Thread: Beautiful day (and night) on the water in Socal, 8/17

In addition to unforgettable UL fishing with so many remarkable crappie and a PB gill on artificials, this has been my 2nd best year of bass fishing in 30 years at my favorite lake. Unfortunately, it seems as though both the crappie and bass fishing dream may be coming to an end as today marks my second consecutive session of very poor bass fishing, and I'm struggling to target crappie. But that doesn't mean a guy can't still have a great day on the lake!

Got to the lake around 230pm today, hoping to learn from my mistakes on Wednesday. A small amount of baitfish activity at the dock saw me drag my 1.5" bait underneath it for a couple pretty standard 9"ish gills. Toward the front of the dock I managed to land a really beautiful gill around 10.5-11" I imagine. Definitely my second biggest of the year but not even close to the monster I caught a few weeks ago. After a half hearted effort to find some bass, I decided it was time to head out on the lake. Just before I left, I noticed a couple 2.5lb bass hanging out a couple feet below the outboard of the boat next to mine. Dropped a 4" Senko down and it was fish on about 5 seconds later. Sometimes it's just that easy lol. This ends up being my big fish of the day sadly.

Completely avoided the side of the lake I focused on Wednesday and went down my usual side. Found an incredible amount of bird activity and a monster school of bass. It was open water, the fish looked small and I was feeling brave so I threw the UL and caught a bass every cast for about 10 minutes. All 8-11" models. Switched to actual bass stuff and caught fewer fish but same size and was satisfied there weren't any bigger fish around. Took a long ride to the spot where I caught 120 a couple weeks ago and couldn't buy a bite, so I headed back out to the main channel and found another group of birds around a huge school of fish. Same story as before but in reverse, threw bass stuff and caught a few small ones. Figured I may as well throw the UL and just have fun and hope for a bigger one. After about 10 little bass in 10 casts, I got bored. Made my way back to the 1 spot that produced some quality fish on Wednesday and there was a decent amount of surface activity. For about 45 minutes I managed a decent mixed bag of small and quality bass. The quality fish remained but quickly lost interest in my lures so I went to the UL once again. About 6-8' down past all the tiny bass, the bluegill were eager to bite. It doesn't happen often on the main lake, but I found a 1.2lb or so crappie that was having a panfish identity crisis among all the bluegill. My first of the day and in a spot I'd never caught one, definitely cool! It was getting pretty late, so I headed back to the dock hoping for some more UL action.

Unsurprisingly the dock provided bluegill action aplenty. The crappie really spoiled me this year but the gills never leave you wanting for action no matter where you are on the lake. As the nearly full moon went up it was a beautiful sight as small groups of baitfish swam around while bass, big bluegill and the rare crappie could be seen just below the surface waiting for the right time to feed. The lake closes at 8 but it's been getting dark earlier and I've never seen this sort of condition so it was a really special treat. The fish near the surface almost no interest in my lure, but I did manage another decent crappie and a quite a few more bluegill while I watched the subsurface show.

UL was definitely the session saver for me today as the bluegill and pair of crappie provided the most exciting action and getting to see the active fish under the moonlight was awesome. I think I may focus on trying to dial in the crappie again on my next trip as opposed to chasing my tail around the lake for bass.

I was also recently given some info on tilapia in a lake that I didn't know held them and made my first (unsuccessful) trip yesterday. Some people don't like invasives but I'm excited at the prospect of something that I can target on UL that grows large and quickly. They've gone from 1 to 3 (that I know of) local lakes and I imagine it is impossible to stop them at this point.

*edit*
I forgot I actually took a picture of the big gill since I almost never take pictures. He's growing a big gut, but he hasn't started growing the hump on his head yet lol. Looking at the picture now he looks like every bit of 11". I've caught so many fish worth measuring or weighing this year and have done so with almost none of them.

The dock has had some real special days this summer. Just been dependent on whether there is baitfish activity this year for the bass. Seems like the temperature has been just right for a ton of shad spawns so my UL bait size has consistently been a pretty perfect match the hatch and the bass love it more than usual.