Fishing Report – Los Vaqueros Reservoir

General Conditions

In between storms we continued to see stripers and trout caught along with a few largemouth bass and catfish. The cold, wet and windy conditions have limited the number of anglers fishing at the reservoir but the few that braved the weather took some nice fish.

Our water temperature is now 54.5 degrees and water level is currently at 51.5%.

Our hours will expand on April 1 to 6AM to 8PM. For the rest of March our hours are 7AM to 6PM.

Trout

Trout fishing continues to be on the slow side. We are hoping the fishing will pick up once the water stabilizes. We see a few holdover trout each day along with a few recently planted fish.

There is currently a need to mix things up. Try different colored power baits or worm/power bait combinations. Power worms can be effective. Move locations and try different depths. Boaters might try drop shotting plastic minnows. Trollers need to change depths and locations until you find some fish. Try some runs about 20 feet from the shoreline. Broken-back Rapala’s are always a good choice but keep mixing it up until you are successful.

Nightcrawlers are a very good choice this time of year. You can float them with a marshmallow, inflate them or fish them under a bobber. If you are bait fishing from a boat try the backs of coves and cast close to shore.

Our next trout plant will be Friday, April 1. Look for 1200lbs of Calaveras Trout Farm fish averaging about 1.5lbs each.

Largemouth Bass

We had very few anglers going after bass. With the cold water conditions, fishing your bait very slowly is an absolute must. Bass fishing should improve once we get some nice days and the water starts to warm up.

Stripers

Most of the striped bass are in the 8 to 12 pound range with a few fish up to 15lbs. The 2 fishing piers or the points near the piers as well as points past the rock wall provide the best action for bait fisherman. Anglers have good luck fishing points past the rock wall. Cut anchovies and shad are the best choices. One angler caught two small keeper fish on a cut sardine. Take advantage of a second rod stamp and get two baits in the water.

  • Paul Leopoldo caught 2 stripers. One went 13lbs and the other 12lbs. He caught his fish trolling a rapala. He also reported having several other fish hooked that escaped.
  • Felix Rosas caught a 12.4lb striper on anchovy fishing at Oak Point.
  • Jay Greenford caught and released a half dozen stripers in the 15 to 20 inch range. He was casting and trolling a silver shad rap on the western shoreline.

Salmon

We did not get reports of any Salmon this week although we did not have any anglers targeting them.

Catfish

Due to the cold water, fishing for catfish remains slow but some monsters are available. We do have several areas where creeks are coming into the lake and muddying up the water. These would be a good place to try for catfish. Mackerel remains the favorite bait but a wide variety of baits will work.

Sam Herrmann caught a 21.1lb catfish fishing with an anchovy in Penn Cove.

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