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.

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Thanks for the ride along. Reminds me of my trips out there with Sonny catching lots of quality gills. Got into a bunch of crappie one year and was catching both crappie and gills from same area, big time fun. Did an over night trip at Perris one year and about froze my a** off. Temps really drop there at night. First one on the lake in the morning.

That is a fine looking fish! As said, thanks for the ride along.

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Originally Posted by JUNGLEJIMJIGS

Thanks for the ride along. Reminds me of my trips out there with Sonny catching lots of quality gills. Got into a bunch of crappie one year and was catching both crappie and gills from same area, big time fun. Did an over night trip at Perris one year and about froze my a** off. Temps really drop there at night. First one on the lake in the morning.

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It's crazy how fast it can go from cold to burning down here. This lake is real chilly in the AM but it was still near 80 degrees when I finally got out of the gate after 845pm last night. I've been on the lake when it's 115 in the early afternoon before. Only reason I knew the temperature is because I was in my car getting the heck out of there! Fishing afternoons instead of all day this year has let me avoid the cold and the worst of the heat.

I'd love to get on to Perris one day. Making a round trip probably isn't in the cards but I've been thinking about a cross country fishing trip late this year or early next year and that's a spot I'd want to swing by.

Got a text that they were biting pretty good a few hours ago. Don't know if I can resist. Worst case scenario is a bunch of nice gills.

Great post! Thanks for sharing

So glad I went back today. Night and day difference from Saturday in terms of quality. Stayed at the dock as planned. Rigged up a 4" senko and my UL and never had to tie on anything else other than switching from my Bellezza to my new Yamasemi at one point for UL.

Around 30 bass with almost all being 2lb+ and a bunch of them coming on the UL. There have been so many shad spawns this summer and the most recent spawn is just under 2" this week so my UL offering matches them perfectly and bass were more than happy to take it. Found a nice pack of crappie right where they had been a month or so ago, though the quality of them was way lower. Mostly around 11-12" with just a couple really nice 14" or so fish.

Highlights of the day were 2 fish I broke off. Had a 12" bass on the UL and a couple 4-5lb class fish nosed up to it. I was goofing around and suddenly a real big one came up and got curious. Over 6.5, under 8, always hard to guess under water. After a minute or so of the big girl being curious, the little bass came off (barbless hook) and the big one followed it down. I dropped my minijig back down the way she went and pretty quickly, I was on a very large fish, almost surely that one. I gave it all I had on the Belllezza Prototype and 4lb leader but she just steadily swam under the dock into some brush or cables with no hope of stopping or turning her. Had no expectation of catching the fish if I hooked it, but sometimes you get lucky and they swim right at you. Not really sure she was even fighting, kinda just felt like she was casually swimming away.

Other one I lost was at the end of the dock on top of the school of crappie. Grabbed my jig on the sink and took off full screaming drag. It stopped very briefly a couple times but by the time it was done running, it had literally run to the very front of the dock and buried me in a bush. One of the other guys asked me if I was still on right before it went in the bush and as soon as I realized what had happened, I said "oh no! it just gained 3 pounds!" :biggrin since we weren't gonna get to see the fish. My experience is the crazy runners usually aren't super big. Could have easily just been a crazy under 4lb fish that was amped up from chasing bait, but from the end of the dock to the front is pretty impressive and leaves you wondering. After losing those 2 I did give in and switch to the Yamasemi for some more power.

Stoked on a good day, so many nice bass on the UL, finding a school of crappie again finally and hooking into a monster even if I didn't land it. That's the 2nd very large bass I've hooked into on that rod, would be cool to land one eventually. I haven't caught a 7lb+ bass in I have no idea how long. I'll take one on anything but I would be ecstatic if it was on UL.

Really good report on what sounds like an extremely enjoyable trip. Thanks for sharing.

Sounds like a blast. With fishing that good I'd never leave the dock. Course I'm a bank fisherman my whole life.

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.