Around 1970 we started float tubing on Lake Solano west of Davis and Winters and just below Lake Berryessa. It was my brother Dick, George Farrell, Galen Geller and some others from the Davis Flyfishers.

Actually we found out that Chuck Campana and Neil Hansen had been fishing there even before then.

We had those old round float tubes and sometimes we would put in above the camp ground and float down into the lake.

Around 1:00pm there was a big Callibaetis mayfly hatch for an hour or so. We used an Adams, Blue Dun or a Red Quill #16 standard dry on 6x tippet. Then we learned from Neil Hansen one day that we could be throwing nymphs at them too. We used a standard #16 Hares Ear nymph on 5x tippet until we pumped the stomach of some later. We started using a pale olive dubbing with a very dark wing case.

I don't think those hatches are still going that strong but in the summer you might take a look for rising fish on all that flat water from noon on if it is not windy?

From there we next moved to Lake McCumber and Manzanita east of Redding on Hwy 44 in the mid-'70s.



Lake McCumber in the mid-'70s