Stripers? Yes please!

[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

To say nothing of the lightly clad young ladies on Paradise Beach.......

[mar]

Meat eating beaver.....
Sounds like a good name for a fly.

I'll go back to shad fishing

[aaron]

Maury and I fished this AM. The schoolies cooperated early on with a few hooked and lots of grabs. No big fish. A few meat eating beavers rousing from their 4th of july hangovers on the beach, but otherwise pretty quiet out. I'll throw some video up later.

[Lightly Simmered]

Maury and I fished this AM. The schoolies cooperated early on with a few hooked and lots of grabs. No big fish.

Solid work mar (Maury?), and Aaron. I promise that you would have better luck if not for all of the poachers in the lower river. Thirty and forty pounders are hauled outta there after midnight, above 80, daily. I don't mean to detract from your catches, just thought it was a good time to point it out...

[Mike O]

Solid work mar (Maury?), and Aaron. I promise that you would have better luck if not for all of the poachers in the lower river. Thirty and forty pounders are hauled outta there after midnight, above 80, daily. I don't mean to detract from your catches, just thought it was a good time to point it out...

I understand that night fishing the AR is illegal above business 80. My question is why does night matter? Do the big stripers bite better at night?

[Fish Guru]

I understand that night fishing the AR is illegal above business 80. My question is why does night matter? Do the big stripers bite better at night?

Illegal night fishing is definitely the easiest time to catch big stripers. It is during the night that they let their guard down and feed aggressively and with reckless abandon, hence making them exponentially easy to catch. It is unfortunate that so many "anglers" choose to selfishly not conform to the rules that we legitimate anglers follow just to achieve personal gratification, all the while doing irrevocable damage to our fishery. Poaching at night on the American is a huge problem that unfortunately does not get the attention it deserves from fish and game, hopefully that begins to change though.

[mar]

Headed out despite Hatch's dire warnings. Kissed my kids goodbye knowing a treacherous journey ahead. Got my beaver spray, hooked up the boat and set off on a solo striper trip.

Got to the usual fishy spots without a single hit. Casting practice in the next hour. This sucks. At least the beavers aren't around.

On the way back, I was just aimlessly drifting, making a cast here and there. Turned around and there's a sweet looking seam. Three casts into it, got a hit.

7-lber:



The boat has drifted 40 feet downstream. Make another cast and got another hit.

5-lber:





Those were the only two hits the whole time. No dinks, no follows. I'll take it.


On the way to the ramp, saw this floating by.

20lbs on the boga. What a beast:



Another nice striper trip, despite the treacherous conditions. Lots of flesh-eating carp trying to jump in the boat.

I'll lay low for awhile and do some 2-hander casting practice. Much safer.

[Hatch]

Mar,
Safety Never takes a Holiday,
I'll take quality over quantity any day.
Good work
HATCH

[Lightly Simmered]

Good job mar, pretty fish. I hear ya on those beavers. They are everywhere, but some are easier on the eyes than others.

Mike O, you are correct, above Business 80 is illegal. Fish Guru nailed it, that's when they eat and get "stupid"... like a buck during rut. In large water bodies (like the Sac, Delta, Pacific, and Atlantic) going after them at night, where it's legal, is fair chase since they have so many places to roam. On the itty bitty American River notsomuch. It's poaching fish out of a barrel... not fair chase imo. Btw, I'd bet a nice reel that the dead 20 pounder mar saw was caught by someone at night that didn't know how to handle fish, but set it "free" thinking they were doing right.

For what it's worth, the rules on the AR are probably meant to protect the salmonids, and rightfully so. Easier to enforce "no fishing hours" than have a warden determine if one's target species is stripers, shad, salmon, or steelhead, etc.

[Andy Guibord]

I concur with Hatch... it is much too dangerous. It has been reported in the right wing news paper, The Sacramento Bee, that there has been a flock of ruby throated hummingbirds raised by Mitt Romney, that have been taking out the left eye of any fly fisherman on the American not waring the current Action Optics sunglasses from a domestic fly shop. They will land and perch right on the tip of any imported rod less than an 8 weight. It is unsettling. They are ruthless!!!!!!!!!