Sonoma County Fishing Reports

No fishing today....but still went out for some boat / water time. We have TONS of babies today! 4 days ago there was nothing. Today, we have a huge cloud of babies! With papa close by, keeping them corraled to their nest. Hard to believe that only 1 out of 1000 will reach adulthood. But, for the next few weeks, papa is gonna have a full plate, looking after his brood. Nature is an amazing show.

I can't say if the females have come up yet, but the males are up, making and tending to their beds / nests. I'm not saying where this is, but there are 3 other males fiercely protecting their territory, within 100ft of this buck. I personally do not bed fish during the spawn. But if you choose to bed fish, please put them back in the water in the same spot, within a minute or so, please. Besides, there are plenty of crappie in the trees now. I've been hitting tons of these, with weightless / weedless wacky rigged 5in Berkeley Max Scent Generals.

Water temps at Lake Sonoma are holding in the low to mid-50s, and recent rains have muddied up water that was starting to clear. Even so, the bass bite has been fair, mostly near the bridge, public launch, and back creeks on the north end. Finesse setups and small blade baits are pulling both smallmouth and largemouth, but most are under a pound. A couple of weeks of clear warm weather and the spring bass bite should bust wide open.

Shore anglers have picked up a few steelhead/trout on spinners. These are native fish, so catch-and-release is recommended.