Contra Costa County Fishing Reports

The Delta has seen a solid push of stripers move through and up the Sacramento River over the last few weeks. Fish are still present in the West Delta (Pittsburg area), with live bait producing best. The Central Delta bite has been fair to good, but expect a lot of undersized fish... the bigger stripers are being caught ripping large jerkbaits during low-light hours. Over the next 2–3 weeks, look for Sacramento fish to begin migrating back down, which should light up the West Delta bite.

Largemouth action has been hit or miss. Fish are locked in full spawn mode and holding in less than 5 feet of water... but very finicky. Spawning beds are hard to spot given current water conditions, but the fish are there. Best approach is to stay shallow, working Senkos, Texas-rigged worms, and punch baits in and around vegetation. There's also been a decent frog bite in the mornings before 9 a.m., and that should only improve as water temps continue to climb.

There's a lot of good action coming out of Contra Loma right now. EBParks continues to stock Lassen rainbows just about every other week (at least). And with water temps sitting in the mid-60s, bass have moved shallow to spawn.

Plenty of bedded bass are around the lake, but the issue is limited shoreline access due to the growing overabundance of weeds. Still, some nice 3-5 pound fish are being caught, primarily on weedless soft plastic worms and creature baits. A few fish are still in prespawn, and feeding in more open water where Flukes or underspins are working well.

Trout are slowly moving into deeper zones with climbing water temps, but the bite is still good. Mini jigs have been working very well in the morning hours, while floated night crawlers and Powerbait are getting fish midday.

Water temps should drop a bit this week with forecasted colder nights, so look for trout to move into shallower zones all day.