New Specie

Ive seen some photos of local Giant Kelpfish but have never actually caught one myself until today. I got out and fished the rocks at the coast for a couple of hours. Beautiful day on Monterey Bay. Lots of little fish in the pockets and pools drop shotting tiny plastic grubs.

A small, Giant Kelpfish

                                                    

                                          baby Olive or Yellowtail Rockfish         

Winter Crappie

Trophy Crappie on Fly and ultra light tackle is right around the corner..Here is one from January 2010, I caught on a small Clouser..

Forebay

 The wind lady said there was zero wind early so I hooked up and got over there for a change of scenery. Maybe a half dozen boats on the water and few kick boaters. Fishing was pretty good despite the cold front and surface temp was 57-58. Excellent conditions if you dont mind a little wind. The fish were spread out and I caught them on the flats and breaks down to 15'.. Nothin fancy, they were at all the usual places. Good strong healthy fish

Delta Stripers

Back out there again for a couple more rounds this past week. Fishing is good on flies. Lots of grabs from smaller fish and few solid hard pulling fish here and there. Conditions are great! Stripers are a blast on the fly and any of Truckee River guys that want to trade a day on the water give me a shout. I really want to get up there and I know you'll have fun on the Delta.

 We were starting enter a more fall like weather pattern when all of the sudden. Back in the 80s with warm nights. Where the hell is fall? The bait fish are spread out and comfortable at this point. Once things get normal and temps decline a tad, it should really take off. I have to admit though, fishing for winter run Stripers with this warm weather in mid November is really nice. It wont last though!

Delta

Nice crib

Gas station. Thing was sick

Fishing ..

It's been tough the last three days. Two of those days were on the Delta. Highs and lows, wind and sun with lots of small Stripers. I was also caught in a wierd wind gust that kicked up a horrible dust storm right in my path.

Great time both days but today I threw in the towl and headed to the coast. A friend, who lives on a small sort of private lake invited me and said he and his friends have brought the carp in and I should come on over and give it a go on the fly rod. I never turn down this invite and I always catch excellent quality fish here.

He is quite the the rough fisher and has an excellent set up for bait fishing but to fly fish you have to trek around tight shore line and roll cast to targets. My plan was to fish Corn Flies and look for fish in the shallows that are tailing, looking for straggler pieces of ground bait that has been thrown out. Not exactly fly fishing, but not exactly not fly fishing I guess. Either way you look at it, its lots of fun with very strong fish that pull like trucks.

Long story short, I fished the parimater of what they call there "swim". I tried not to blow out there area and spook fish. I saw several and I was able to get 4 or 5 to pounce on the fly and connect with only two. Its difficult to see them make the final move on the fly with the wind and rain we had today.

They kind of laughed that I even to photos of these youngsters but I was happy. They ended the day with several fish in the high teens-low 20s from what he told me. The wind and rain got a little overwhelming and I called it about 3pm. Ended up taking a walk on the beach on the way home since I was already drenched. A nice rainy day diversion.


Delta dust storm






Not a soul at the beach today

The Delta

The California Delta is more than a good place to fish. There is so much going on every minute of the day, 12 hours goes by so fast you can't believe it. Fishing wasn't great but it had moments of fast fishing and I tangled with an absolute monster Striper in the early am on a Topwater Plug. It was an amazing eat and I was sad I coudn't close the deal. I've thought about this and how I would do it different but I really dont think I did anything wrong, it just wasn't meant to be.

It was another beautiful day in the mid 70s and only a breath of wind all day. The fly fishing was steady for small school fish from start to finish and the average was decent and they were strong fish. I imagin I have spent close to 1000 days fishing the Delta in the past 25 years and I can not wait to get back out there for a couple more days this week.


Perfect Halloween plug!