On Saturday once again I got up to the Lagoon very early in the morning. I made my trip down along the rim of the Moonflower in the dark with my lantern and got set up to start fishing at around 4:30 AM.
Water temp was 72 and air temp was a cool 60 degrees and it felt refreshing to be out there. Temperature wise that wouldn't last long and it was due to be a real scorcher that day. Sky was clear as a bell. Water somewhat stained.
Well OK, I know you've seen it before but I just love these early morning shots... here's another beauty showing how calm and serene it can be out there.
I started out with a black Fat Boy Ika with purple flake. No bites on that after a while I switched over to a dropshot rig with a six inch ribbon tail Tequila sunrise worm on a #6 mosquito hook, weedless.
Pitched that out as far as I could a couple of times and was patiently waiting to feel that strike in the dark. Nothing happening and then suddenly this very strong pull on the line... like a real strong tug but didn't have the feel of a bass strike.
I swung to set the hook but was broken off immediately. My feeling on this one is that a large fish... possibly a carp ran into my line, stuck around a fin and when it crossed over its back..... immediate cut off. This was only five pound line but the fish felt like it must have been pretty big.
After the short lived excitement of that encounter and a retie of the same setup, which by the way was pretty difficult in the dark even with the lantern, I got back to fishing.
Once the sun came up it began to hot pretty fast. The model airplane guys were at it again and this one came flying directly overhead. I've included this to give you guys an idea of exactly how big these things are and also how potentially dangerous should one come down and hit somebody.
The first shot here, altitude approximately 500 feet I would say.
And this second zoom in.... I would estimate the wingspan on this one to be about the width of a typical sliding glass patio door, six feet at least.
Passed off on the bigger setups and stepped down to a light rigged dropshot and finally got into a small one around 10:00 AM. Yeah it had been a long time till this bite but hey!! I'll take it.
There was a baptism ceremony taking place over on the swim beach side at about this time.
And although none of my usual reptile visitors showed up... this crawdad that ate New York dig crawl out from under his rock to say hello.
That was it for me on Sat. Caught one small one and had a whole lot of tapping and poking going on the line which I think were bluegill messing with me.
On my way back to my car I did run into a guy who had caught a huge bluegill, biggest one I've ever seen come out of the Lagoon.
When I packed it in at around 1:30 PM it was a toasty 98 degrees in the shade.
Sky was still clear as a bell, conditions were calm and besides the heat it was another bluebird day at Castaic Lagoon.
Wed 9/6
Got up to the Lagoon around 8:00 AM. Air temp was 64, water was 72. Conditions were calm, slight breeze, barometer had been holding relatively steady at around 29.75 for the past couple of days and there was a solid high overcast. This did look promising.
I did see one pretty large bass... I estimate this one to be around six pounds, hanging around this rock right in front of me real shallow. I tried to sight fish this one but couldn't get it to bite on anything. It was basically just protecting a good hiding spot it had found on the shady side of this big rock.
I started out with the light dropshots and had one really small bite which I'm embarrased to show but it was a sign that the bite was on.
Rotated through a whole bunch of plastics, Ika, Senko, and dropshot worms with no love on those.
Decided to give one of my old favorites a shot. Tied up a nice Carolina rig on 10 lb. P-line. Was fishing that for a while in the excruciatingly mode just inching it along.
Finally got a bite which felt pretty good and I pulled hard to set the hook and felt some pretty good weight on the line.
I'm on..... fish pulling hard, plenty of resistance, this one feels pretty good. Then all of a sudden a give away. Feels like the fish is off..... nope still on... fish coming up to surface. Shoot... turned out to be a real small one that eventually shook me off.
Turns out my solid tug and weight was grass and pulling against that. Never did get a hook on it. Was pulling up a lot more grass and tossing a lot more salad than usual today.
Cleaned off my rig and got ready to pitch it out again to a spot I was hoping to be more clear of grass. Well I got one bite on this setup, why not stick with it for round two.
After a couple of more passes with the C-rig in the ultra slow mode I finally did get another bite and landed this one.
Here's a pic of the C-rig I had going. Two back to back bullets with a gold plated metal ball followed by a red bead and then a sapphire blue cut glass bead. Oxblood redflake 4.5" Roboworm on #1 offset shank worm hook.
Hung with this for a while, no other bites on it. Finished off my last hour with the Senko and light dropshots.
That was it for me on Wed. One small one landed on the C-rig. When I left at around 1:30 it was clear skies, air temp was 84 in the shade, conditions were still calm with a nice breeze coming out of the SW. Wish the bite had been better but it was another nice day to be out there. Another bluebird day at Castaic.
Thanked my luck stars I was far cry from having to deal with hurricane Ike which was ripping up Cuba and heading for Texas. I really hope the rest of that storm turns out to be not so bad for the US.
Also, being that today is 911 we should all never forget how precious our freedom in this country is and give our greatest admiration and thanks to all of the brave men and women in our armed forces that put their lives on the line day in and day out to protect our great nation. God Bless America and those who defend her.
Good fishing to you guys, later............. geobass