Big Bear Lake July 22-24

[Mojave River Angler]

My friend Bill and I camped in Holcomb Valley by night and fished the west end of the lake by day. Lake conditions were acceptable for kayaking but the wind was a bit bothersome at times. Traffic on the lake was not too bad on Friday. Saturday was a ZOO. Not even close to being safe and lake patrol does not enforce. Too many stupid boaters...period. Sunday was tolerable. Still we pressed on and caught our limits on Saturday. Friday and Sunday we made good stringer as well. I suppose we caught about 25 fish...6 of which were about 2 lbs. The rest were typical rainbow size. A couple of them looked a lot like Alpers and one of the others had gold/yellow scales on top making him stand out on the stringer. Most had fins missing and one was almost completely finless. Those that looked like Alpers were full fined all the way around and had pink fins instead of white. However, I did see some fish with pink fins that did not have that distinctive rosy cheek and wide pink band. Maybe I look too close.
For methods...just drifting with the wind in the kayak dragging powerbait in the upper 20 feet of water. Not really going fast enough to be calling it trolling, but lots of folks were doing well with trolling from what I could see. Bait and wait didn't do much for us. Best weekend I've had fishing that lake. I was always one of the shore fishermen before and not really doing all that great.

Looking forward to going back, but I wouldn't take the power boat on a Saturday in the summer.

Ran into etaggart out there and maybe I'll meet him again some time and we can chat.

We've all seen pics of trout probably.
Mojave River Angler

[GdHkSet1]

Nice report, sounds like alot of fun camping and fishing for three days-got to like those big tail holdovers up there. Thanks for sharing.

[etaggart]

Hey Carl (and Bill) - Great to meet you on the water and sorry for the mis-attribution in my earlier post. I didn't quite catch your FNN handle when we were talking.

After we chatted, I hit a few nice trout by working the higher water - maybe 5 or 6 feet under the surface.

Drifting like you were doing can be king in BBL. And you picked one of the best locations. Some people also do very well on the south side of the lake in the same region. Not sure if you had them, but electronics also help a lot to see exactly the level of the fish and if you're in a dead zone - a little further east can get a bit scarce sometimes - but there are pockets and hidden structure in a few key places.

The boats were bad this weekend but it gets worse unfortunately. And, working the 5mph buoys can be tough since some people LOVE to buzz that zone - Sheesh!!! Later August and Sept/Oct are great since all the kiddies are back in school.

The wind was relatively mild this weekend. I usually plan for more. However, knowing the pattern can really help. Still/finesse fishing early until 8:30 or 9, then drift with the easterly winds 10 til whenever. Going straight back up wind isn't bad in a boat or kayak - kicking sucks, but at least I get a workout. The best is when the wife drops me off at the west end and picks me up hours later toward the east!

I see a few guys who live lakeside that troll in their kayaks for a few hours most mornings. The run needlefish at 2 or 3 colors of leadcore and always pickup a few.

My wife's almost convinced to get a kayak - she loves to paddle for hours on end. Great trolling motor!

Keep an eye on the limno report to see oxygen levels: http://www.bbmwd.com/Lake_Info.html

And here's a nice topo map to see structure: http://www.bigbearbassfishing.com/pdf/bathametricmap.pdf

Cheers and hope to see you out there again.

Eric

[Mojave River Angler]

Ya, we love the kayak fishing. I see that most folks boating the lake have no understanding of CA boating law or the BBL lake rules. We were fishing in a 14' kayak. Based on the BBL rules, we can go anywhere on the lake. So the powerboat owners that don't know this just buzz by puling a tube just 50' away knocking the crap out of us and laughing cause they think we are not allowed outside the bouy line. They are ignorant and stupid. I'm going to start keeping tennis balls in the kayak to throw at them. If they get that close...they are too close doing 35. I thought Castaic was bad for stupid boaters...now I see that they are everywhere.

I had a fishfinder in the kayak but I ripped it off and mounted it on the power boat. I'll think about getting a new one for the power boat and getting the Priana back on the kayak one of these days. We had our suspicions about a couple of spots that we picked up fish almost every time we drifted over. Must be one of the rock piles or ledges you refered to. We never did try the south shore. We'll have to give it a shot next time. I noticed that the wind shifted directions a lot and depended on where you were as to the prevailing direction. The dam area creates a strange vortex around that north side hill.

Next time I'm heading up I'll shoot you a message at you (etaggart).

Thanks for the links.
MRA

[Kelster]

Thanks for those links. I've been having too much fun at Lake Perris I haven't made it up to BB since they had the trout tournament. I am going to have to make some time and float tube up there.

[M@M]

Sounds like you had a great time on the water (too bad about the WILD boaters) why can't they all just fish...LOL....being out on the water, catching fish...life is Good! :Big Grin:Thanks for the report.

[flytyingreloader]

July and August can be NUTZ on some of the SoCal lakes. I head for saltwater more often than not, and avoid a lot of the lake lice that way. La Jolla Kelp and Point Loma might both be parking lots, but wake-pounding isn't an issue at least.