Delta Mini-Report

[Bob Young]

I've just returned from fishing the ebb tide in the east Delta. It was such a nice day that it seemed that on the water was where one shouild be regardless of the fishes cooperating. I did manage a couple of 20 inch stripers and a small LM. I didn't mark anything so the catching came after blind casting near the end of 14 mile slough. I previously tied a few Pulgisi style flies so another reason to be there was to see how these creations worked. They looked great and I see why Jerry and Strumer are fans. Now, so am I. Bob

[Sturmer White]

Hey Bob
Just wait till the warm water starts. Bass love bluegills,Hang on with both hands.
I can't wait.
Sturm

[JerryInLodi]

I went out today after work for a couple of hours but went with the giant chartreuse woolly bugger. Stuck two 20 inchers just inside Potato Slough at the first set of flats off the San Joaquin. Same situation as you Bob, I did not graph a single fish but caught the two casting blind to rips coming off points on the beginning of an incoming.

Love those bluegill style flies though!

[davkrat]

Do you guys fish from boats or from shore? I work all summer in the Delta pretty much see every single inch of it every other year. I drive boats all day at work but don't have a nice boat for my own personal use. Anywhere you could recomend to attempt from shore. It's a bummer to spend all day on the water and not get to fish it.

[JerryInLodi]

Dave, do you have anything that floats, float tube, kayak, etc. If a float tube take a look at the access off Eight Mile Road. The levees are accessable and the water is small water, suitable for float tubing.

Warning, make sure you can watch your car while in the water if you park it away from a marina. Break-ins are the rule rather than the exception.

The amount of water you could actually fish from the shore is minimal. As you're aware, the delta is pretty much surrounded by levees and there is no interior apron where you can lay out a back cast. Casting from the top of the levee will not work and now that most of the levees are covered with rip-wrap, walking along the water's edge, even throwing roll casts would be tough.

[davkrat]

That's funny I'll be at Paradise Point tomorrow picking up my airbot, got a sweet new Chevy 350 dropped in it can't wait to blow my ears out on it! Maybe after we finish giving our training to the Boating and Waterways guys I'll take a look at the water. I see people fisihing along there all the time figured they were going for carp or catfish. Maybe I'll head out there on one of my days off. Thanks

[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

Dan Blanton told me that March can be great in the Delta for Stripers if it is warm.

[Hairstacker]

davkrat, you've seen practically every inch of the Delta but you don't fish it?!? Holy mackerel! You don't know what you're missing! You have got to get some kind of watercraft this summer so you can get out there and experience some world-class topwater largemouth bass fishing. You've probably seen a zillion killer spots and just didn't realize it. It doesn't take much money to find something that will get you out on the water. All you need is something you can paddle away from shore. . . .

[lee s.]

Yeah Hairstacker,
Getting out on the water doesn't cost much......it's the getting BACK that's expensive! :lol:
Sure sounds like davkrat is on the green side of the fence. :wink:
.....lee s.

[davkrat]

From our airboats we can see all sorts of places that are just loaded with fish. I actually caught one a few years ago. The best place to drive an airboat is over the beds of egeria and milfoil because the water is like glass. Airboats don't like chop. Driving them across Franks Tract and the San Joaquin can get real interesting once the wind picks up. You know, it gets breezy out there once in a while :wink: The fish get freaked out by the sound of the boat going right over them through the weeds and often they will jump. One day back behind Paradise Point I was driving along and all of a sudden about a 16" bass jumps out of the water just off the bow and next thing you know he's flopping around in the bottom of the boat. I've actually had that happen twice and have had numerous near misses. We do a lot of kayaking too in some areas but even in our state vehicles we tend to get a talking too by land owners about parking on the sides of the road. I'm hoping to pick up my own kayak htis year to take out on the weekends. I've definately been back 100 yards into some of those HUGE weedbeds and seen some pigs sitting in bathtub sized holes in the weeds. :shock: I don't think you could get to them in anything but an airboat.

[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

They use a lot of air-boats in Florida for site seeing, hunting and fishing.

Being an old hot rodder and a boat lover I have always wanted one.

What does one cost with a trailer 'davkrat'?

[davkrat]

We bought the one assigned to me in 2000 for around $18,000. I believe my Department was one of the first to buy airboats in California. Fish and Game now have a bunch they use for waterfowl surveys and Boating and Waterways have quite a few. The gas bill is what will really kill you. I remember seeing one or two in people's yards around the Delta but I don't believe I have ever seen a private one on the water. I remember a report of someone having one go flying by on one of the north coast rivers last year. The closest manufacturer is in Texas, we had them building us a new trailer when huricane Rita hit. That turned into a real nightmare getting the trailer out here.

They aren't the sort of thing you just hop in and drive I've actually moved towards requiring people to spend a year with me working on one before allowing them to drive it. There's no reverse therefore no brakes. It's like you are constantly driving on ice making controlled slides. It's real unnerving at first when you learn that you have to basically floor it when you get into trouble. If you aren't accelerating you can't turn. Like in a jet boat. People will freak out cut the power turn the rudders and then nothing happens. When you get into trouble you have to turn the boat around wihtout swamping into your own wake and then gun it to stop your slide. They don't have any way to trim the boat other than getting it up on plane so when one of those monster 4' trauler wakes comes across the channel you have to keep the gas on to keep the nose up and power through the waves. The noses are so low that wakes and big waves will just wash right over them. The easiest way to sink them is to "pearl" like on a surf board and dig the nose into a wave or your own wake if you turn to tight while planing.

Here's a shot of my boat from last year while working up on Big Lake with Shasta in the background.
http://www.kratvillephoto.com/images/_M1W1083small.jpg

[jbird]

There are a couple idiots that rip up and down the rogue river in airboats. One of them sounds to have some kind of top fuel engine. Sounds like a monster truck show. There is definitley a place for airboats and the rogue river aint one of em.

J

[Flycanoe]

Hey davkrat, you have a neat job! And your photography is very inspiring as well. Well done. :D

[davkrat]

Jbird,
I agree. I would hate to see the average joe regularly driving these things. I always try to be as polite as possible yet I still have a job to do. We get some pretty nasty looks from guys on the Feather River going for salmon. My standard procedure is to slow down so as not to wake other boats especially those that are tied up or slowly moving. Sometimes people get upset thinking I'm trying to make them go deaf by crawling past them with the loudest boat on earth.

Our boat is pretty stock, they tried to sell us an aluminum blueprinted XXX horsepower engine when we first got the boat. They're big in the south where people race them in the swamps. I've heard the top ones can go 100mph. That just won't fly in CA, if you aren't on weeds or have the bottom supported by the river bottom they start climbing out of the water and porpoiseing. My boat does that at 30mph and gets freaky real fast. Of course when you are sitting on the nose of an airplane 30mph feals like 60.

We do run them up some pretty small streams at times, the tuolumne near modesto is about as small a river as I like to go in. Luckily there just aren't many people in the river and you never let it rip full speed. People just aren't expecting it, it's like someone street racing down a back alley and you step out to throw away the garbage.

You can run them on anything, I did surveys in the Bay 100 yards from the waterline at low tide before. The only thing limiting where you can take them is if it is wet and the skill of the driver. The problem with running them on mud is that they don't stop they just keep sliding. So some moron could very easily kill someone on one of the popular rivers.You probably feel pretty safe in shin deep water but that is where these boats really shine and it's just a matter of time before that yahoo on the Rogue hurts some one. I really think they should be left to people with the proper training to drive them. The way the average teenager drives a wakeboard boat would be deadly in an airboat. I try to do as much of the smaller rivers and creeks by kayak now. It's so much easier to find a place to launch a kayak than an airboat.

[davkrat]

Thanks Flycanoe,
For me it's the best job on earth. Even when I'm up to my pits in some filthy muck and it's 105 degrees out beats sitting at a desk!

[sculpin]

There are a couple idiots that rip up and down the rogue river in airboats. One of them sounds to have some kind of top fuel engine. Sounds like a monster truck show. There is definitley a place for airboats and the rogue river aint one of em.

J

Idiot is a little to polite of a word for the guy Jay is speaking of and we were just about the first to be run over by him . I took my boat into the mouth of a small creek to park it to get out and wade fish . The damn air boat is so loud we couldn't really tell where it was . Luckily we saw movement in the brush up the creek and I was able to quickly back out of the inlet just as our hero comes flying around the corner . If I had stayed he would have smacked into us for sure .
This really doesn't have anything to do with this post but for those interested in air boats think about it before springing for one .

Mark

[davkrat]

As far as fishing there are much better platforms. Airboats really freak the fish out. You don't know how loud one is until you are right next to one. The fish definatley know when you are comming up they jump a few hundred feet away sometimes. And don't even think about paddling one or poling one along. They are basically motorized sail boats accept you can't take the sales down. I pole them around a little when we collect insects but it is a royal pain constantly fighting the wind puching the tail around. The hull is basically a barge too which sits pretty deep when you aren't under power. The best way to move them without the engine is by wading alongside and pulling. I really cannot recomend them for use anywhere in California for recreational uses. I would dread the day they became a common boat for joe average to drive around the Delta.

[JerryInLodi]

Hey Bill, from what davkrat describes, if you get one, I ain't ridin' with ya!

[davkrat]

Jerry,
It happens everytime I teach someone to drive one who has has driven other boats. You don't realise how much the prop holds you down into the water. You know how they say landing a plane is a controled crash, I look at driving an airboat as a controlled wipeout! In deep water like the Delta and in a lake it just isn't what the boats were made to run on which is shallow weedy water where there is little to no chop, never mind waves. Weeds seem to hold the boat down. I don't know if ti is added friction or if they form more of a pillow with the water but the boats handle 100 times better in weeds.

[Hairstacker]

Jerry, me either! :shock: :lol: