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Northern California Lake Fishing Report

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Monday, February 27th, 2006

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

      Report: Fished the lake Sat and Sun, bite was awsome, alot of spots suspended over 30 ft. of water, most fish were hitting the bait on the fall at about the 15-20ft. depth. I started out sat. throwing 4" and 6" swimbaits, various patterns, caught two nice spots one at 4.7 and one at 5.9. after an hour of that I started thowing white tubes, red, and rootbear senkos and watermelon sweet beavers. I boated 12 more spots ranging from 2.5lbs 5.4lbs. Also boated two little smallies, and one 3lb. largemouth. Majority fo the fish came off the senkos, working points down near the dam. Sun I started off with a white spinnerbait, and a rougue. Lots of smaller spots with only one at 5.1lbs. Swithched to dropshot mmIII(roboworm) and darthead 4" senkos in orange and pumpkin, caught alot of smaller fish in the brandy creek area and lost about a 4lb. largemouth in whiskey creek whille fishing back towards ramp. It was an awsome trip and I cant wait to come back. This lake is tough to figure but once you get on a the right structure you can do very well.
      City: redding

      Tips: watch line as your bait falls and try to keep slight tension in it-fish are suspended and hitting it on the fall. Stay out from the bank in 25-30 ft or water.

Sunday, February 26th, 2006

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      Water Temp: cold!

      Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

      Report: Fished along shoreline parallel to coleman ave and caught one bass about 3.5 lbs on a plastic crawdad.
      City: Santa Clara

  • Napa County
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      Water Temp: 50 - 55

      Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

      Report: Fished Sunday with Tiger. First Fish 7:45 last fish 1:00. Fished till 3:00. 14 Fish total. Best 5 only 9lbs. 2.5 SMB largest. All fish released with bites coming from Senko, Drop-Shot, Jig, Crank Bait. Rain started about 11:30 and continued most of the afternoon. Bite slowed significantly after that 11 fish by 10:30. Buddies boat landed a dozen or so on a variety of baits as well. Heard fish were moving up but saw nothing on beds Sunday.
      City: Pacifica

      Tips: SMB great fight non-aggressive bites all around.

    • By

      Water Temp: 40

      Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

      Report: fished the backyards off the main launch and caught three bass ranging from a pound to two. just fished a couple of hours cuz it started pouring around noon.. fishes caught on a senko in 6 ft. water..
      City: newark

  • Santa Clara County
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      Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

      Report: Got some fishing in just before the storm hit and caught one 8 pounds and the other 3 pounds. Fished deep vegetation.
      City: Morgan Hill

  • Solano County
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      Water Temp: 51-54

      Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

      Report: Launched out of Wimpies on Sat and Sun to fish Stripers in the usual areas around the ramp. Fishing was slow if you stayed in one spot. Caught six good ones and no shakers with the largest going 16lbs. Had fun time showing the beginners how to fish stripers using plugs. Also tried a little for Largemouths- only managed one on the d22 on outside weedlines (12'). None on the jig-cold wheather on Sunday really shut them down.
      City: Sacramento

    • By

      Water Temp: 51-52.9

      Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

      Report: Cold, windy, wet and blustrey day greated Mike, Dan and I today on the River. We commited to tossing jigs all day. Caught very few fish today, 6 keepers all day. I had one of those 9 bites, "There he is, damn, it's gone!" kinda days. I was a model fer California Quick Release! HAR! After fishing one long rock wall with out a bite around 2:00pm, I looked to the guys and said, let's go try the two points in that opening to that lake behind us. We idle over and Mike's first pitch to the tree nets an agressive 7 pounder. Inly good fish we boated all day.
      City: Oakley

      Tips: With the changing weather and cold temps returning, over all fishing seems to have slowed down in the middle Delta. Water has gotten very dirty everywhere. There are some places where it's still clear. Big fish continue to feed on jigs for us. And my guess is Billy Spence & partner may have gotten his 28 pounds today in that Angler Choice tournament on jigs, ya think maybe? Gonna be an ugly week out there weather wise guys, be safe and be careful on the River!

  • Ventura County
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      Water Temp: 59-61

      Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

      Report: Weather was mostly sunny and at times partly cloudy with calm to light east wind. Water still has slight green stain and some faint mudlines in some areas. Theres enough color in the water that it would be really hard to see deep beds. Lots of boat traffic.

      Started with swimbait again and stuck with it for much of the morning but seemed like a long shot with bright sky, calm wind, and lots of boats running around. Did not have any follows or bites on the big stuff. Changed over to worm pattern and found it to be slow. My partner for the day, who I had been to El Salto with recently, started tossing a senko and he landed a nice 3 1/2 pound bass. I think he brought confidence in the senko back with him from Salto. Over the next few hours he used his confidence to catch 2 more solid fish on senko. I was shaking worms and mixing it up with jigs, cranks, etc, but couldnt get anything going. Pitching worms on points like last week was not producing. Finally late afternoon I pitched onto point and missed a solid bite, and little later hooked a big fish. It immediately came up a wallowed on top and luckily she ran out to deep water and not into brush or over shallow part of point. Made a few runs and dogged at deep color and then into net - 7lb 6oz on digital scale. I just posted the pic on this site. Caught on oxblood roboworm and 6# fluorocarbon. Overall a slow day only landed 4 fish but quality was good 3-7lbs
      City: Thousand Oaks

      Tips: I didnt spend much time looking in the shallows but Im guessing I would have found them if I looked at enough places. I'll probably do that next trip....

    • By

      Water Temp: 53 to 55

      Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

      Report: Well guys i didnt do very well this weekend i had 5 bass in 7 1/2 hour and biggest was around 3 1/2 pounds and i even caught one about 7 inches long he fought like he own the lake. i use a new jig today it was a lite pumpkin and rust color and a 208 yamamoto watermelon red/black single tail grub. The bass were in 10 to 30 feet of water and the lake has come up 7 to 8 feet from last week. There was a tournament on the lake saturday the sierra bass club from clovis ca. but i didnt get to the weigh in so i hope to have some info on there tournament at next writing im sure there were some nice baas caught saturday traffic was heavy as they closed the day use side to parking around 10am.Brushhogs still should be a good choice to fish and yamamoto ( senko's )and there 5" kreature baits are a good choice to fish this lake with. stick with rock piles fish around the bases of the rocks and also flats with deep water near by. Also try brush piles as some bass are starting to move up and hold in these areas.The islands on the east side of the lake are holding some nice bass in 10 to 25 feet of water. Big storm front coming this week starting sunday night and last till thursday may stain the water even more if water is going to be released.Call ahead to ckeck lake clarity at 559-689-3255
      ranger station.
      City: kerman ca.

      Tips: I still think the east side of the lake hold the best fish. Brushogs,senko's,5"kreature baits are going too be good baits to fish in the coming weeks. Also spinnerbaits and swimbait action will pick up again. swimbaits ( ABT ) are leading the way as the bait of choice here at this lake.Im trying new color of jigs in my line that i make and so far there working well. Im trying to put colors together for eastman & hensley as well as millerton & pineflat & mclure. Good luck any questions e mail me here at markinman50@aol.com

  • Sacramento County
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      Water Temp: 48

      Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

      Report: Slept in a little. Hit water by 8am. Played guide for my son in law who dosen't get to fish much. He caught a nice 2lber on first cast? I told him that was bad luck. After 4 keepers I reminded him it was bad luck. It was bad luck for me. I only had one taker and I forgot to tighter the drag on my crank bait reel. So nice run no hook set. Somebody better do something about the crappy launch facility at granite bay. There is no room when everybone wants to get out at the same time.Nobody knows how to drop off there driver and get the hell out of the way? Reminds me of driving in san jose at rush hour.
      City: Orangevale

      Tips: We had a 3 mile pattern. Every 3 miles of bank we would get one fish. Charge your batterys. No real pattern just dumb luck.I was throwing a 8 inch trout bait first 2 hours with no luck. Jarret caught all 4 fish first 2 hours. Wind came up bite shut down. Go fish oroville or berryessa until folsom gets some water in it.Fish were in 10 feet of water. Lite line dart head grubs? Good Luck.

    • By

      Water Temp: 52-53

      Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

      Report: Out at Granite at 6:15am, found some bait and fish on island tops in 10-25 ft dragging a lizard and a JK jig in brown/rust. Good fish over near Brown's. Winds came on so off the water by noon.
      City: rocklin

      Tips: find the bait and you'll find the big bass

  • Leon County
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      Water Temp: n/a

      Water Clarity: Muddy (0-2 foot visibility)

      Report: Get out there and fish and figure it out for yourself!!!
      City: p.hill, ca

  • San Francisco County
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      Water Temp: cold

      Water Clarity: Muddy (0-2 foot visibility)

      Report: Decided to go out in the rain. Out there for about 45 minutes at yesterday's spot - before the rain started down. Fished a purple/red flake Kinami creature bait on a 3/8 oz football jig head. Poked around the tules with the YUM Wooly Hawg from yesterday's bass bite. Rain made me go home...no fish, but still got out there and gave it a go.
      City: Daly City

Saturday, February 25th, 2006

  • Napa County
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      Water Temp: 54

      Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

      Report: The Bass Classics of Santa Clara Valley had there tournament and the weather was great we had 25 guys catch 95 fish with two 6.72 lbers caught for the big fish. In first place with 16.00 lbs. was Russell Witkowsky he was Carolina rigging baby brush hogs near main lake points and boat docks for the win. In second place with 14.1 was Dieter Spicker he said he caught fish in pockets off the main lake points on spider grubs. In third place with 13.85 lbs was David Malley and he was Carolina rigging lizards. There were two big fish caught one by Tom Mordue on a shad crankbait and the other by Jason Giamonna.
      City: Fremont

      Tips: Throw crankbaits in the morning and afternoons and fish spider grubs and worms in the middle of the day. Main lake points and boat docks for the best fish.

  • Santa Barbara County
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      Water Temp: 54-56

      Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

      Report: Had an awesome day on Cachuma Saturday. I took out a new friend and we were the only ones in line when they opened the gate so off we went. Because I had some preconcieved ideas about where the fish were and what they were doing after the snow of last week our morning started slow. I missed one and my partner dumped one. We hit another spot just like the first and my partner got a largemouth on a blade but I didn't want to throw blades as the water was VERY clear. The coming rains should help that out a bit. We kept at it and had a slow pick on both largemouth and smallmouth on cranks,blades,jerkbaits and dropshot. Around 10:30 the wind picked up in earnest and I picked up a spider jig. On 3 consecutive casts I caught smallmouth that were 3+ pounds. We went in and had lunch and back on the lake the wind had died off some and so had the bite. we caught maybe 6-7 more fish and I put him on the dock at 4:00. I went back out and fished until 5:15. The last hour and a half the fish went nutz. I lost count on the smallmouth and had 3 very nice largemouth also. The smallmouth were all very big..For Cachuma as they were all at or better than three pounds. I caught some and there would be fish chasing the hooked fish trying to snatch the bait out of the hooked fishes mouth. It is still early and the water has cooled so the fish backed off aways waiting out the late winter pattern before their push to spawn. It will only get better so put on some fresh line and sharpen your hooks so you are ready when The whole lake goes off.
      City: Santa Barbara

      Tips: oxblood robo worms, 3/4 oz spider jigs, brown and purple jigs, white with chrome willow leaf blade, Chrome black jerkbait and craw colored cranks. They still haven't settled down onto a typical spring pattern but time will cure this ill.

  • Solano County
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      Water Temp: 50ish

      Water Clarity: Muddy (0-2 foot visibility)

      Report: went to east delta to prefish for wonbass proam in march. found clear water and stained water.I traveloed and hit a spot here and there. Stained areas were warmer and i only had two bites for over seventeen pounds. The gorillas were right where they have been year after ytear, just bigger.
      City: Sacramento

      Tips: For right now check out the migration routes from the main waterways in stained, warmer water. Cruisers are checking it out.Tossing Bob's frogs are a sure bet.

    • By

      Water Temp: 53'

      Water Clarity: Muddy (0-2 foot visibility)

      Report: Went out for strippers in the morning and caught a few on cranks, the best only 4.8. Around 11, tried for LMB. I was pitching jigs and worms and only had two taps. There was a Tournament still in progress and one boat reported catching limits and I was watching them catch them tight in the tules flipping worms. No size they reported. I moved out to deeper water and fished weed clumps. Put on a helix worm and finally picked up a 5.11oz, released the fish then left at 1pm. Tough fishing and what little bites I had were very light.
      City: South SF

      Tips: While I didn't get any fish and only 2 taps, most of the fish I saw being caught were very tight in the tules.

  • Lake County
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      Water Temp: 48-53

      Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

      Report: I was thinking about going fishing and I read a guys report names Kamron, so I emailed him and said thanks for the report, that he made up my mind by the his report to go to Clear Lake. He emailed me back and said no problem if I need a buddy to go along to let him know because his truck was down and could not drop his boat in the water so I picked him up at a dock near his house and he put us on the fish. He said ripping is the way to go so we started at south end and ripped 30-40 fish each to 4lbs before lunch time, I nicked named Karmon RML (rip master lips) this guy could cast like no one I have ever fished with before and thats 35 year of fishing on my end. I kept up with him until about 2PM and than my lack of slip and 40 year old arms got tired (He is 29). We ended the day with David 45-50 fish and Kamron 65-70 fish, 110-120 fish total. Had 2 4lbrs, 3-4 3 lbers and a ton of 1 1/2 to 2lb cookie cutters. The next day was a dif story, the front came in Sunday but the barometric presure must have change over night becuase we had to beg still and borrow for a fish. I caught 2 on dart head and 2 on split shot and Kamron got 3 or 4 fish on worms and he did rip one or 2. Had a great time with Kamron and I am sure we will hook up again.
      City: San Jose

      Tips: Before the front the fish were in shallow 1-10 feet with deep water near by, 95% of our fish were between the docks not under them. rip rip rip with very short pauses but they hit it on the pause. Stacy 90 in any color but the crazier the color the more fish. The few worm fish with caught on robo's in purple and brown and magic worm green weenie.

    • By

      Water Temp: 46-54

      Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

      Report: Fished today with Jerry and Mike Cossey of Petaluma and had an absolutely amazing day on ClearLake. Our first stop produce 5 football fish in 20 minutes, 3 of them 4 pounders on Lizards. We then ran to the stained water of the north to toss jigs and found a million boats! LOL! We did manage 3 long skinney two pounders. After an hour fishing, a chat with Seig and some guy on a dock speaking cajun yiddish er something, (kept talking of this 100 pound bass he caught in the state park! LOL), I decided this wasn't gonna work like it had been and we needed to go back south, so off we went. Along the way we stopped and tossed some blades and jerkbaits with only a couple of strikes but no fish. We then pulled into a cove on the RedBud arm where the wind was blowin into the bay out of the south and commenced to just stroke fish from 11:30-4:00pm. In all, we caught 103 keepers and two dinks over the entire day. 11 of these fish were over 4 lbs 5 ozs, with the biggest going 8 lb 10oz. Best five were 8.10, 6.9, 4.13, 4.10 & 4.10 for a total of 29 pounds 4 oz. All but 6 of our fish were caught on lizards in 6-12 foot of water on big flats between docks with deep water behind us. We just put the trolling motor on low and kept our baits wet and moving. We did catch 6 jig fish, but amazingly, none of them were more than 2 pounds.
      City: Oakley

      Tips: The big flat pattern has been working for me at Clearlake for over 3 monthes now. Typically I'll work that lizard from 3-20 feet until we locate which ledge or level the fish are at. On this day, we got very lucky to find one bay that was just loaded with a ton of fish up shallow and the temperature, when we got there, was 52 degrees and was 54 by the time we left. We talked to a lot of anglers who struggled today and many of the boats were grouped up. Heard at Limit Out that it took 31 lbs to win the 100% Team event. Look for those areas void of boats, where the big flats are being overlooked! This will be a tough task this week with the Stren series taking place. But I believe this will be a good pattern that will be overlooked in the tournament by most anglers and if yer not in that event, you should have a great time like we did today.

    • By

      Water Temp: 54

      Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

      Report: It is definitliey a afternoon bite. went out friday caught one on a craw speed trap five on drop shot.
      City: ukiah

      Tips: throw crawdad speed traps in sparsh tulies and end of docks drop shot under docks.