011

  • By

    Water Temp: 73-81

    Water Clarity: Muddy (0-2 foot visibility)

    Report: I've had lots of tripsin the last few weeks and fishing has been good some days and not so good other days. On the most part its been good and its great having a full lake. My clients have been singles and as many as four at a time. Top water has been working in the morning and in the evening with spooks. Tubes,worms,jigs all have been working and also lipless crank baits have been working mainly in the afternoon. The bait that has done the best over all has been the senko. Sunday I had two trips the first being an anniversary for a great couple. It was a lot of fun. The husband took a 4+ lb. large mouth on a senko up the West Branch. Nice bass!
    City: Paradise

    Tips: The bass are sattered. Move to find them,use the basics. The bass are starting to go deeper now.

Tuesday, July 12th, 2011

  • By

    Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

    Report: Took my brother to oroville for the first time today to bass fish. We did well managed about 30 fish between the both of us. I got on a good topwater bite with spooks and poppers. Caught a nice spot a little under 3 pounds and 1 around 2 1/2 a bunch of blow ups just couldnt hook them. the rest of our fish were caught on a M.Mutilator II robo worm. drop shot and t-rig best 5 a little over 11 pounds
    City: elk grove

    Tips: wind blown point were the ticket for me.

Wednesday, July 6th, 2011

  • By

    Water Temp: 75-81

    Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

    Report: Who would be dumb enough to guide 2 days after the 4th of July weekend?? Me, I guess, if clients wanted to go. Three of them did and off to the lake we went. Actually, the bite was as I thought it would be - and maybe a little better. One of the fellas was a good stick and caught a bunch! The other two were missing a lot of fish - and I'm sure lots of those bites were dinks - since they are everywhere now. So, a few minutes before we start heading in, at 1:20 in the afternoon, one of them sticks big fish for the day - at 16 inches! The the other fellow catches 2, one just under the slot. All told, they caught around 25 and I caught a few too - trying different color Robo worms for them. I stumbled on a winner! Fish wouldn't look at morning dawn, a solid winner for the past several weeks. What color was hot today? M.Mutilator II. Who wouda thunk!
    City: Yuba City

    Tips: Summer is here and the lake shows it. Small bass have invaded the shallows, hitting the fishing line, following baits to the boat, and biting non-stop. Air temp was nearly 100 and water temp mostly from 79 to 81. Can't make to many judgements on the bite so soon after the major holiday. We found most of our fish on underwater rockpiles, ridges, shadelines, and rock walls. Not too many on points. Stayed in the middle fork all day.

Friday, June 24th, 2011

  • By

    Water Temp: 70-73

    Water Clarity: Muddy (0-2 foot visibility)

    Report: With 8 out of the last 11 days my trips have been from single clients to three generations. All shave been very exciting and all have been in the uper part of the lake. From mid slot to the North and West Branch. The patterns that were most productive were spooks in eary morning, senkos in shade lines and dart head worm and senkos later in the morning and early afternoon. Lots of other patterns are also working as, blades on bushes, flukes and other jerk baits under hanging trees, and jigs on walls and points. Many bags consistes of pre-spawn, spawning and post spawn bass. Many of the bags were up 11-lbs+ and some of the bass were in the 3lb range. Several really nice large mouth but mostly spotted bass. We had lots of laughs high-fives and good times.
    City: Paradise

    Tips: We targeted main and secondary points with steep walls next to them and the walls next to the points. Coves with springs, over hanging trees and bushes exposed or submersed.

Wednesday, June 15th, 2011

  • By

    Water Temp: 67-70

    Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

    Report: Wow! Finally!! 70 degree water!!! 'Bout time! I took a father/daughter team yesterday and found the bite to still be pretty good. We fished about 6 hrs and 25 or more with 3 over - up to 2 lbs 11 oz. The teenage girl had only fished about 2 times in her life and has pro potential! She was casting like a pro in about 15 minutes and her second spotted bass was 16 1/4 inches!! Female anglers seem to pick up casting skills so quickly! We stayed in the middle fork, working small coves and steep areas with shadows. There are lots of overhanging trees in the middle fork now. They say the lake is 99% full - trust me - it is 100% full. The 2 food shoreline visible last Sat is GONE! Next trip? A grandpa and an 8 year old. Pray for me!!
    City: Yuba City

    Tips: We pretty much stuck with Robo worms in the morning. Morning dawn (makes sense!) was working and oxblood was great today. I had an idea to try a small Beaver, brown w/ chartreuse tail. Bingo!! Started that pattern about 11:30 am and the spots were all over it! We ended the trip with several on that bait and another one over the slot. We just Texas rigged the bait with a #1 Gami hook. I tried Senkos briefly and caught a nice one but decided the wind was too much for my clients to use them effectively.

Sunday, June 12th, 2011

  • By

    Water Temp: 65-69

    Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

    Report: I took a young couple and their 13 yr old nephew to Oroville yesterday and enjoyed a fairly good bite and another cool summer day. We threw various Robo worms most of the day - mostly 6 inch Texas rigged. We found the fish a little deeper yesterday until some mudlines developed and then caught some from 5 to 10 feet. The highlight of the trip was the young boy catching the biggest fish of the trip - a 17 inch spot a hair over 2 1/2 lbs! He was thrilled (and so was the guide)!! And that fish was shallow. The lad played the fish like a pro! This was everyone's first time bass fishing in a bass boat. They usually fish from the bank or rent a boat. We wound up with around 25 fish and another big one lost at the boat by the husband. We had between 8 and 9 lbs for the best 5.CRC orpoodur After falling off as the favorite bait, the morning dawn w/chartreuse tail was again red hot in my boat yesterday. Maybe because of a little more water color. We only fished the middle fork.
    City: Yuba City

    Tips: If you are just getting into bass fishing - remember to keep your rod tip up off the water when the bass gets next to the boat. If you let the bass pull your tip down, the bass is pulling directly against the reel and there is no give. A bigger bass will break lighter line or the hook will pull out - which happened yesterday to the man. He lost a GOOD fish! We concentrated on walls with indentations and points with small coves on either side. That has been a good pattern for me at Oroville for years!