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View Full Version : Making Memories at the 'Mid: A Bait-'n-Wait Bonanza



AnglerBob
11-08-2012, 10:51 AM
(Please note: due to battery failures, the claims in this report are not supported by photographic evidence and should be viewed with considerable suspicion.)

Pyramid and I are officially friends again.

It was a petty thing perhaps. Last time I was there, I got a ticket for fishing off that dock everybody fishes off. (Some of you have entire online video channels dedicated to fishing off this dock. You know who you are.) A small thing, perhaps, but it ruined my day, as well as re-pricing my single fish at roughly the cost of decent ossetra caviar. I didn't come back to Pyramid for nearly two years.

What brought me back? In a word, (ok, two words): rental boats. Pyramid is a place of deep canyons, offshore islands, long creek channels. Shore fishing can be good, yes; but boat fishing, so much better. I could remember when they had rentals before, days spent sitting in a boat with a friend near the dam pulling in striper on every cast. Throwing a jig down a rock wall for beautiful bronze smallmouth. It was time to try again.

I got a late, by fishing standards, start this morning as I wanted to run by the local supermarket for a new tactic: dry ice to keep the anchovies frozen. I hadn't tried this before and hoped it would solve the problem of soft, spoiled and unappealing bait which always seems to manifest after a couple of hours on a warm day. This would prove to be a wise decision.

The next stop: Alliance gas station in Castaic for sandwich and bait, where the kind man rocked out my bait ensemble with some free leftover bloodworms (because nothing encourages customer loyalty like a gift of venomous annelids; the Ritz-Carlton hotel chain now offers them to visiting heads of state). He also attempted to call Pyramid for me to determine if there had been a recent trout plant. Easy to see why this place is such a favorite stop for anglers.

High on possibilities and sublimated CO2 from the dry ice, I arrived at Emigrant landing around 8:30, knowing I'd probably missed the morning topwater bite if there was any and hoping the careful planning was worth it. It took a while to get a boat and get all my stuff in it: The boats are stored at the infamous no-fishing dock, but it's down a lot of stairs from the parking lot. If there's ever a TV show called “Pimp My Rental Boat,” I will be on it. The attendant checked the motor carefully to make sure it worked up to par. I asked where the fishing had been good.

“Yellowbar might be a good place to start,” he said. “The fish hang out there especially in the morning. Also try the coves near the dam. Or the marina—we're also expecting a trout plant later, if you want to catch trout. They've been planting larger, quality fish so the stripers don't eat them all.” He explained the cost: a full day would be eight hours, except it wouldn't be a full day because “the sheriffs start kicking everyone off the lake around 4:00 pm.” Still time for a lot of fishing, so I paid and headed for Yellowbar.

As happy as I am to be able to rent a boat at Pyramid, it should be noted that their rental fleet is far from new. In my case, the boat ran just fine, but some of the seat welds were coming loose, scary in a banging headwind situation. Also, I couldn't get the boat up to full throttle without some strange sort of power loss happening, like engaging the clutch: the engine would rev but the boat speed would slow down. I didn't see any cavitation taking place, so I wonder if perhaps it was some sort of speed governor.

I arrived at the Yellowbar area around 9:15 and began to look for fish on my portable meter. There were a few marks but no huge schools. The place looked great, though, so I shut down the motor and made a few casts. I didn't bother to anchor, since there was no wind at the time.

And...nothing. I worked the whole area: the cliffs, the weed bed. On the meter, I could see stripers hanging out over the river channel—always a favorite spot, but I either couldn't place the bait correctly or they just weren't hungry. I moved over to the dropoffs on the other side, near the picnic area. A few more marks here, and again no takers. Trying to pinpoint some good structure, I anchored up. Several bass boats cruised into the channel, working the docks and weed beds at the shallow end. I exchanged greetings with a guy in a Ranger tossing plastics for LMB.

“You're in a great spot for striper,” he told me. “This area is absolutely perfect. They're all over here—you should be filling the boat with them.”

“I know,” I agreed. “Can't understand it myself,” I said. Things were definitely off to a slow start, but I remembered something I've learned about stripers: no matter how many fish you see, how perfect the conditions, how awesome your boat positioning and presentation—if it's not working, DO SOMETHING ELSE.

So I pulled up and headed for the cove near the dam. The ride over was long and rough as the wind was starting to pick up and I was hoping this would motivate the fish, as it sometimes does. Entering the cove, I spent some time driving around, getting a feel for the geography and hunting for meter marks, which were more prevalent than they'd been over at Yellowbar. I found a nice dropoff with good meter marks and decided to anchor on it, but the wind pushed me up against the canyon wall, so I decided to tie up to bushes there and cast to the deep water (nearly 80 feet) mid-channel. This might have worked except for the nasty snags. I lost a couple of rigs and than figured I'd better move again. Time for lunch and a strategy change. I decided to move to the channel mouth and work the deep water there for a few suspended fish I'd seen.

The wind was blowing in earnest now, but I was armed with a rental boat's best friend: a real danforth fluke anchor and 100+ feet of polypropylene rope. It took a few tries, but eventually I was able to move into the spot I wanted. The wind eventually died down to a dull roar, no more snags—fishing was looking up, except for the part—what do you call it—oh yeah, catching. By now it was getting on to midafternoon and I hadn't had so much as a nibble when all of a sudden there it was, a nibble. I reacted too hastily, jerking the slack-line bait away from an inquisitive striper. A fresh chunk was fly-lined; fortunately, striper is often a fish of second chances. This time, the hook was set and I reeled in a micro-striper of about eight inches.

But it had begun. The next fish would be bigger, and the one after that. Only slightly; these underfed waifs tipped the scales at a pound, at best. Still fun on light tackle. Then all hell broke loose. I set the hook on a giant striper that didn't act like a striper. No runs, no screeching drag—just dogged determination and incredible strength. I had a pretty good idea what this was, but it took several minutes of tug-of-war before I would get a glimpse of tan underbelly. It was, of course, a catfish—an impressive specimen of 5-6 lbs, which I would have been more excited about had I actually been fishing for them. I gave the scarred and ugly creature its freedom, looking up just in time to see the sheriff boat bearing down on me at a pace suggesting a Navy SEAL raid of Somalian pirates.

I froze. What this time? For a minute, I contemplated making a run for it. Though terribly outgunned, perhaps I could lose him in some narrow twisty straits, the way the “Dukes of Hazzard” always managed to evade Boss Hogg, who never figured it out even though their entire county consisted of three dirt roads on six acres.

“You have to pack up and head in,” the officer said. Now? It's only...3:38. And the catfish are biting. “All boats have to be off the water by 4:00 pm. And it will take you twenty minutes to get THAT back to the dock,” he noted, smirking at the rental with some measure of disdain. He had a point about the twenty-minute trip, though.

Upon arriving back at the dock, I asked the store clerk the expected trout plant had taken place. A different guy was there, Dennis, who claimed it had. I asked if there was still time for shore fishing.

“Oh yeah,” he said. “We close at 5:00, so you've got nearly two hours.” I suspected the clock in his office trailer had stopped, but so had my cellphone, so for the moment we were equally chronologically challenged. I emptied the rental boat and packed up, then checked the time in my car; it was 4:45 or so. I took a few shots around the shoreline with a Thomas Buoyant, when the man reappeared. “Try over there near the ramp,” he suggested. “The trout are still stacked up there. You've still got a few minutes. If my bosses come by, they'll probably warn you it's close to closing time. They'll probably come over here. They get trout fever too.” I did as he suggested, throwing the chunky metal lure across the boat launch area, letting it sink several seconds and starting a medium retrieve. The strike was swift and intense. We shared a laugh. I thanked Dennis, and tossed the lure again. Another fresh healthy rainbow trout. I pinched down the barbs of the lure, sailing it across the inlet into the setting sun. I remembered a similar day, years ago with my dad, on a cold fall evening at Rock Creek Lake in the high Sierra when again and again I would toss this same lure up onto a mid-lake ice shelf, yank it off and count the seconds before it was engulfed with a fury.

As I left, the big stripers were starting to boil on the trout like an uncomfortable scene on the Nature Channel. They're waiting for you, guys.

http://i629.photobucket.com/albums/uu17/AnglerBob/2012-11-07_14-46-53_763.jpg
(A quick striper snapshot before the phone died)

Coefficient13
11-08-2012, 11:09 AM
Good times.

Glad you hit the bite, and gave Pyramid another chance.

cutbait
11-08-2012, 01:08 PM
Fun report to read, even though I gloss over most long reports, I read it all!


Though ixna on the mployeea elpingha ouya on the routta lantpa... The "bosses" read this forum

fishfinder
11-08-2012, 10:37 PM
nice story telling skills. helped me kill 10 minutes of my long boring night. glad you didn't get a ticket for fishing off the boat ramp.

AnglerBob
11-09-2012, 08:53 PM
Thanks guys. Man that really was long, sorry. Coupla beers and I think I'm Hemingway. For the record, no "mployeea" helped me do anything illegal—I was fishing near the ramp, not on it. Some lessons you don't have to learn twice...just wanted to spread the word that there's a nearly untouched trout plant there, easy pickins with rainbows and Mr. stripey hanging around...take your pick!

snospdr
11-09-2012, 09:16 PM
Great report! The best I've read. Long ones are usually sleepers for me.
Thanks.

FishinGame
11-11-2012, 07:07 PM
Good descriptive writing... it's kind of interesting reading words and recollecting the face behind them. Glad you enjoyed your trip back.

Some customers treat our rental boats like bumper boats- and some think they're qualifiers of the American Powerboat Association... We check them daily and end up repairing them almost excessively due to improper operation. Rock and a hard place ? :D

Although, I do believe our rental prices are a bit lower than most...

gletemfeelsteelgary
11-13-2012, 02:17 PM
nicely written report : )

congrats on ur catches....like ur style....a report SHOULD be a good read...well done sir : )

Looks like a good time on the water

Gary