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Northern California Lake Fishing Report

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Saturday, January 13th, 2001

  • Alameda County
    • By

      Water Temp: 49

      Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

      Report: I have never ished here beore, my iance and I decided to go try it out, got on the water at 12:30 and ished until three. 2 very solid keepers on 1/4 oz dartheads, shakin rainbow 3" zipper worms- blue ghost. Pretty much just out havin un.Had three other solid thumps on c-rig junebug brush hogs. It was a un day, not a bad body o water at all or something so close.
      City: Sa Ramon

  • Tuolumne County
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      Water Temp: 54-55

      Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

      Report: Started in six bit creek at daybreak....Got one strike,on a salt & pepper Zipper worm.Fished a couple area's back toward Willow creek"nothing"..App 11 am caught the irst ish,Then 4 more,rom 1 too 21/2 #....ish came on worms rom 20 too 35 t...Nothing on drop shot,spoons,swim bait & grubs.
      City: Riv.

  • Mariposa County
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      Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

      Report: Fished rom 9 to 11. Not much. Only cought 2. 12 & 14in. Both on a green and brown worm w/ a 1/4oz. weight. Both at the mouth o Bagby in the trees.
      City: Atwater

      Tips: jig slowly w/ a worm.

    • By

      Water Temp: 52'

      Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

      Report: Fished club tourney (CVBC)started and inished on main lake, no takers. Spent most o the day up river ishing points and pockets, shaking worms and dropshotting. I got three keepers, and the backseater got one. From 20'-50' eet. Still very slow. Ran into Steve Green, who said they hadn't gotten as much rain as we in the Bay area during the last storm. By the way, thanks, I got a good keeper rom your advice.
      City: San Leandro

      Tips: Don't dropshot till you see the ish, use small baits.(Thanks JLS)Fish slow

    • By

      Water Temp: unknown

      Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

      Report: Local ishing club. Had our one day tournament today at Lake McClure. Weather cleared up or us, ater the storm ront had passed through last couple o days. rom the 8 boats that we launched at irst light, no-one caught a limit. orgot the winning total weight but it was minimal. to make my irst post short, ishing was slow 5 people got skunked, including mysel unless you include the trout I caught using a drop shot rig with predator worm. biggest ish 2 that measured 16in. I tried every color combination seems like blue ghost or purple worms work the best. but other than a slow day ishing it was great participating in my irst Bass tourney.
      City: livermore

      Tips: I guess I wouldn't have any tips since I caught no Bass. But the winning angler caught all his ish with Yamamoto grubs. others caught ish early with crankbaits, caralina rigs or dropshots. good luck and happy ishing.

    • By

      Water Temp: 48

      Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

      Report: Fished New Hogan or the irst time today. Nice Lake! Fished as an observer or Bigun who won the CCBC Angler o the year with 4 or a little over 6# (Congratulations). We caught smallies, spots, and largemouth. Best LM (4.38#) I caught on a white speed trap at early in the morning out o the weeds in the back o a shallow cove in 4 eet o water. Bigun had a ew bites and a couple o ish on worm, but out best bait seemed to be brown/green jigs. The 6 keepers we landed came airly shallow (less than 20 eet). Best banks were steep rock. Us observers has a 1 ish option going, thought my 4# would be good enough, but got beat out by a 7#. There are some nice ish in this lake.
      City: Brentwood

      Tips: No real pattern other than the steep rocky banks. Best area was the south end o the lake where the water was a little warmer at 49 degrees.

Thursday, January 11th, 2001

  • Lake County
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      Water Temp: 45 to 46

      Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

      Report: Fished several trips during the last several days, and watched the water temp go down, down, down, inally to 45 degrees Tuesday night. I have always elt that the number 47 is very important when ishing or largemouth bass. When the water temp is 47 or below, anglers have their work cut out or them, at least those ishing with artiicials. I have had outstanding trips in 48 and 49 degree water, but not as many in 47 and below. Friday night the temp was 47-48, and two clients and I had a pretty good trip, ishing rom 7pm to 1 am. We had about 15 bites and landed 7 to 7lbs 7 oz, with the ive best at 23 1/2. Again, brush hogs and Weapon jigs were the ticket. We got bit in about 6 dierent rocky locations in the south end. The day beore, on a "learn the lake" trip, a client and I got one bite on a jig - and missed it!!! We didn't ish all the time, but still - very slow day ishing. Talked to a ellow who ripped all day, and he had one bass. The minnow leet was doing well, rom what I saw. Tuesday night was the most interesting weather activity I've ever witnessed in my 22 years o night ishing Clear Lake. It is amazing we caught anything, but we did get an 8-3, 7-8, and a 4, all on Weapon jigs with 6" Yamamoto grub trailers. The weather olks messed up again - instead o a nice evening, we had a cold rain 'til 9 pm, then crystal-clear skies (instantly!) with a ull moon and a 10 to 15 degree air temp drop (real good or ishing, ha!). Keeping my eye on the weather, I noticed the clouds that had just moved east were backing up. I knew that was crazy, so I looked a little closer, and realized that those wern't clouds, but FOG! I couldn't believe it - too soon or og. "Bring 'em in guys, we're outta here!" From the time we let the Wheeler area to when we got to Windlower Point, that whole area ogged up, in minutes! It was amazing. We made it back to the Rattlesnake area just ine, and inished our trip with the our pounder, and a ew misses. I will mention that I was shaking my jig (which I rarely do) violently in order to get bit in the 45 degree water. I may have to rethink that technique, since the 8-3 that answered my calling nearly stretched out my arm. What a hit!!! Make 'em mad enough in that cold water, and they will bite! All the bass we caught on those night trips were no deeper that 15 eet, and some were right on the bank. Interesting.
      City: Yuba City

      Tips: Look or bass, even i they are shallow, near rocky breaks, ledges, steep banks, etc. I you are ishing rockpiles, bass are likely to be near the bottom o the dropo, in 10 to 20 eet - not on the top o the rockpile as they would be in summer and all. Deadstick any bait you are ishing, i possible. For example - rip, rip - eat a sandwich, rip, rip - have a cup o coee. You get the idea!!

Wednesday, January 10th, 2001

  • Tuolumne County
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      Water Temp: 54

      Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

      Report: We were on the water beore daybreak...Caught 3 bass,lost 3 & got a couple more hits.All on grubs & 4 in. worms. One on a carolina rig,rest on darter heads in deep water,rom 20 too 60 t.We let at noon,wind had started coming up at app. 10 am & it got too rough too ish.
      City: Riv

      Tips: Pick better day then we did

Tuesday, January 9th, 2001

  • Alameda County
    • By

      Water Temp: ?

      Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

      Report: My riend and I tried tubin a ew hours on 1-5.We tried jigs and cranks with no takers but a nice aternoon none the less.On 1-7 he returned and in the late aternoon sunshine he landed a 23in. ootball.Fiteen minutes later in the same spot he landed another 23in.ootball bass!He measured both ish careully,could it be the same one twice on the same lure? Anyhow they or it ought good.Thanks Ryan or the chat on the water on 1-5.cya
      City: Manteca

      Tips: This time the bites came on SLOW jig n pig.

  • Butte County
    • By

      Water Temp: 50

      Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

      Report: Interesting comments rom Patrick - I think I agree with him concerning the lack o posts. Anyway, I had a hal-day trip this aternoon out o Lime Saddle. The two ellows couldn't go in the morning, and as I expected, the ishing was ok, but the size was not very good. One o the clients did get a "barely over" spot, and the other 15 were 12 to 14 3/4 inches. One was however, a 14 1/2 inch largemouth. My recent trips to Collins bear out what the post said beore mine - the quality ish are caught early. My job was to show them some good spots to ish in the West Branch and the North Fork, and I think they were surprised to learn that mud sometimes is better than rock. The less rock we had, the better the quality o the bass. We ished brown/orange 3/8 oz Rodstrainer jigs most o the time. As has happened several times recently, the ellow that usually gets his butt kicked, caught most o the ish this trip - 8. He does have a wicked hookset!! The ish were more shallow in the West Branch because the water had more color. They were on a good bite when we started at 12:45 PM, but really shut down about 3:30 PM. The last hour bite wasn't too good since the sun didn't shine much ater 3 PM. I it does, the last hour during the winter can be awesome!
      City: Yuba City

      Tips: We saw a lot o bait in some o the creek channels and did some spooning with no success. Had one hit on a 4 inch Berkley paddle tail worm. Jigs seems to be the answer. So what else is new!

    • By

      Water Temp: real cold

      Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

      Report: Started early caught limit o nice trout then went bass ishing. I splitshot live crawlers with no takers ,wish I could ind a place that sold live crawdads. I anyone has any ino it would be appreciated.
      City: Dublin

      Tips: Gold kastmasters or the trout.

Monday, January 8th, 2001

  • Solano County
    • By

      Water Temp: cold

      Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

      Report: Ripped and wormed a couple of hours Saturday around Dutch, Taylor and Frank's. Picked up 12 blackies to 3 lbs and one striper of 5 lbs or so. Met some real nice NCBF'ers on the water and at the Hook, got some good suggestions and baits (thanks, Bob). Decided to fish Mildred Sunday to see if any blackies were around, could not get bit on cranks, or rip baits. Went over to sunken trees - birds were working and there was a big school of stripers just slaughtering shad! Big boils and fish all over the place. These were not small schoolies but looked to be 10-15 lb fish. You could see them on top at times right next to the boat. I was sure that I would slaughter them, but I did not get a single hit in over an hour of throwing everything but the kitchen sink at them! Jigs, Hairraisers, rattletraps, rip baits, nada! There was so much bait in the water that you could not retrieve your lure without snagging a shad on nearly every cast, and could feel them hitting your line as you retrieved. In desperation I scooped an injured shad off the water, hooked it and still did not get hit, even though huge swirls and fish were right next to the bait. Unbelievable! Well, I guess it's good to get your balloon popped, and that certainly happened to me Sunday compliments of the blackies and stripers!
      City: Half Moon Bay

  • Lake County
    • By

      Water Temp: 50

      Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

      Report: Yes, I could see down to 8 eet and I think that kept ish rom some o my avorite docks but not rom my avorite o shore ree where we caught 7 ish to 3 1/2 lbs, but we did get 1 ish to 5 lbs on a dock that was in 8' o water, we could see the bottom and yet the ish still took the minnow.I tried plastics as slow as possible but no takers.
      City: MILPITAS

      Tips: I you get some takers in one place don't stray to araway becuase when you come back to it there will be two boats sitting on your spot catching ish and keeping them, that is what happened to us, we saw 15-20 ish to 5 lbs taken home this week, I hope the lake can handle it.

Sunday, January 7th, 2001

  • Amador County
    • By

      Water Temp: 49

      Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

      Report: Had a good day today. Went point hopping....mostly graphing, and looking or ish. They are all bunched up now, and when you ind'em, the schools are big. The main creek channels were the key. First spot with active ish yielded a 6.5 ,a 3.5, and a 4 . Ater the school dispersed, went looking again and ound a hump on a creekchannel in 45 t. that had ish. Immediately got two ish ...a 2 lb'er, and another 4. Dropshot out produced the spoon today. All solid, at ish. Didn't see much bait activity, just ish....suspended three or our eet o the bottom. Large trout Everywhere now. Caught two on plastic worms...on the all. The low pressure was just starting to come in....might have helped turn on the bite some.
      City: Wilton

      Tips: Use your electronics to locate ish in schools, and then dropshot them with 6 to 8 lb. test, with 2" & 3" worms. Be patient. Even though you know they're down there, the bites may come a bit slow. Follow the creek channels out to 45-50 t.

  • Santa Clara County
    • By

      Water Temp: 49

      Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

      Report: Hit the water at 8am and managed to get 4 fish in the boat by 1130. Got 2 on a grape zipper. One was 2 feet off the bank in the big cove and the other was in 10' on the main. Hit one by the spillway on a Orange spider grub in 15' and finally one Ripping a Pointer 100 by the rock Horseshoe. It seems to me that the fish are still in the top 15' range for some reason. Wind was blowing really hard and was pretty cold.
      City: San Jose

      Tips: 4' grape zipper texas rigged, Blue/Silver pointer 100, Orange yamamoto spider grub. top 15'.

    • By

      Water Temp: 49

      Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

      Report: Hit the water at 8am and managed to get 4 fish in the boat by 1130. Got 2 on a grape zipper. One was 2 feet off the bank in the big cove and the other was in 10' on the main. Hit one by the spillway on a Orange spider grub in 15' and finally one Ripping a Pointer 100 by the rock Horseshoe. It seems to me that the fish are still in the top 15' range for some reason. Wind was blowing really hard and was pretty cold.
      City: San Jose

      Tips: 4' grape zipper texas rigged, Blue/Silver pointer 100, Orange yamamoto spider grub. top 15'.

  • Solano County
    • By

      Water Temp: 47

      Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

      Report: lauched out of ladds today fog pretty thick somehow made my way to franks tract started ripping and cranking weed lines and tule burms with current caught a couple dinks heard bobby and chris won the new years tourney in sandmound started ripiing weed lines by docks in sandmound caught 6 fish to 4lbs by letting rip bait sit still deceided to do what bobby and chris did after rip bite tappered off picked up flippin stick with black and red brushog and started flipping outside dock pilings picked up 6 more fish to 3 lbs lost one about 7lbs inside dock so much for 14 lb line got off the water at 3:30 had a great day thanks to good info from close friend good fishin frank d
      City: stockton

      Tips: try ripping and cranking weed lines next to docks if that doesnt work get in tighter to docks and flip brushogs or whatever you have confidence in as long as its black and red if its good enough for bobby and chris its good enough for me good job guys and good luck for the rest of the year

    • By

      Water Temp: 47

      Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

      Report: launched out of ladds today fog very bad somehow found my way to franks tract fished for an hour with speed traps no luck went to sandmound deceided to try throwing rip baits on docks with weeds found decent bite fish to 4lbs caught alot of 2-3lb blacks bite slowed down so i deceided to do what bobby and chris did during new years tourney picked up flippin stick with brushhog and started flipping and pitching to docks and pilings stuck a 4 and 5 dragging it out to weeds off the water at 2:00 great day will try again during the hook tournement good fishin ffd
      City: stockton

      Tips: find areas that have docks with weeds and pilings try ripping or cranking if that does'nt work go in tight and start flipping brushhog if it's good enough for bobby and chris it's good enough f

    • By

      Water Temp: 49 to 51

      Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

      Report: Have been having some great days on the water lately, but yesterday was exceptional!! Went to Franks Tract, and fished open cuts from main river into the tract. Caught many stripers in a very short time, then latched into a 5.12 lb Blackie. After weighing her, I proceeded to work the same patch of water, then whammo! got a 9 pounder. Took a picture, put her back, and continued to catch many more fish in the 2 to 4 pound range. After crankin all these fish, I went right over to the tule wall and started flippin my favorite Iovino worm, and caught a couple more quality fish. I started fishing at 8 am, and was off the water by noon, and caught at least 15 bass, and 8 to 10 stripers.
      City: Oakley

      Tips: Shad pattern Speedtraps slow as possible, and basically dead stick the worm

  • Yuba County
    • By

      Water Temp: 50 to 55

      Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

      Report: one ish all day about a 2 lbs trout
      City: gridley