Thank God for Tilapia

[Natural Lefty]

Oh, there you are, just like "magic." Leo. The floattubeforum link asks for a username and password, and I am not a member nor are many of the others on this site I assume. Perhaps you could cut and paste some relevant parts of the discussion to here.

[TheAsianGuy]

Not a problem. Here's the detailed current report, one of the two written:

Wife's family visited for memorial weekends. Plenty of float tubes in the garage to take out during the cool days, but the wind conditions would have us kicking like we're in a marathon. So, float tubes were left behind. We went light..ultra light gears on everything.

Location: Yacht Club

Water temp: Glorious 70°F @ 7:15AM.

Air tempt: Cooling at 72°F at 6:45AM, cooking 99°F at 1PM.

Wind conditions: variable wind directions from south to north, west to east, and east to west all throughout the day @ 20mph.

Bites: Extremely hot between 5AM (according to the first guy that was there before us) to 10AM. Slows down a bit from 11AM to 12PM. Picks up again from 12PM to ?? (we left at 1PM).

Baits of choice: Biggest, freshest crawlers you can get. The local bait store at Salton Sea won't open until late in the morning (11AM). Best bet, grab the crawlers at the local bait stores before going to the lake. Do not grab any at the local Walmart. Worms there are lethargic and pretty much dead. I use orange saddle worms (cousin of the red wigglies, same size, but pack more pheromone than the nightcrawler for the small bodies). I also used Berkeley red synthetic worm on the second hook as presentation, while the live worms for attraction. Saved all my crawlers for my father-in-laws. We brought with us 120 large crawlers and Alabama Jumpers, and 350 wigglies. All gone in matters of hours. You can reduce your crawler segment down to 3/4", or even 1/2" length. As long as a scent is presented in the water. Don't use scent spray. Won't work. The guys near us use the sprays and plastic, only catch once every 30 minutes. We catch 1 every 10 seconds, or the longest was 1 every 2 minutes during slow period.

Hot zones: 45ft to 110ft from peninsulas. Look for the migratory zones which is outlined in a darker, brownish/darker color that the water. You cannot miss it. Use polarized glasses for faster detection. Schools constantly moves through the area, creating this migratory zone. The hottest bites are there. Second hottest bites are in the shallower area (15ft to 25ft sand beds) where the spawning grounds are.

Rig: dropshot, the only choice, out-rigged with 2 or 3 hooks. Leader should be 10 inches of run from weight to first hook, and 6" from first hook to second, and 6" again from 2nd to 3rd. The extended branch from leader to hook should be 2", nor more than 3". Each hook will be met by a hungry mouth, with double and triple hooksets on one line.

Lines: start at 6lbs. Best is 10lb. Don't matter if you use braid, mono, or flouro. Fishes only care about the worms. Leader should be clear, and not colored. They will ignore colored line for the leader.

Catch limit: No such thing.

Eating limit: You'll die from inflammatory responses from omega 6 oil before you die from the bio-accumulation toxicity from fish tissues. DDT and organo-toxins are not found in fish tissues in the 2013 sampling results.

Areas to stay away from: Red Hill (southern most portion of the lake. Wind and current from the northern area prevent the contamination from causing issues with the fishes near the Salt Creek and Mecca Beach HQ fishing areas.

We caught, during fileting period, over 120 large tilapia that we kept, average of 20", at 2.5lbs. We gave away smaller 1.5lbs, fileting smaller 2.5 to 3lbs, and kept larger 3.5+lbs whole (minus the head) for grill and frying. Fish tacos with beer batter were delicious.

[Natural Lefty]

Yikes, those are some huge Tilapia, Leo. The bigger ones weren't biting when we were there, only modest size ones near shore. I tried casting farther out from several locations but nothing bit until I casted near the rocks. Actually, I was close to giving up and heading to the state recreation area, when I saw a Tilapia swimming near me. It looked sick, and ignored my bait, but I thought if there was one that close to shore, there might be some healthy ones near the rocks, so I casted parallel to the rocks and bingo, immediate bites and I had two fish on.

The orange saddle worms are the ones you got from me, correct? I must remember what to call them.

[TheAsianGuy]

The one near the club house, within the shallow areas, were very lethargic. Low oxygen level I believe, since the churning of the water wasn't as active as the one near the rocky peninsulas, outside of the marina bay. On either side of the peninsulas, cast either perpendicular, fanning about 5° after each cast, roughly 40 to 110 feet out, combing the beds, if you can't see the migratory trail. Reel in 3 feet, stop for 20 seconds, and very slowly reel in another 3 feet. Repeat without pausing for too long. Our lines did not even have time to wait. We constantly reel and reload our lines with worms. This is not a soak-and-wait. This is constant action to search-and-hookset. When one is gone, another one will move in and take over the empty bed. Normally, if you haul out a 2lbs+ body, a bigger one will move in quite quick. If you're removing a smaller 1lbs, a smaller one will fill that bed up. Not certain why yet. I'm still trying to deduce the behavior of small-to-small and large-to-large replacement on the empty bed. Possibly due to bed size and attractive presentation.

I love this location because of the sandy bottom. The HQ at the Mecca Beach is way too rocky. The only bad thing is there was no toiletry, unless the Yacht Clubhouse is opened for activities. Other than that, you have to drive to the local bait store, spend a bit of cash to buy more baits, and use the facilities.

The orange saddle was the one you gave me. I've hybridized them, and they have a unique coexistence with the red wigglies and Euro crawlers. I'll be migrating them to the larger outside bin to increase the reproduction activity even more, since the inside factory maxed out. The orange saddle or red wiggly in pure strains don't provide the tenacity and pheromones like the hybridized ones. The hybridized strain excrete a large amount of yellowish, very pungent, scent when being handled. The pure strain only secrete a tiny brownish excretion. They bundle together for protection in a massive ball like the tubifex, and struggle just as hard as the Amynthas agretis species in a C-flex and pump patterns when being extracted from the group. They are docile in the compost container I brought with me, or while in the bundle. I'll try to influence this hybridized strain with the Amynthas gratis to see if the aggressive wiggling will be increased, probably noticeable results in another 5 months or so. If you need some for your external composting areas, let me know.

[Natural Lefty]

Thanks for the information, Leo. I did try out there along the sides of the left jetty briefly, and nothing bit. Maybe they weren't there at the time. Usually, there is either a dense school of them or none of them. Also, when I was there, the ones in the shallows were active. I guess they change from day to day.

I am glad your worms are doing well, including the Orange Saddle worms I gave you. We have literally gobs of redworms and euroworms (possible hybrids too?) in our big compost pot too, plus some more worms in other areas. The Orange Saddle worms are mostly in the area I showed you.

By the way, being mouthbrooders, Tilapia don't need to stick to a nest. I think they have preferred breeding places, but I don't think they build nests in fact. The father Tilapia carries the eggs and the babies in his mouth wherever he goes, until the babies are too big to fit anymore. I should know, as I used to have Tilapia which bred in my aquariums.

[TheAsianGuy]

That's what confused the living crap out of me Robert. Why would the same spot yield the same size once it's removed from the location. The fishing pressure for the entire area got dredged, and hooked, like a fine tooth comb. Yet, we all confirmed the same result, where the same spot we hammered yield the similar sized tilapia. We were laughing very hard for hours, as everyone tried to hit the same spot over and over again to see who could haul out the larger one from the spots. We were betting on our Lady Luck to offer us larger ones each time at the same wishing well spots.

The schools do migrate from zone to zone, normally in different phases of the wind condition and temperature. However, the migratory paths are varied quite heavily. Morning hours, the migratory path was far out from the jetties/peninsulas. However, as the temperature risen, the paths move closer and closer to shore. Quite a unique spectacle to observe.

Great to know you have so many orange saddle population in your yard. Make sure never to run out of them, and continually cultivate them. They are valuable asset to have as a fishing worm, and a dedicated composter. I'm not sure how invasive they are, since they can both dwell in harsh conditions, yet, remain prolific when resources are available, unlike the red wigglies. I guess you can say they're like the jumpers. We got to hook up and hit the Salton Sea again, so we can ideally observe and document the findings more meticulously. Of course, your wife may not like the scorching earth hours. My family don't care. As long there's a bit of shade, and fishing actions, they will go the distant to suffer for fun.

[Natural Lefty]

My wife definitely doesn't like high heat, Leo. She waited for the sun to go down to start fishing last Thursday. By the way, the Yacht Club was open that day with restrooms and people there, but on Memorial Day, of course it was closed.

I haven't been finding as many of the Orange Saddle worms this year, but that is probably because we haven't put as much compost in that area. There are definitely some though, and they are hardy worms which grow in my yard even in relatively poor conditions.

The breeding habits of Tilapia are indeed why you keep catching fish from the same spot. They do not have territorial nests, so they are free to move according to the conditions. If you find a preferred spot, one fish (male I suppose) will probably move into it as soon as the previous occupant is removed.

[TheAsianGuy]

Possibility is endless without us poking our heads into the water and observe them. I noticed a few things while fanning the spots:

1. They would not leave the spots, no matter how enticing the offering was. The spot is about 3 feet in diameter. Once the offerings left the domain, the nibbling (my synthetic worm or hard to remove segment of worm above the hook's eyelet) stopped. The buffer in between each spot is about a foot. The nibble began once again as the hooks made the transitions into another spot.

2. Larger sized tilapia (2lbs+ would move in closer to the sandy shore, no less than 7 feet deep. I believe this is due to oxygen rich environment at this time phase. Deeper areas had less oxygenation. Only larger ones, about 3lbs+ were the closest to shore. Smaller ones were found near the rocky jetties, hammering every remaining offering bits as the lines were pulled in.

3. The stronger the wind, the closer the migratory paths gotten to the shore. I should have taken a few photos of the migratory paths for documentation, but we were so hung up on hauling out the bodies. They were amazing. Lower wind speeds during the early morning presented the migratory zones much further from shore, possibly for feeding, and moving closer to shore before day breaks to enjoy the highly oxygenated environment.

4. Fully absent of tilapia in the isolated marina area. 12 of us gave it a test trial, and fanned the entire area, from the jetties, to the clubhouse. Not even a nibble. Whatever small bodies we hauled out of the deep areas, we tossed them into the shallow marina. All those small ones scrambled to flee back out into the deeper area. You could see them riding the surface of the water, and not at the bottom, risking themselves from the aerial attacks from above (low DO content near sand bed). Pretty need to see pelicans dive-bombed those small ones. One actually hauled out a huge tilapia 40 feet from us, but lost it in mid flight.

So, we can't rule out windy conditions that tilapia known for disliking in this lake. This lake is completely eccentric to the rest of the world's waters. If your wife don't like the heat, try to make it there as early as possible. 4AM was the perfect time for the guy that was there. He was heading home around 10AM, as the heat was reaching 89°F, with a full cooler. He indicated the bite was already hot as he arrived.

[Natural Lefty]

I agree that the Salton Sea is a really unique, strange fishery, Leo. Thanks for your observations. It sounds like the big ones did come close to shore when you were there. When Eunice and I were there, smaller ones were all close to shore around the rocks. I do think that oxygen content is a big issue there, even for Tilapia. The lack of oxygen was I believe determined to be the main reason that the other species died out, especially during breeding when the babies couldn't hatch. Salinity was the other big issue.

We saw one or two Pelicans there also, but didn't see them catch anything.

[The Fishing Queen]

Robert, very nice report! I can't believe you two caught 36 tilapia in 3 hours. I love the picture of Eunice with fish action. She looked like a pro, lol.... Looks like a fun trip and I am happy that you got out to fish. A good way to release the stress. Thanks for sharing your story and I enjoyed reading it.