Tracy Press

Want to know where the big ones are biting? Visit the Tracy Press Bite Watch for your hot fishing tips.

It’s sturgeon fishing season! It’s that time when most mature sturgeon migrate to the upper streams for spawning. Sturgeon show in the Colusa area in the Sacramento River or sometimes even up to the Feather River.

The upper streams from Sacramento to Colusa have water that is mostly shallow with a number of holes 10- to 12-feet deep. When fishing from a boat, anchor your boat just above the hole and drop the bait. The good baits are ghost shrimp, grass shrimp or lamprey eel. There are also good places to fish for sturgeon from Light 49 upstream or along Sherman Island throughout Horseshoe Bend. From the bank, fishermen can find the good spots for sturgeon from Sherman Lake Park to the Rio Vista Bridge. The dump gate on Cache Slough is also another good spot to fish for sturgeon and striped bass. The lowest tide at midnight is best time to get sturgeon at this place.

Striped bass fishing is picking up with some good-sized catches reported at Isleton Bridge, or along Highway 160 from Three-Mile Slough Bridge up to Rio Vista Bridge.

Catfishing is slow due to cold water. It should be better when water temperature is about 55 degrees or higher.

The surface temperature has risen to 53 degrees, and trollers are finding fish a little deeper during the day. Many fish are being caught between 10 to 20 feet after the sun gets on the water.

One angler rented a boat twice at North Shore in the past two weeks and caught 14 trout the first week and eight and a 14-inch crappie the second. He was fishing in the Rabbit Creek area with Rapalas in gold/black and silver/black, as well as with Needlefish. Another caught a limit of trout and a limit of bass while trolling with a Rapala in black/gold. His big trout weighed in at 4.4 pounds. He was fishing in the main lake near South Shore and Little Hat Island. Several more very nice trout came out of the South Shore Pond.

This week’s trout plant of 1,200 pounds of Mt. Lassen hatchery trout will be at South Shore, with 600 pounds going into the South Shore Pond and 600 pounds going into the lake.

San Pablo Reservoir has awoken from its slumber. Water conditions are clearing up and the fish are out there.  This week saw a huge spike in the quantity and size of fish brought to shore, including a 15-plus-pound trout. The trout fishing has really started to pick up, as several limits were recorded. Trolling is beginning to prove successful — with water clarity on the rise, try using a broken-back Rapala.

The lake’s next fish plant will be Thursday. Look for 2,400 pounds of rainbow trout to enter the water at about 10 a.m. Since mid-February, more than 11,000 pounds of rainbow trout have been planted at San Pablo Reservoir.

Night fishing is also back. The lake’s first night fishing event for 2008 on Saturday drew a great crowd. A San Ramon fisherman wrestled in a nice 7.56-pound striper from a boat while trolling along the eastern shore using a ½-oz. Kastmaster. Another reeled in an 11.03-pound striper from the Rock Wall area on a night crawler during the season-opening Saturday night fishing.

• Courtesy of www.usafishing.com and www.norcalfishing.com.

TrackBack URI for this entry

Comments (1)

Subscribe to this comment's feed

Show/Hide comments

...
written by Ron Clark , March 23, 2008

Why isn't the Bite Watch feature run every week?! I understand local sports is important, but there are fishermen in Tracy, too, not just fans of high school baseball and basketball. Some of us really want to read about how the fish are biting and where.