FishDelta.com - California Delta Fishing Report

Sacramento Area Report - by Jack Chapman

Information about the CSBA, each of its chapters, upcoming events, a message board and much more are available at the organizations web site, http://www.striper-csba.com/.

This is a great time of year to fish if you can get out. Between work (preparing for year end processing) holiday parties and family responsibilities it has been almost impossible to get on the water. I did finally manage to get out and spend an afternoon chasing Mr. Sturgeon. Steve Talmadge (Flash Fishing) is a professional fisherman and guide in the bay and delta specializing in sturgeon. He is very successful and gave me these “Pro Secrets” to pass on:

Pro Secret #1 - Noise:
Sturgeon are very leery of noise, they avoid boat noise and will move to the shallows to avoid it. Weekends with a lot of boat traffic will move the fish toward shore. Avoid noise as much as possible when anchoring. Turn off your fish finder and stereo while anchored to remain as quiet as possible. These noises will move fish away from your boat. Cast your bait well behind the boat to reduce noises you may make moving around the boat.

Pro Secret #2 - Bait:
Try to use the bait that represents the food sturgeon are currently eating. Salmon roe (sugar cured or natural) when salmon are in the river system, herring during the spawn in the South Bay, grass shrimp most of the time, and the premiere bait is Pacific Lamprey eel anytime throughout the year. Roe and grass shrimp should be put into bags such as Coleman lantern mantles! The bags are tied to the shank of the hook. Lantern mantles will "milk" scent for 2-3 hours. All bait should be attached to the shank of the hooks, not the points. The points need to be bare so they can penetrate the mouth and when allowed to move freely, they will hook the fish better. Some special techniques for using eel are very useful, cut a flap in each side of the 3" piece of eel similar to a rose petal. These flaps will open and close in the current and pump eel oil into a scent trail. To attach the eel, use a threader to thread the piece of eel onto the leader, there is a tunnel through the center of the eel that will hold the bait securely. Slide the eel down the leader onto the double shank of the hooks; this leaves the points bare to penetrate the fish.

Pro Secret #3 - Scent Trail:
An uncontaminated and unbroken scent trail is a must!
Several techniques are necessary to maintain an uncontaminated scent trail. Use eel oil on your hand whenever you handle the bait or leaders. Rub eel oil on your weights, leaders and terminal tackle. Steve is very serious about this, if you set a weight on engine oil or fuel or get mayonnaise from a sandwich on the gear, it will turn the fish away.
To maintain an unbroken scent trail don’t check your bait! This breaks the scent trail and the fish won’t find your bait. If you miss a hook set, don't reel it in to check. Let the bait back down and wait for the fish to return. There is no need to check eel; it will stay on your leader generating a scent trail all day. Steve has used the same piece of eel for 3 days at a time and it was still putting out scent. Eel is tough and crabs, stripers, or sturgeon hits will not get it off your leader.
Keep your scent trail intact!

Pro Secret #4 - Patience:
Sturgeon only eat once every three days or so. It is typically several hours between bites. Putting lots of time on the water is the key, fish through two complete tide cycles, 12 hours or so. You never know when the bite will turn on for a fish, it can occur anytime though the tide cycle. Only move your boat to a new spot during the slack of the tide. Watch your rod tip constantly at least until your eyes cross. You can put a bullhead out as bait for stripers to increase the action but this is slow fishing. Live bullheads are much better than frozen. If you have kids aboard, you can put out grass shrimp to get small stripers. The most common mistake in sturgeon fishing is to anchor and fish for an hour then move on.

Pro Secret #5 - Bites:
Look for any change in the movement of your rod tip. A slow pull down and release is classic but very subtle changes can indicate a bite. Strike any pull on your line or break in movement pattern. Strikes are free; just leave the bait there if no fish is on. Strike hard and firmly once, don't use full force, then keep the pressure on to tire the fish. Sturgeon fights last a long time, up to a few hours. Don't net a hot fish; wait until it is completely tired out. They often will come in quietly until they get to the boat then make a massive run. Many fish are lost when at the boat when they are not tired out.

Striped Bass: There are stripers all over the delta. They are being caught by trollers and those anchored using bait. For those using bait the trick is to find a stretch of water without too much debris and no mitten crabs. The trick for trollers seems to be to stay shallow (5 to 10 feet) and put he miles in. our chapter guru, Mark Wilson, reports, “… went fishing … for striped bass. Another one of those days. We launched at Brannan Island at 7 a.m. We trolled Decker for one small keeper striper. Then we hit West Bank for nada. Then up to the Old Dairy for another nada, and the water was getting very dirty and with a lot of floating debris. So, we headed over to the San Joaquin River. We trolled False River and Fishermen's Cut for nada. Then, over to the Santa Clara Shoals for a whole bunch of fish on spoons. We landed over 50 fish with only 9 keepers to 4 pounds. Then, up to Prisoners Point where we threw Fish Traps for another 5 keepers. Then, up into Mildred Island for one more keeper. Final tally: about 80 fish with 15 keepers. The two largest were at 8 pounds apiece. Back through Frank's Tract to the San Joaquin and back to Brannan Island. Off the water at 4:30 p.m. and we went 49.7 miles today.” Another member, Alan Fong reported, “… Decided to go out for a while for stripers. The wind was blowing thirty plus but I managed to find a couple of big weed beds loaded with stripers. We were fishing in rollers but the stripers were on a feeding frenzy! On our first stop we had our limit in ten minutes. White fishtraps with an 1/2oz head has been killing these stripers for the last month. I'm fishing in 46* water and catching these stripers in two to seven feet of water in the weeds. We made two stops on the San Joaquin River and caught thirty stripers today. I even caught two bass over four pounds each on the same baits.” One last report from a Coastside member, “Started off buoy 22 below Rio Vista at the end of the outgo for 3 keepers. Moved to Broad for another keeper. Tried False River at the peak of the income, but there is just to much junk in the water. Went back to 22 at the end of the income for 4 more keepers. Total 9 keepers to 13# (let the 13# go) all on shad in 26-30' of water.”

Sturgeon:. more and more anglers are starting to target them now that some storms have moved through. One of our members, Bill Crooks reported, “Ted & I check out sturgeon in Monte Slough. We know big tides are tough in Monte, but figure we have some time at top & bottom. NOT. We hit bridge just before low. Thirty minutes after change the weeds come, big time. We go to mouth (west) and find clean water on in coming but no fish. We go up Nurse & to end of Denverton Slough. (That's an adventure. Reminds me of the movie Deliverance!). Come back & find slightly better water in out go. We try roe & eel. Only positive is I see many more sturgeon than in past months.” Mark Wilson, our striper guru even gave a try one day and reported, “Fred and I went sturgeon/striper fishing today with salmon roe and shad. We fished the last of the outgo and first of the income down off Sherman Island. Then we fished the last of the income and first of the outgo by Decker Island. We fished roe for sturgeon and shad for stripers. Guess what? I broke off another big sturgeon on shad and I caught 2 keeper stripers to 8 pounds on salmon roe. Anyway, we wound up with 1 shaker sturgeon, 4 shaker stripers, and 13 keeper stripers to 8 pounds. Back at Vieira's to take pictures and clean fish.”

Hook Line And Sinker Report
Robert from the Hook in Oakley reports.
Black Bass:
The largemouth bite has slowed down some in overall weight with the recent cold weather. It has dropped the water temps into the mid to low 50's which means you'll have to slow down and cover areas very thouroughly to get the most and better quality bites. Keys for getting bit right now are to look for areas out of extreme current, clearer water and areas holding lots of bait. If you find these 3 keys you will find the fish. Fish slower techniques with plastics like drop-shotting, split-shotting and texas rigging and stick to more straight tail or small curly tail worms and down size your presentations. Also, a suspending rip bait this time of the year works well.

Striped Bass:
The majority of the stripers have moved well into the middle portion of the delta by now and from Frank's Tract to Stockton on the San Joaquin River should be holding good numbers of fish and will until Feburary. Also, Old and Middle Rivers and into Discovery Bay are holding some good sized fish right now with 30lbs.+ sized fish being reported in the last week. With the water temp. dropping drastically and dirtier water flowing in bait fishing will be the best bet for top results. On the live end mudsuckers and minnows fished off the bottom and fresh or frozen shad will all get the job done.


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