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BACK TO CAMANCHE FOR
THE BIG'UNS
By: Ron Wilson
May 29, 2003.... Memorial weekend is a time for avid
fishermen to stay away from our waterways. This seems to be the weekend that
most people kick off their summer water sports.
I usual spend this weekend working on boats and fishing equipment.
However, guide
Bruce Hamby of Ripon was taking
Fish Sniffer editor Dan Bacher up to Lake Camanche to show him how we
have been catching all those big trout. Bruce asked if I wanted to
come along. I am not one to
pass up a free trip so I agreed to meet Bruce at his home at 3:30 a.m.
This would put us at the lake at 5 a.m. to meet Dan.
We arrived as planned and waited for daylight. Turkeys
that were roosting in the surrounding oak trees were just waking
up also. There was gobbling coming from many different directions.
Safe light came as Bruce got the jet boat ready, and at 6 a.m. we launched the
boat. To my surprise we were one of the first
boats in the water but shortly some local trout
anglers arrived and headed out.
At 7 a.m. Dan arrived. He informed us that he had to fill in on a
radio show which delayed his arrival.
By 7:15 Bruce had the first rod in the water and we
were trolling toward the dam just past Hat Island.
By the time Bruce got the second rod down the first rod already had a
fish on.
Dan reeled in the 14 inch trout and released it.
Bruce got that rod
back in the water and was putting down the 3rd rod when rod number 2
went off. Dan shook another one.
Bruce had just picked up the 4th rod to put it in the water when a fish
struck again. Another trout released by Dan.
Another Rod went off and Dan decided to keep this one as he wanted some
fish to take home for dinner. Bruce was just fixing to put the 4th rod
in the water again when Dan got up to reel in and release another trout.
I looked at Dan and said "if we had a good guide he would of got all
the fishing rods in the water so that we could have been catching fish
faster"! I continued "here we have been trolling for 25 minutes and
the guide still doesn't have all the fishing rods in the water".
Dan smiled but Bruce was too busy to pay attention to my needling.
Dan had reeled in a limit of fish in 25 minutes but they weren't what
we were after. We were looking for one of the big boys. As I hear that's
one of Dan's favorite trout to catch.
The hot bite diminished as the action slowed to a hookup about every
10 to 15 minutes. We were having a
lot of short hits for some reason.
I believe part of it was because Bruce had used a small lure container in
which he put strings of scented eggs in each compartment, I am not sure
if they were power eggs or Crave as they all look alike.
I think the scent had left the lures and that was one of the reasons the
fish were hitting short. Another factor I think was not having the color baits the fish wanted to
kill and eat right then.
After
an hour of slow action and switching to different Ex-Cel Lures, Bruce got
out his box of fish scents and put a couple different types in a
plastic container to use.
Bruce dipped a lure in one of them and dropped it down and was soon
rewarded with a fish on it for Dan to reel in. He did this 3 times with
the one rod and was rewarded with a fish each time.
While we had caught fish on a variety of blue silver, green and other
colors of Ex-Cel Lures, nothing was working like the silver/blue Ex-Cel
Lure with a gold tail. Bruce had even gotten in his tackle box for one of
his "one of a kind" favorite, never miss Apex lures to try,
but it didn't work either.
By 11 a.m. I was helping with the downrigger rods on my side.
Dan had reeled in and released lots of small trout and kept 3 nice trout
and one kokanee for the dinner table.
I kept kidding Dan about the fish that had got away, as several had spit
the lure back at him. The lightweight G Loomis kokanee rods were so
limber that Dan couldn't tell how big the fish were as he kept tightening
the drag on the fish to reel them in. Nothing like being an observer, you can see all the mistakes that a fisherman makes.
At 11:30 one of the fish we were after struck. We told Dan it was a good
one but I don't think he believed us until it made a run sideways along the boat and then
back behind the boat as it leaped a good 3 feet out
of the water throwing the lure clear back over Dan's head. The fish was
a chunky 3 pound plus trout that was just getting ready to give Dan a
real workout. These holdover trout fight as good as natives. They have lots
of heart, jumps and head shakes. Several times Dan felt he had a real
good one on that turned
out to be just a run of the mill Camanche trout with heart.
By noon Bruce and I had 4 rods rigged with blue/silver and gold tail
lures on. We were running them from 40 to 60 feet
deep and catching fish.
The bite soon died again. Bruce had been keeping a mental track of the
big fish he had been catching as well as what I have reported to him
on my big fish catches. It seems the majority of all the big fish
have been caught during the slow bite.
Finally at 1:30 p.m. the fish Dan had came to catch hit. I could see the line
being stripped off the reel as the fish took off, I told Dan "it's a big
one". Dan grabbed the pole and started to pump the rod like all us bass
fishermen do! I said "Dan quit pumping the rod, that's why you're losing
the trout". When you give them slack the hook falls from the hole
that's worn in the fish's mouth from the battle.
After about 10 minutes Dan got the fish close enough to
the boat to be seen. From the flash all of us agreed that it was at
least a 5 pound trout. That was before it decided to make another
5 minute run!
The fish was
tiring and as Dan got it closer and closer, the fish started growing,
"hey its at least 6 pounds". Dan finally got it to the back of the boat
and just as it swam into the net the fish jumped out of the net
and took off pulling drag again.
My heart was racing and all I was doing
was watching. I just knew the fish was going to come off the hook.
Dan got the fish to the net again and just as Bruce was ready to scoop
it, the fish speed away again. Two times at the net and
the fish wasn't in the boat yet. I knew the hook hole was now worn big
enough that a quick turn, roll or slack line and it was gone!
Dan brought the fish to the net once more and this time the tired trout
cooperated. No monster but a nice trout that weighed 7.2 pounds.
We trolled around for another hour and put a few fish in the box to take
home to smoke but we never got another big bite!
Sierra Sportfishing can be reached by calling Bruce at (209) 599-2023 or click
on his ad in the fishing section to check out his web page and some of the big rainbows that his clients have
caught!
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