Urban Fishing Report

URBAN FISHING REPORT

Covering

Irvine, Santa Ana and Corona Lakes

Gordon introduces all the happy winners at the 24th Annual Free Youth Fishing Derby Saturday, June 5th at Lake Gregory Regional Park in the San Bernardino Mountains

6-10-10

Young Anglers Enjoy Free Fishing Derby

Story and Photo By Mike Harris Mountain News and Crestline-Courier News Reporter

More than 125 young anglers went looking for the biggest fish last Saturday at the 24th annual free Youth Fishing Derby held at Lake Gregory Regional Park, but it was Austin Lightcap of Oaks Hills who found it.

Not only did he find the biggest fish—a rainbow trout weighing 2.2 pounds—Austin also took first prize in the 8-12 year-old category with a total of three trout for a catch weight of 3.8 pounds.

Austin used Power Bait and treble hooks to land his catch. Greg Lightcap, Austin's father, said the two enjoy coming to Lake Gregory. “We fish here all the time,” he said, all smiles over his son's victory.

Taking the prize for the Most Fish award was Zachary Montgomery, who produced a limit of crappies and trout weighing in at 5.3 pounds. Young Zachary also placed second in the 13-15 year-old category with his 2.2 pound rainbow trout.

Zachary, who fished with his brother, Austin Montgomery, said the two fished around the dam for their entries.

With summer-like temperatures as a setting, fishing was a little slow for the anglers, and attendance was on the light side, but the kids who showed up caught some nice fish including a lot of trout caught on the Gulp! baits that were included in the kids goodie bags, according to Gordon McHenry, event founder and chairman.

“We usually sign up at least 200 kids,” he said. “I heard that there were a lot of other events, such as baseball and soccer, going on at the same time. But it was great for those kids who did show up since all of them won prizes during the drawing!!”

Young anglers and their parents began arriving at 7 a.m., with final weigh-in taking place at 11 a.m.

Prizes were awarded for first, second and third in three age categories.

For ages 7 and under, first prize went to Dan Sheehan (1 lb.), second prize went to Victoria Nichols (.8 lb.) and third prize went to Kent Stafford (.5 lb.).

For ages 8 to 12, first prize went to Austin Lightcap (3.8 lbs.), second prize went to Johnny Angle (2.2 lbs.) and third prize went to Mark Woodhall (1.95 lbs.).

For ages 13 to 15, first prize went to John Magnaña (3.2 lbs.), second prize went to Zachary Montgomery (2.2 lbs.) and third prize went to Tristin Harrison (1.6 lbs.).

Each child entering the contest received a free goodie bag containing a package of Gulp! Bait, a spool of Trilene line, a Trout Trap Lure, a food certificate from McDonald's, a package of Mustad hooks, a bobber, Bazooka gum and a Trilene/Fireline knot card.

After fishing, each child received a free soda from Goodwin's Market and a free drawing ticket for prizes.

“Speaking of prizes, some people go out of their way to help us with our goal of getting things for the drawing that will help our young mountain anglers have more fishing fun and catch more and bigger fish.” said McHenry. “Ron Nopwaskey, owner of Ron’s Mobile Repair, is a great example. He knows how badly we need tackle boxes so every year he picks up a pile of them for the giveaway. Same thing with all the rods and reels from Tim Tyson and Pete Vermeulen, a couple great regular Lake Gregory anglers who care enough about our mountain kids and the future of fishing to donate a pile of them every year. And I can't forget Maureen Mann, the love of Pat Marley’s life, who donated a lot (and Pat had a LOT!) of his tackle to the derby this year. Thank you all!!

Sponsored by The Mountain News, the Crestline-Courier News and the California Fishing Show, in association with Lake Gregory Regional Park, the annual event is held in conjunction with National Fishing and Boating Week and National Kids Fishing Month.

7-29-10

Irvine Lake

Irvine Lake catfish biting well; 30 fish stringer tops catches

Outstanding catfish action was had at Irvine Lake this week, reported Jimmy Getty at the Pro Shop. “If you were in the right spot, you could have a limit of catfish within an hour. Otherwise, the bite was very steady all over at Santiago Flats and Boat Dock Cove.”

Getty added, “One angler who bought multiple-limit passes went home with 30 catfish, and lake regular Phil Hildebrandt had a 5-fish limit of channel cats that totaled 25-9, topped by a 7-8.” The catfish start to bite right about dusk, and keep going until about 10:00 PM. Anglers report that nightcrawlers are best while there is still light, and mackerel becomes the hot ticket once full dark arrives. Most of the prime eating-size 2 to 6-pound whiskerfish are being caught in 1 to 15 feet of water, with shrimp, DuMong’s and Gulp! also catching their fair share.

Irvine Lake Pro-Team member Dave Young reported wide-open catfish action on Saturday night. “We limited out in Boat Dock Cove within an hour”, related Young. “The catfish were breaking all around us in about 12 feet
of water. Best rig was flylining 1-inch pieces of mackerel on 10 or 12 pound line and 2/0 long-shank hooks. The cats were so aggressive they were hitting the bait while it was sinking. All of our fish were stockers weighting 2 to 4 pounds.”

Largemouth bass continued to bite well, with many quality limits turned in like the 5-fish total of 14-6 tuned in by Joey Ninehuisof Newport Beach on a variety of crankbaits. Most of the 2 to 6-pound largemouth are holding at 15 to 40 feet on rocky structure.

Plenty of bluegill and redear are being caught in brushy areas on mealworms and Gulp! Crickets. Trout anglers are finding a moderate number of rainbows in the 2-pound category trolling with 7 colors of leadcore line trailed by a cop-car color Luhr Jensen Needlefish. Both
crappie and hybrid striped bass anglers found slow action due to the full moon.

Families with children age 12 and under are finding very good numbers of catfish in the Kids Lagoon. The main lake water level is receding slowly, with surface temperatures averaging 78 degrees. Last week’s algae bloom has dissipated completely.

Outstanding catches of the week at Irvine Lake included:

Phil Hildebrandt of Anaheim, 7-8 channel catfish on mackerel at the flats
Eric Miller of Orange, 6-5 largemouth bass [released] on a Power Worm at Crawdad Point
Joey Ninhuis of Newport Beach, 4-0 largemouth bass [released] on crankbaits at Rocky Point
Jerry Chang of Manhattan Beach, 12-3 carp [released] on an IMA Ramba at the Red Clay Cliffs
Paul Johnstone of Villa Park, 2-4 rainbow trout on a fluttercraft worm at the west shore
8, 9, and 5-year old Kayla, Cameron, and Daryl Bellamy of Hawthorne, limits of catfish on mackerel at the Kids Lagoon.

For more info go to irvinelake.net

7-29-10

SANTA ANA RIVER LAKES

Excellent catfish bite continues at Santa Ana River Lakes complex

The catfish action has remained excellent at Santa Ana River Lakes, and anglers will see a big influx of trophy catfish next week when broodstock channels from 10 pounds up will be planted on Tuesday. The trophies could be up into the 40-pound class.

SARL has been getting twice-weekly plants of catfish with tilapia also added at least once each week. The channels have been best on shrimp or the marshmallow-meal worm (M&M) combo doused with Eagle Claw garlic Gravy with the average size fish between one and two pounds. The tilapia are best on nightcrawler pieces and run up to two pounds.

With so many fish being planted, there are some impressive stringers being caught, especially on Friday and Saturday nights when 24-hour fishing is allowed and anglers who purchase 24-hour passes have a 15-fish limit. Mary Harper, Los Angeles, had a near-limit with 14-fish that weighed 21 pounds fishing worms in Chris’ Pond. Walter Harris, Van Nuys, was also a fish shy of the 15-fish, 24-hour limit, but his stringer weighed in at 16 1/2 pounds and they were caught on shrimp at the boa dock. Jeff Bradley, Carson, had five cats for 11 1/2 pounds, including a four-pounder, fishing mackerel at the road.

The Palacios and Rivera families, of West Covina and Riverside respectively, found a school of big fish off the road and landed 16 catfish for a total of 77 pounds, including the top channel at eight pounds. The group was fishing with shrimp and the M&M combo.

Vincent Worthington, Cypress, caught two sturgeon, one at 12 pounds and one at 10 pounds to top off his stringer, which also included three catfish. He was fishing nightcrawlers at the Bubble Hole. Meanwhile, Nash Holm, La Mirada, landed a two-pound tilapia on a nightcrawler in Chris’ Pond, and Chris Flowers, Mission Hills, landed a 9-4 carp from the Catfish Lake on a blood marshmallow.

Santa Ana River Lakes is open seven days a week with fishing allowed from 6 a.m. to 4 p.m. on day passes or from 5 p.m. to 11 p.m. on an evening pass. Each of these passes is $22. Seniors only pay $20, with a special $17 pass sold on Wednesdays. All of these passes have a five-fish limit. For kids 4 to 13, a three-fish pass is just $9. The 24-hour passes available every Friday and Saturday night are $60, and anglers can bring a spouse and up to three kids to help fill the 24-hour pass 15-fish limit. Camping at the lakes is free with the 24-hour pass.

For Santa Ana River Lakes fishing information, call 714-632-7830 or log on at www.fishinglakes.com.

7-29-10

Corona Lake

Huge 37 1/2-pounder leads hot catfish action at Corona Lake

Craig and Grant Yamashita teamed up to battle a 37 1/2-pound catfish at Corona Lake, landing the best fish of this year’s catfish season at this popular western Riverside County water. The San Jacinto anglers were using shrimp and fishing from a boat when they hooked the big fish.

The catfish action has been excellent here thanks to twice-weekly plants of channel catfish with the best action on mackerel or shrimp doused with Eagle Claw catfish Gravy. The tilapia are also very good with the fish running up to two pounds and showing on nightcrawlers, red worms, or even wax worms. The tilapia are planted each week, too.

Besides the Yamashita’s big fish, Dave Beaver, Anaheim, caught cats at 7 3/4 pounds and 3 1/4 pounds, and Andrew Pasillas, Riverside, landed seven catfish for a total stringer weighed of 14 1/2 pounds.Mike Mortiz, Temecula, landed a 2 1/2-pound tilapia, while the Singh family of Fontana had 11 tilapia to two pounds.

While not a lot of sturgeon are showing, Blake Burgess, Elsinore, landed a 5 1/2-pounder fishing shrimp at the dam.

Corona Lake is open seven days a week with fishing allowed from 6 a.m. to 4 p.m. on day passes or from 5 p.m. to 11 p.m. on an evening pass. Each of these passes is $22. Seniors pay only $20, with a special $17 pass sold on Wednesdays. All of these passes have a five-fish limit. For kids 4 to 13, a three-fish pass is just $9. The 24-hour passes now sold every Friday and Saturday through the summer. They cost just $60, and anglers can bring a spouse and up to three kids to help fill the 24-hour pass 15-fish limit. Camping at Corona Lake is also free with a 24-hour pass.

For Corona Lake fishing information, call 951-277-4489 or log on at www.fishinglakes.com

SPECIAL RELEASE

Sturgeon are now stocked in the Santa Ana River Lakes and Corona Lake on regular basis

Hard-fighting, high-jumping, gourmet sturgeon will be planted in Santa Ana River Lakes and Corona Lake on a regular basis beginning Father’s Day weekend. And for the first time, anglers will be allowed – encouraged even – to keep these delicious gamefish.

The initial plant will consist of 5,000 pounds of mainly three to five-plus pounders, and there will be regular plants in both lakes after this initial plant which will be in the five to 15 pound class.

“These are gourmet fish,” said Craig Elliott with The Lakes. “We’ve been able to work out an exclusive deal and get quite a few of them and we plan to plant them for anglers – maybe forever.”

The white sturgeon are from a highly acclaimed Caviar-producing operation near Sacramento, and the meat is sold around the world to gourmet restaurants. Chefs love their firm, dense, white meat that is always tender and moist.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if they quickly become our most popular fish,” said Elliott of the fish that fights as hard and jumps as high as the scrappiest rainbow trout. “We’ve been planting ‘Nebraska Tailwalkers’ during trout season, and these fish might end up being called ‘California Tailwalkers’ once anglers start hooking them. And after they’ve had them on the barbecue, there’s no doubt in my mind the word will spread quickly.”

Sturgeon have been planted in waters throughout Southern California, including Santa Ana River and Corona Lakes, but most stockings have been small numbers of big fish from 25 to 100 pounds or more. At The Lakes, anglers were asked to release the sturgeon. But that is all changing come Father’s Day weekend when hundreds of fish will be put in both waters and anglers will be allowed to catch and sample the wonderful table qualities of these prehistoric fish.

The sturgeon are the major component of the big Warmwater Grand Opening at both Santa Ana River Lakes and Corona Lake for June 19-21, Father’s Day weekend. There will also be bonus plants of thousands of pounds of “Silver” channel catfish along with tilapia put in to complement the sturgeon. There will be thousands and thousands of pounds of all three fish planted.

Santa Ana River Lakes and Corona Lake are both open seven days a week with fishing allowed from 6 a.m. to 4 p.m. on day passes or from 5 p.m. to 11 p.m. on an evening pass. Each of these passes is $22. Seniors only pay $20, with a special $17 pass sold on Wednesdays. All of these passes have a five-fish catfish and tilapia limit. The 24-hour passes are sold every Friday and Saturday and are just $60. Anglers can bring a spouse and up to three kids to help fill the 24-hour pass 15-fish catfish and tilapia limit. Sturgeon can be mixed into these limits, but anglers with regular passes can only keep two sturgeon five pounds and under or one fish from five to 15 pounds. Bigger fish must be released. Anglers on 24-hour passes can keep three sturgeon under five pounds and two fish over five pounds. Anglers can fill out the total limit of five or 15 fish with catfish or tilapia.

For Santa Ana River Lakes fishing information, call 714-632-7830, or for Corona Lake updates, call 951-277-4489. You can also log on at www.fishinglakes.com for more information.

HOW TO CATCH STURGEON

Sturgeon are bottom-feeding fish, like catfish, that will eat just about anything that lives on the lake bed and ends up there when it dies. Large sturgeon living in Pacific rivers and bays feast on salmon and shad that die after spawning. They will eat all kinds of roe, clams and mussels, crawdads, or bottom-dwelling fish like freshwater sculpin that try to hide instead of fleeing.

In Santa Ana River Lakes and Corona Lake, it is likely the sturgeon will quickly adapt over to feeding on the huge threadfin shad populations in both lakes, which routinely die-off and cover the bottom of these lakes. Frozen shad and other cut baits like those used for catfish are certain to catch the new additions to these two lakes. In the past at the Lakes, shrimp slathered with Gravy has also worked well catching the big ones.

A standard sliding egg sinker rig should be perfect. Since few of the initial plants will be larger than 15 pounds, so six to 12-pound main line with a 1/4 to 1/2-ounce weight should suffice. An appropriately-sized barrel swivel between the weight and the leader is the next part of the rig and keeps the line from twisting. The leader is then tied to a baitholder hooks from No. 4 up to a 1/0, depending on the size of the bait, and this completes the rig.

The fish quickly learn what a baited hook is all about and anglers might have to fish lighter leaders and more delicate set-ups to consistently get action. The question if you scale down to six- or even four-pound test will be whether or not you can land the fish.

When first hooked, sturgeon frequently head right to the surface and leap out of the water, tailwalking across the surface like a marlin. Then the angler will be faced with long, sustained runs and head-shaking. When finally tired and brought into shallow, shoreline water, the fish is likely to spin, catching and breaking the line on the bony barbs along all four sides of its body.

STURGEON CLEANING AND PREPERATION

If anglers plan to keep sturgeon for the table, the fish should be immediately stunned with a blow to the head and then bled out completely by cutting around the tail and/or slicing the gills on one side or the other. Sturgeon should then be gutted and the head and tail removed. The scutes, the bony barbs down the sides, back, and belly should be filleted off flush with the skin, and the fins all removed close to the body. Once the sturgeon is in this “bullet” form, you come to the most important step in assuring that your sturgeon will be delectable table fare:

You must age the fish in a refrigerator for 48 hours!

Don’t forget this step. Sturgeon meat takes that long to “relax” from rigor mortise. It can also continue to react reflexively to knife cuts, making final filleting and skinning difficult. More importantly, if the meat is cooked before it is relaxed, it is likely to be rubbery and tough.

After the 48-hour period, a big fish can then be steaked or filleted, while smaller fish should then be filleted.

The filleting method for sturgeon is different than for most gamefish because it is done from the inside of the body cavity. The spine is removed with careful knife work and then the ribs are carefully sliced off each fillet. The two fillets from each side of the body are still joined by skin at this point. They are separated and the skin removed in the normal fashion. (Complete step-by-step photo instructions are on The Lakes’ website at www.fishinglakes.com.)

The fillets are so firm, they are ideal for grilling because they don’t break apart, but they are also perfect for broiling, baking, frying, poaching and smoking. Use with recipes that call for shark, swordfish, or halibut, and you will be pleasantly surprised. You will also find several fantastic recipes for sturgeon along with other interesting information on the www.fishinglakes.com website and a link to purchase some of the best-tasting caviar in the world.

NOMENCLATURE AND TIDBITS

---Don’t call them barbs or horns. Don’t call it body armor. The correct term for the bony bumps along the back, sides,and belly of a sturgeon is “scutes.” These scutes often catch fishing line and nick it or completely shear if off. This is mostly likely to happen near the end of a fight when the fish is brought into shallow water where it will roll vigorously.

-- While sturgeon are called “bony fish” that is technically incorrect. Their skeleton is made of cartilage, like a shark. And like shark, the leathery skin if tanned in Europe and made into handbags.

-- Sturgeon have taste buds on the outside of their lips and smell food from the tips of the four barbells around their tube-like mouth, that almost seems prehensile. This means they can actually smell and taste your bait before they put it in their mouth. The goods news is that if they decide to eat the bait and you feel a bite, it’s time to set the hook. They’re probably not going to spit the bait out.

-- Sturgeon are a very primitive fish, with fossil records that date back 175 million years or more. They are also prolific and long-lived. A mature female will lay up to million eggs or more when they broadcast spawn in rapidly-flowing water in a river. White sturgeon can live more than 100 years and fish that live in saltwater, except for spawning, can weigh over 1,500 pounds, while landlocked fish will still weigh 300 pounds or more! Go get 'em!!!

The California Fishing Show

With Gordon McHenry

URBAN FISHING REPORT

Irvine, Santa Ana and Corona Lakes