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Northern California Lake Fishing Report

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Friday, October 9th, 2015

  • Lake County
    • By

      Water Temp: 71-73

      Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

      Report: I heard the small sub-keeper bass were a little less active recently. Not so for Mike and me. Those creatures were everywhere - but - some are now keepers - finally!! We fished Friday afternoon from 4 pm 'til 10 pm. We thought the lake would calm dawn in the evening but many of the tourney guys were still hunting the big ones 'til dark. We fished a variety of soft plastics from 10 to 40 feet. Our best 5 limit was only around 13 lbs. I had 2 good hits after dark - landing 1 that went 4 lbs. She was about 35 feet deep. The other one felt big!! I'm sure the best bite would have been at the coolest time, probably from 4 to 7 am. We did a lot of cranking but didn't hook any. Flappin' hogs and beaver type baits worked best for us. I threw a lot of bigger plastic worms - to no avail.

      Tips: I don't say much during the busy tournament weekends. It really seems like a late summer bite - fall is NOT in the air yet!!

Thursday, October 8th, 2015

  • Solano County
    • By

      Water Temp: 71

      Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

      Report: Launched at Wimpy's around 8:00AM. Fished the South Mokelumne River toward Sycamore Slough. Since it was still the outgoing tide, I decided to throw a top water lure, River2Sea Whopper Plopper 90, in the color powder. My cousin was throwing a small crayfish looking crankbait. On both of our first 2 casts, each of us caught a small size bass. We were casting over the top of weed beds/flats or the edges of the weeds. We made our way down the Mokelumne and went into Hog, Beaver, and Sycamore sloughs. We spent most of the day throwing these lures. Caught 11 keeper size bass (biggest 2.5 lbs) and probably 50+ small bass. I even caught a 6 inch turtle on the whopper plopper. Off the water by 1:00PM.

      The back part of both Beaver and Sycamore sloughs were covered with hyacinths from bank to bank. The front part of Sycamore slough looked like it was sprayed because there was a lot of dead hyacinths, but the back part was a different story.

      Tips: We were using 50lb or 65lb braid. We had to pull most of the fish out of the weeds. We fished top water or shallow running lures most of the day. I had changed the hooks on the whooper plopper to heavier hooks. The front hook was a VMC 4X red treble hook while the tail hook was a custom made dressed Owner 4X treble (white feathers with red flash). The dressed tail hook made the lure tail heavy so the lure didn't float while it was sitting idle, but the action was great when it was retrieved.

Wednesday, October 7th, 2015

  • Yuba County
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      Water Temp: 71-73

      Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

      Report: I made a quick solo trip to Collins today (Wed). starting about 3 pm and fishing until 6:30 pm. I looked and studied all the low water sights - structure that is normally under water. I fished some and looked around some. I was metering the middle of the lake with my NEW Gen 3 12" Lowrance. Fantastic!! All of a sudden a bunch of bass busted shad - out of nowhere!! I had the presence of mind to quick throw a spook and nailed a 3 1/4 lb spot. Good first topwater fish of the fall. I landed 3 more keepers on the spook - one a 2 3/4 lb largemouth. The bite didn't last long. I cranked a lot, but no hits. One worm hit.

      Tips: With another warm week in store, I think the Oct bite will be a bit late this year. Launching take some time down by the dam, but had no trouble with my Ranger.

Tuesday, October 6th, 2015

  • Butte County
    • By

      Water Temp: 68-70

      Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

      Report: Got an early start, never sure why I go so darn early. Launched at the Dam about 6:15 am, off the water at 10:30 am. Tossed worms working my way into the North fork. Bite was way off compared to last trip, not sure why other then the front that came though a few days ago. Had to work hard for fish today, managed just 11 fish, largest at 14 1/2", a couple 14" and the rest 12-13", no big fish today!!! Just about all fish were caught 30-35 feet, no shallow fish, none deeper. Think I'm headed back to middle fork next trip. Water ranged from 68-70 degrees depending on where I was at.

Sunday, October 4th, 2015

  • Alameda County
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      Report: Got skunked again but without tossing a lure today. I had not fished here for months and thought it would be a good idea to try today. Not my lucky day. Lake was closed to people with boats. Unfortunately, a person was much more unlucky on Friday evening. The group's boat started taking on water and someone may not have made it to shore, hence the lake shut down to boaters while the search continues for this boater.

      Tips: Call before you come to this lake.

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

      Report: Went to the Lake for the first time in 10 years expecting way lower water. Although the ramps are way down, there was plenty of water to fish. I started on the main body throwing topwater and started landing fish quickly with 4 fish in about 15 minutes. Moved down the bank throwing a darted with oxblood worm and land 3 more fish in the next 15 minutes. Fired up the new electronics and located tons of bait of some walls and cuts, Tossed out a drop shop and caught 4 fish in 30 minutes as a played withy sonar. Ran up the middle fork and caught a dozen fish on topwater, drop shot and dart head. Ran all the way up the North and to limesaddle, getting use to my new (used) boat, was able to catch fish everywhere in the afternoon in 20-35 ft of water on a drop shot, lost count of how many fish I caught. Landed 3 over 15 inches and several nice keepers, all fish were spots.

      Tips: Locate bait and you'll find plenty of fish, if they are small move on till you find the bigger ones. Don't wast time catching dinks! Oxblood worms were great for the dart heads and shad with purple or green worked great for drop shot. Topwater was a lucky craft walking bait (forgot the name) in perch pattern.

Tuesday, September 29th, 2015

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

      Report: Launched about 6:30 am and headed to the middle fork, end portion, and tossed worms till 10: am. Decent bite today, but many smaller fish, seems half my catch was under 12"! even though I fished deeper then many do at 25-40 feet. Total 23 fish, only one 15" spot with about 2 14" the rest 12-13" or so other then the dinks. Again, 4-5 were LM. I'm beginning to like the middle fork, but going to north fork next trip to my old honey holes.

Saturday, September 26th, 2015

  • Napa County
    • By

      Water Temp: 70-75

      Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

      Report: I took a good fisherman to Berryessa yesterday, teaching him about off-shore structure and - new to him - spooning! He has now become a fan of the Rick Tietz designed Blade Runnner spoons. His first spoon bass with a big 1 1/2 oz spoon was a 3 lb 2 oz smallie!! He even caught a few more. He had started off with some of Rick's smaller spoons. As I was showing him how to work the spoon, I nailed a quality smallie at 3 1/2 lbs! I told him all spoon fish are like that - (yea, right!). I was using one of Rick's new UV morning dawn spoons. We started early in the morning and the lake was DEAD!! No bites and no small bass chasing shad on the surface. Had one small bass hit a topwater. We started spooning around 11 am and the bite was fair - but not great. In a cove I like, we saw a wolfpack of big bass chase a school of bait. What a sight! As they went out to deeper water, we spooned those 3 pounder smallies I mentioned. I was metering a bank off Big Island with my new Gen 3 Lowrance 12"meter (really a TV screen!) There was nothing on the meter - bait or fish. I was trying the MM111 Robo worm for fun and soon a 3 lb largemouth crunched it! The invisible fish!!! We wound up with a fair amount of spoon bass with our best 5 about 12 1/2 lbs.

      Tips: This is the time of year to move around. The bait moves - and so should you! Again, I am impressed with the size of the bass this year. No big largemouth this trip, but the smallies are amazing - big and fat! I'm sure drop-shotting would be good now with shad colored baits, but again, my largemouth hit a Texas rigged worm. If the summer heat would ever give in to a cool fall, the bite will improve!!

  • Butte County
    • By

      Report: Pretty new to bass fishing, Having hard time catching many this summer. Found this site and must say a big thank you to Tom for your reports. Fished drop shot, buddy and I caught 31

      Keep em coming Tom

Thursday, September 24th, 2015

  • Solano County
    • By

      Report: Delta Report….

      East County Fishing rolls as Salmon Stripers surge

      Tournaments return to Big Break Marina with Dan’s Delta Outdoors Striper Series Leading the way back to this Delta Icon! Last minute Check In 430 to 600 am Saturday AM Awards, Raffle and Fun starts at 300 pm. Sodas and snacks will be available.

      R2SeaTournament is just a week away and promises to be Epic event! More Next Week!

      Isleton
      Tough hot temps accompanied by the approaching full moon slowed salmon a bit. Still salmon anglers are seeing success, a few fishing finally started getting an occasional report of success from Salmon searching anglers. Water temperatures have dropped with the cooler evenings. Many anglers to the west are seeing more salmon daily… getting close. Silvertron’s are the best bet for those who want to try. Smallies are getting more attention now as 2 to 4 pound fish show more often now… Jigs and flukes are getting them!

      Walnut Grove
      Salmon are increasing in numbers Silvertrons and K-14 getting mentioned Bank anglers Pile worms and cut baits prevail. Catfish action is getting the most praise, Few Stripes are in the area as anglers recover still around as temperatures return more seasonable in the Walnut Grove area as the trolling bite is OK mostly small fish. Best area has been Courtland to Walnut grove. Red Eye Shad and small shad patterned plastics are the top choices here as well. Small swimbaits are scoring Largemoth and Smallmouth in the Meadows.

      Discovery Bay
      Hot muggy conditions had revitalized the frog for bass anglers. Stay near main river current with Crankbaits Strike King XD 6 and 2.5 square bills. Bobby D’s Swim Jigs and Spinner baits getting mentioned often. Jig bite on points is also good, the all new TNT Booby Trap is a great replica of Delta Craws come by and check them out ! Top water stripes are showing in the deep water side. Topwater scoring striped bass on the main river topwater look for birds.

      West Delta
      WOW! More Anglers in search of stripers are finding solid numbers of keeper stripers from both boat and bank. Most of the nice stripers coming soaking Shad. Antioch Pier scored stripers to 38 inches this week. Shad is top offering. The West as in Honker Bay to the Broad Slough plug casting is getting fish when wind cooperates. Go On Top with Dan’s Delta Mizers. A few more Salmon success stories have come on the incoming tide with Mepp’s Flying C’s in Pittsburgh and Humphries areas . Bass Bite stays solid in the Break and surrounding cuts. Cranking and spinnerbaits is starting to improve daily.

      Provided by Dan’s Delta Outdoors, 1625 Main St Oakley CA 925/234-4694 Follow us on Facebook

  • Shasta County
    • By

      Report: Provided by Phil's Props - Visit them at http://www.philsprop.com/
      Lake Shasta
      Fishing is still getting better as the water temp starts to edge down. Fish shallow early with top water baits and shallow crankbaits, As the day goes on move out to 20' to 30' and fish tubes, 6" worms on dartheads, Wacky rigged senkos and spoons.

      Trinity lake
      Trinity is continuing to fish well. Small swimbaits like the Keitech Fat Swing Impact, Tubes and top water baits have been producing well.

    • By

      Water Temp: High 60's

      Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

      Report: Got a chance to fish the Pit Arm this morning, the drop shot bite was hot from 8:30-10. I'm talking every other cast ranging from 12-17 inches. A few was choking up Shad so I grab a Crankbait and manage to hook into a solid 2 pounder. I'd like to welcome this cool fall introduction with open arms

      Tips: Anything shad color or brown. Target areas with 7-25ft of water. The deeper the better

Wednesday, September 23rd, 2015

  • Alameda County
    • By

      Report: This LARGEMOUTH MONSTER weighing in at a hearty 16.6 lbs. was carefully caught and released by Ian Cornelius of Castro Valley on September 14, 2015. Cornelius reported it was caught near Alder Point using roboworms. A half pound shy of the lake record, this is one of the biggest bass caught here at Lake Chabot in over 10 years. Our current lake record is held by Louis Vasquez from 2002 for a bass weighing in at 17 lbs.


      From Lake Chabot
      Bass fishing has been steady for the last several weeks with some bass anglers catching and releasing good numbers. Reports of bass from 1 lbs. to 4 lbs. are coming in daily. If you are fishing for bass, the early mornings and the evenings are best and they bite mostly on plastics, jigs, hula grubs and top water. If you do want to try your luck a couple good spots to fish for bass are near the island or in bass cove.

      Please practice catch and release for bass, as they are not stocked into the lake and their population depends on you!

  • Butte County
    • By

      Water Temp: 72

      Water Clarity: Clear (4+ foot visibility)

      Report: Launched about 6:20 am today, headed to the west fork and glad I did. Wide open bite till I stopped fishing at 10:30 am. No big fish, but plenty of action tossing worm. Managed to catch 34 fish, largest fish a 14 1/2" spot, with most running 12-13". Quite a few LM mixed in, guessing about 6-7 LM this morning, largest 14". Some dinks spots and LM under 12", 5-6 is my guess. Fished deep, 30 foot to 40 foot. Fished steep rocky banks only, no point fishing today. When driving across the Dam on my way out, noticed something swimming in the middle of the dam area, thought it was a person at first, then it dived, never coming up. Huge fish whatever it was!!

Tuesday, September 22nd, 2015

  • Solano County
    • By

      Water Temp: 75

      Report: Got on the water today around 10:30 and the bite was good until around 2:30. Swimming jigs along grass and tule clumps seemed to work okay. Pitching jigs and letting them fall to the base of targets really hasn't been working for me. I caught several nice fish off a 6" hollow body swimbait rigged on a weedless jig head. The water is pretty clear and there is a lot of bait in the water so in order to get bites off the swimbait I had to work it fast and violent. Its a reaction bit and they take it deep. Biggest fish today was pushing 5lbs. The evening bite was not there so I am going to try and get out earlier next time.

      Tips: There are a lot of 12" schoolie stripers out there right now so if you have kids it would be a good time to take em. I caught a bunch off a 1/2 oz team daiwa vibe in the ghost/olive color. The biggest problem with catching these small stripers is removing them from the hook. BE CAREFUL.

  • Amador County
    • By

      Report: From Lake Camanche

      Alert: Due to a large release of water from Pardee & a lower release from Camanche the water level has risen. Please note that south shore low water courtesy ramp #2 has now been reopened while ramp #3 has been closed. No change at north shore.

Sunday, September 20th, 2015

  • Solano County
    • By

      Water Temp: 72 degrees

      Water Clarity: Stained (2-4 foot visibility)

      Report: Fished Big Break on Saturday, out at first-light fishing for some striped bass. At 7:45 the bait fish were popping and the water started to boil at the entrance to Dutch and caught about 7-8 fish on chrome/black rattle trap. Largest was about 20 inches, but most about 12 inches. Rolled into Emerson and caught about 15 LMB ranging in size from dink to 2 pounds, fishing with wacky Trick worm. Off the water by noon before the temperature hit 90 degrees.

      Tips: When the birds start hunting get ready to pick-up your trolling motor and gun it to the first sign of popping bait fish.

    • By

      Water Temp: 72-76

      Water Clarity: Muddy (0-2 foot visibility)

      Report: Got out again on Sunday @ about 7:30 with all intentions on refining my punching skills so just started right from the ramp of oasis (figuring on the fresh release of the tournament fish) to no avail. Haf a little current tossed the swim jig out and picked up two 2lbers so i figured I'd troll around and find em with that then flip the grass around them. More dinks. Figured I had too much weight for flipping the grass clumps so started pitching a white jig hit an outside bend with overhanging bamboo with a clump of grass and my line was under the boat in a hurry, set and a nice 3.75. Tried to duplicate that but couldn't. Went out to the main channel to flip the grass and mats picked up 2 3lbers on the outsider grass but again couldn't put it together. Lots of boats can't wait for the rain

      Tips: None. Just read my previous report and it seems like the big one's are sticking real close and in that deeper water only to come up briefly, from there who knows.

Saturday, September 19th, 2015

  • Solano County
    • By

      Water Temp: 69-76

      Water Clarity: Muddy (0-2 foot visibility)

      Report: Man the bite is so much different on the weekends with the traffic. Had a Saturday tourney, it was a tough day mostly 1.5lbers with one going 4.36. The good one came off a swim jig on a grass flat next to a drop, others off a lipless and swim senco. Worked slopoing points, inside bends, and grass points at all different depths, nothing really going except dinks.

      Tips: None really except get away from the boat traffic

Friday, September 18th, 2015

  • Lake County
    • By

      Report: Well as you can image we have had one hell of a week up here at the lake with the fire and all. Let me first start off by saying our thoughts & prayers go out to the poor families which lost everything in this devastating tragedy. A special thanks going out to all the fire fighters for once again putting it all on the line to fight the blaze.

      On the fishing scene, the Lake continues to fish good with the mid-lake and southern arms accounting for most of the action. Water temps seem to be slowly dropping down a bit to the low to mid 70's. The water clarity has improved slightly as well. The north end of the lake is starting to show signs of life with a few fisherman doing well fishing LV500's with a yo -yo retrieve off the bottom. The jig & crankbait bite is still going strong on the rock piles and deep water areas. There is also a decent swimbait bite starting up on the 6" trash fish or 4.8" & 5.8" Keitech with a moderate retrieve close to the bottom. We have also been selling quite a few 5" & 6" Senkos and plastic worms as well. We finally got our first shipment of jumbo minnows in and some of the local old-timers have been roping them pretty good using the sliding bobber technique.

      The lake is just on the leading edge of the fall transition. We are starting to see the silverside minnows showing up and we also believe there is a very healthy population of threadfin shad this year. It won't be much longer and the cooling water temps will push the bait fish to the shore & we will begin to see the bass start to school up & put the feed bag on.

      In closing, I want everyone to know that all roads leading to the lake remain open except for highway 29 from Middletown to Lower Lake. Also the prevailing winds have switched back to out of the west so there is absolutely no smoke to contend with out there on the lake. I also wanted to take a moment to applaud Kent Brown for having to make the difficult decision to cancel this year's Triton owner's tournament due to the circumstances. The hotels & motels are pretty much full with the fire fighting personnel & evacuee's, so Kent made the right choice. As we get closer to full containment of the fire, things will hopefully get back to normal real soon. We will see all you Triton owner's guy's and gal's next year for sure. This awesome lake and the giant bass that swim in it aren't going anywhere, anytime soon.

      Tight Lines, Troy Bellah (Clear Lake Outdoors)