Back in the Saddle…

 

 

I havent fished San Luis Reservoir since July.  Its been a busy few months and despite the great Salmon and Trout fishing trips that I have taken to Alberta, Oregon and the RED HOT Sacramento River,  I keep thinking of how great the fishing is at San Luis in September.  Here it is,  the last weekend in September and my only trip out this month.

The fishing was pretty good with a total of 10 fish for the day–nothing huge.   Stripers for sure pull harder than trout, at least in those first couple runs.  Maybe its the season–even the dinks were fat and healthy.   The winds have been very fluky and despite the wind lady saying it was 25 mph the night before,  I prepared and called in the morning at 5 AM to be surprised that it had dropped to 3 mph in the last 7 hours.    The weeds are everywhere in the forebay.  Water temp around 71.  The lake is still really low although filling rapidly.    There was a giant floating weed wacker cruising around the shallows chopping at the vegetation on the  Cottonwood side of the trench.  For a Saturday,  there was only three boats out and about half a dozen fly fisherman in prams and tubes, all day.   I wouldn’t say the fishing was on fire but there were hours where it was fast and plentiful and hours when you couldn’t get a hit to save your life. There were many many surface schools of very small minnows around the weed beds at the islands and trench but I did not see any stripers slashing them.   I did however catch a few underneath these schools of minnows.   My strategy was to drift the weed lines close and  cast parallel and close.   Half the fish were caught at the weed line and half were caught casting to the deep water from the weed line.   Judging from the girth on the 20 inchers,  they are fat and well fed and perhaps not that hungry.    I had most luck on smaller, rattled, white marabou streamers tied on jig hooks with some orange and chartreuse.  I think the rattles are important.  I noticed in several cases that I would get bumped, I would set and miss, and then the fish would hit it again 5 feet away from the first bump on a fly moving about 15mph!  I think they follow the sound and the water push.  The  staff at the inspection station told me  that the Big Lake was putting out some bigger fish at the dam face.  Maybe they read Blantons Page too.

I streamed the CAL game to the ipad while fishing  and they were pathetic.  I think I will remember the day because of their crappy performance loosing to Arizona for the first time since 1985..   The Ducks on the other hand  were sensational that evening.   The question I should ask now is if they do go to a national championship,  should I go?  It may be the first time in my life that I have a vested interest in a national championship college football team.  It certainly helps make the tuition go down easier.

 

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