Decent striper bite today

[Stumpknocker]

Dennis and I launched at dawn and started trolling u-rigs with topwater rods at the ready...after trolling and looking at few marks and no boils for a while, we started looking for a place to soak sardines...found some decent striper marks in 60 feet near the buoy line area and dropped the anchor...after some world-class farming on my part (two breakoffs in a row!), we started catching schoolies. Here's Dennis with a couple of them...

It was a slow pick, but we were getting bit...about equally on flyline in midwater and carolina rig near the bottom...they mostly bit very lightly...on one of the flyline hookups it felt like I was wrapped around the anchor...dead heavy weight...and then it started slowly swimming away...turned out to be a nine pound channel cat...a nice fight on four pound test with a noodle rod...catch and release.

We probably caught around 15 schoolies, but we both only wanted to bring home about 5 each, so we started releasing the lip-hooked ones...here's the 10 we kept...we were off the lake by 11.

No big stripers landed today, but considering it's the first time I've fished Castaic in a couple months, and after reading about how slow things have been here, I'll take it!

[fishinone]

Nice job catching.

Congrats on the world class farming! Lol

What bait were they hitting?

[Stumpknocker]

Thanks fishinone...at times I raise farming to the level of art! All fish came on frozen sardines from Gallions...no secret sauce.

[fishinone]

Thanks fishinone...at times I raise farming to the level of art! All fish came on frozen sardines from Gallions...no secret sauce.

I've started some of my best catches with serial farming.

[Stumpknocker]

I've started some of my best catches with serial farming.

Yeah, I guess if you're farming at least you're getting bit...lots better chance at a good day than if you're not getting hit at all...