Shad on the Lower American River

[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

Have had reports of Shad being caught at Watt Avenue and at Herrington/Gristmill acesses.

Had reports of anglers having Stripers eat their Shad on the way in too.

Watch the flows and when it gets down near 5000 cfs it will be wild then.

Look for Stripers, Shad, Spring Salmon and Halfpounders too.

[smokeater]

The water still looks really high, are people fishing from boats or is it actually wadeable anywhere on the AR?

[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

Some are in boats.

I heard that a guy was really catching them with a spinning rod on the Herrington acess side standing on dry ground this morning.

[koffler]

Floated from Rossmoor to Gristmill last night and got into the shad - flows are still ripping along and almost missed my take out. I'll probably wait a bit longer to float again when the flows come down cause looking back I don't know how smart it was to take the boat out. All the fish came on a pink shad fly.

[Ed Wahl]

I saw the skunk at Watt ave yesterday evening, but there were a couple guys in a drift boat just beating up on 'em.

[smokeater]

I am sort of conflicted about even mentioning it, but I have been out on the AR a couple of times this weekend for shad, and yes there are shad in the river, and yes even at high flows it is fishable. With the flows scheduled to come down this week I think it will only get better. The worst I could say about both days I went out was that it was really hit and miss. Not the typical bump bump SLAM! you would normally encounter. Just a few fish here and there striking out of nowhere. I think I averaged about ten fish for every three hours I was out. Happy hunting.......and save a few for me.