CA Davis Lake report from Don Rotsma.....

[jayclarkflyfishing]

Fished for 4 hours yesterday morning and went 6 for 8 hooked.Got them on Sheeps Creek and cinnamon wiggle tails on a clear camo line.Fished on the east side right out of Grizzly campground.Some blood midges hatching but saw a lot of callibaetis mayflies. Definitely my best day out this season.

Rick-did you try midging at the depth that you were marking fish? Hanging a blood midge and a pt under a bobber has been picking up a few fish for me lately.Nothing spectacular but better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick!!

Jay

[michaeln]

Hmmm.... east side. I was wondering if maybe all the recent strong winds blowing from the southwest and west might be blowing a lot of food over to the east shore, and maybe the fish with it?

[1flyfisher]

The lake is a month behind a normal year or an average year. The water temp was 57 on friday according to an above poster rick. That is usually the average water temp in early may. I have seen damsels as early as mid april crawling up the banks and sometimes in colder years it might only begin to start as late as june (as it is doing this year). Damsels come off strongest when water temps are above 65 and weed beds start to emerge the surface. 65-72+ they will hatch strongest, not 57. Generally when you have strong numbers of hold over larger fish in the 17-22" range these older fish will cruise the shorelines in early may and readily grab damsels. I believe There may be a lack of numbers of these typical bigger lake saavy fish and more 12-16 yutes. We shall see what fish quality we have as the summer progresses.
Damsels cant hatch in the water so that is why you won't see many adults at this point. They need the weed beds to hatch or the ability to make it to shore to hatch and emerge into adults. Last year water levels were historically low. So that means that the damsels hatched and laid their eggs way far out there as the lake has come up a lot this spring, and it is still coming up right now. Now that the shore line is up hundred + feet that is all the further they have to crawl along the bottom to get to the shore. The damsels mass is out far right now but will migrate to shore. It will take a bit for them to make the long crawl. Right now they will be moving along the bottom mostly. Some will try for the surface but they can't do anything there as there are no weeds to crawl out on and hatch. They can't hatch so they are exposing themselves to being eaten. Nature isn't stupid so the bulk of the damsels won't head for the surface. Only a smaller number of damsels(the dumb ones) will be near the surface when there is no weed beds.

We just had our first real warm temps this last week and runoff fired up on all rivers and streams. Truckee is raqing. Davis is still getting fresh runoff and the lake is still rising. Best fishing will be when the lake peaks and starts to lower and the weed beds pop through the surface.
The lake is traditionally slow in the spring when water temps are in the mid to upper 50's. There is the ice out creek fishing that people do and catch good numbers around the creeks. That lasts a few weeks. Then the lake slows down. That is what has been going on right now as I have said we are a month behind. You can't go by dates for what to expect, you have to evaluate things by the overall spring we had, water temps and water levels. We had snow right before memorial day and it has been another cold spring. When we have a lot of snow and runoff and the lake comes up a lot that will slow things down. Now that we are getting into summer and finally some warm temps things will improve daily but it wouldn't surprise me if it remains spotty for the rest of this week. It looks like the weather will cool a bit starting wed and get windy. Warm windless days will see better fishing this time of year. Once the weed beds are up and the damsels kick into high gear the wind will be less of a factor. Once these smaller fish figure things out they will move to the west shore and freeman. From jenkins over to cow,freeman and lightning tree will then have nice damsel hatches.

The fish are scattered right now. I would recommend getting out in a float tube,pram, boat etc and get out in the middle of the channels off the points far out with an intermediate type 1 or 2 line in 8-12 feet of water. That is if you can't find fish porpoising the shoreline. IF you don't see any fish activity in close and aren't hooking up get in the tube and head out. If you don't see em porpoising the shoreline they aren't there so get out far. Put on a beadhead weighted large dark brown or olive size #12 damsel with a longish marabou tail and fish slow and deep over the beginnings of the first deep submerged weed beds if you can find any. East shore should produce better numbers at this time till the fish move over to the west shore and cow/freeman area. You can also try the bloodmidge at various depths. Blood midge with a trailing #16 pt nymph or your best callibaetis nymph pattern. Fish won't be too picky as far as patterns this time of year. So don't get too neurotic about not having the right damsel pattern. A tad bigger and darker will do fine. The fish may be slow but it isn't due to you not having the right pattern. If they aren't grabby they aren't grabby. That's just the way it is and way it can be at this time of year. When I say time of year that is of course based on overall conditions (late or early spring) and not the actual date. It is June 6. Things are normally going strong by this time. But not this year.
Also....it can pop any day.
Be patient.
My buddy is up there right now for a few days when He calls I will give you an accurate skinny on the fish conditions.


.....also don rotsma always has an accurate report. But I have found Area businesses wildly exaggerate fishing conditions on a regular basis.

[michaeln]

Thanks for the obvious thought and effort that went into your excellent post, 1flyfisher!

[1flyfisher]

No problem.
I think there will be some good fishing on davis very soon.
Hopefully with some 20-22" fish without maggots but it will probably be alot of smaller fish with maggots. Hopefully more bigger fish now or maybe by fall.
The lake will be improving with the higher water. Damsels are there. Callibaetis are there. Blood Midges are there. There are a small amount of snails and I bet with higher water they will scatter about the lake from the east side mosquito area cove.
Things should be improving. Hopefully the gill maggots and the rest of the parasites die off, but apparently they are still there.
I think Damsels will come off great since they didn't come off huge last year. Last year was subpar amounts of damsels. As in below average. So I guess it would be safe to assume there will be more damsels this year from holdovers. We need some good warm weather up there to get things going.

My buddy called and left a short message, I haven't been able to talk directly but he will call me back soon. He said on my machine that it was slow. He said so so fishing. He is leaving for reno if that tells you anything.

[michaeln]

Of course it's slow. I'm headed up there Friday. It's my fault. That's the reason.

[1flyfisher]

My buddy AL from truckee just called he is at Davis this morning but is leaving. Fishing is slow. He fished bloodmidges out of jenkins from his tube. He got a half dozen yesterday and they were on the small side 16" or so was his biggest. He said they weren't coated with parasites. Just a few parasites and a sore here or there ...not too bad. He talked to other folks as he was up there for a few days. Folks out of cow did poorly. 2 fish avg at best. He fished at jenkins the entire time. Water has come up nicely and is almost around the cow island but not quite all around. So that is good. He said it is cold and windy and he is on his way to my house. He didn't fish damsels. He spoke with folks out of cow that fished damsel patterns and they said they got 1-2.
So that's about it.


With the higher water that will delay the weed beds from popping through as they grew and rooted last year in water that is much deeper now and further out......it may be a bit before things kick into high gear. Hopefully some quality fish show.