April 2005 Short Reports
compiled by
It must be spring because I'm starting to hear from PFF folk about their latest outings. True, the general trout season hasn't opened (mark your calendars, last Saturday in April 2005) but judging from the reports, the bass are king. If you want to share a short narrative or picture of a recent trip, just email it to and we'll put it into this PFF short report!
Lower Sacramento River
Lower Sacramento River,
March 19:Chris Rich took a new PFFer, Jim Ducey, to fish the Lower
Sacramento, where there were rumors of a magnificent March caddis hatch.
The story goes that beginners luck reigned, although judging from this picture,
Chris was doing fine.
– Rodney Chun
Bass Fishing with Alex
Robinson Ranch, April 9 My son, Alex, and I fished the bass ponds at Robison Ranch recently.
The weather was balmy and the wildflowers were everywhere. It was a gorgeous Saturday to be fishing. The upper pond is fuller this year than I can ever remember. There was a minor hatch occurring in the morning with no wind to complicate matters. The bass and bluegill made swirls on the surface and you could often hear their smacking sounds across the lake. As I methodically worked the shoreline, large bullfrogs would jump out from underfoot with a resounding squawk and scare me half to death. I fished with my usual Sneaky Pete poppers and caught about 30 before noon on the upper pond. The bass were not spawning yet and most fish were caught on the outside edges of the reeds of the southern and eastern shorelines. Alex was fishing with chartreuse crappie jigs and release about 20 fish, almost all of which were bass.
A breeze came up in the afternoon and fishing poppers became more difficult. I have always felt that this is due to the motion of the pond surface reducing the disturbance of the poppers and making them less desirable. However, on this trip I think that the wind stopped the bug activity and the fish just stopped looking to the surface for food. We moved to the lower pond in the afternoon, which has fewer, but larger, fish. We saw some very large swirls in the shallows by the dam indicating that some of the bass were preparing to spawn in that lake. I caught a very decent crappie on my popper in the evening hours. I was pleasantly surprised with this fish because crappies usually fight like a wet rag.
On the way home we made our traditional stop at Perko's and over dinner
tried to recall the best memories of the day.
– Igor Doncov
John and Bob Chase Bass
Lake Nacimiento, April 12 – 15 John Files and I decided to take advantage of our recently acquired "retired" status, and went to Lake Nacimiento during mid-week. This year it is really pretty with the green hills and flowers all blooming. Why you ask? Well this is the bass season. Last year we went around March 23 and it was too early.
We camped at the resort for $30/night. They also have cabins, trailers, and boats for rent. This lake really requires a boat to fish safely, or to cover the distances. It is possible to fish near the campground in a tube, but it gets windy, and this lake is a big water ski lake – read it can have a lot of boat traffic. Most arms have a 5 mph limit. You could boat up one and then unload the tubes, if that is your pleasure. In our case we fished from my boat. We found good fishing anywhere from 1/2 to 8 miles from camp.
Currently the water is running over the spillway. The water clarity is maybe 2-3 feet, more or less, depending where you are. The surface water temperature varied from 64' to 71' depending on the sun, wind, and location.
We arrived Tuesday afternoon, set up camp and went fishing around 2 pm. The sunny weather was in the 70's with light winds. We started at the Dip Creek and Snake Creek arms near the camp. The wind was light, and there were very few boats. It was quiet and the fishing was 'good'. We each had landed around 12 by quitting time at 7pm. For the record, I was 1 for 6, with the fly rod, using Tom Kirfoil style frog poppers around 6 pm. I caught one white bass, the rest were spotted bass. Those ranged from 10-16 inches. The rest of the time we used a range of spinning lures. White Swimtails – 2" on a Micro-lite rod – was the most successful. Poppers, and large worms also worked.
Wednesday we woke up to high winds and cold weather (high in the 50's-60). It was heavily overcast, looked like it could rain, but did not. We went up the lake, stopping at all structures, especially where rock drop-offs were in the shade. We had to avoid the winds so the electric trolling motor could overcome the constant battle with the wind. The fishing was GREAT. We each boated/released over 30 fish. Around 5% were White Bass. Those we found on the points. Around dusk we found fish busting the surface along the banks opposite the campground. That was exciting. Wed's most successful lure was a YELLOW curly tail crappy jig. Some other things worked, but not reliably. It was too windy to fly cast.
Thursday the cold snap seemed to start having an effect on the bite, and the winds lessened. There was not surface bite, and mostly the fish were deeper. Some were found hugging large, newly flooded trees. We each eventually got around 15-20 bass, but it was really spread out, and they were deeper.
Friday was low wind, sunny and warm again, but the bite was slow still.
We each got maybe 12 fish each, and left by 3PM to avoid the traffic.
– Bob Schwehr
Keep those reports and photos coming!
Rodney