- Lake Sonoma Update
Too many photos to upload. No photos in this report, sorry. You all know what a bass looks like, anyway. So, the lake is definitely waking up from the winter slumber. I caught 32 fish on Saturday and another 54 fish on Wednesday. All fish were between 1.5lb to 3lbs. No larger fish caught, but still made for a very entertaining day! There was a...
Too many photos to upload. No photos in this report, sorry. You all know what a bass looks like, anyway. So, the lake is definitely waking up from the winter slumber. I caught 32 fish on Saturday and another 54 fish on Wednesday. All fish were between 1.5lb to 3lbs. No larger fish caught, but still made for a very entertaining day! There was a stretch where I caught a fish on ELEVEN casts IN A ROW! That's a new PB best for me, as far as consecutive casts w/ fish.
I had not previously witnessed what the pros call "bass being stacked up like a cord of wood", until this past week. That's probably because I hadn't had FFS until this season.
They are literally stacked up between 30ft to 50ft, off of the primary lake points. I am seeing literally hundreds of fish on the sonar.....so many that I'm not looking at the sonar screen, just using it to ID where the thickest part of the stack is, and casting into it.
I've been using 4in to 5in minnows (crush city and sakamata shad) on a 1/2 oz head to get down there fast, and stay along the bottom. ALL of my hook ups are happening while I am bumping the bottom while shaking the minnow.
I even caught about 5 fish on that new "Coike" dice bait from Japan. But, they definitely like the minnows better.
When I'm landing the fish, upon observation, many have half swallowed shad in their gullets - I thought the shad that they would be feeding on, would have been smaller. But, most shad I'm finding in their throats are between 5 - 7 inches. So, adjust the bait size accordingly.
When I switched to a 6 inch bait, I started to consistently hook 2lb to 3lb fish.
The big ones have to be staging somewhere else. I'm going to look deeper in the water column, this week.
Overall, the lake is waking up from it's winter slumber!
Lake temps are rising, but still between 56 in the morning, and up to 62 in the afternoon.
Afternoon bite produced a lot of 2lb + fish. Not sure if that is a pattern, or just coincidence. But, I'll track that next time I go out, on SAT.
Time to get out there and have some fun!
Tight lines!
