We got up around 5:00 a.m. and headed down to the marina and they had netted a full tank of shad by 5:45. We headed out and within 20 minutes I was hooked up on the first bass while flylining a live shad into a flooded tree. I lipped him in and weighed him at 2#'s 4 ounces. I wanted to get him back in the water quick, and unfortunately too quick as I forgot to take a pic. But we though well that's only the first fish, we'll get a pic of the next one. Nope, that was the last fish. DOH! We moved around the lake and came up on quite a few fish I saw some larger ones lazing around a foot below the surface around 30 feet off the bow and tried casting past them and bringing it right to them....nothing. They just didn't want any part of it. We headed in around 9:30 to Drop off Tim's nephew who had to take off, but by the time we got back and decided to rent a slip, it was getting to be 11:00, so we went back to the campsite to grab a bite and go for the afternoon bite.

Rebecca and I headed out later on to try trolling for trout around the dam for an hour for nill and decided to head back as the sun was hitting the mountains to see if they wanted to try another shot at some sunset bass.

But when we got back Tim was down at an inlet just below the campground and was seeing some 5 pounders just cuising in and out of this little strip of water. So I grabbed a 6# setup and headed down the hill to the inlet and immedately saw some big boys just cruising past. We started throwing everything from Osprey's to Spinners and Tim started hooking up on a what looked like a generic white roostertail with chrome blade. But these were big fish and he hwas fishing 14# and this fish was pulling some seious drag, but kept unbuttoning. I switched to a silver blue fox and after a few casts I hooked into something big it fought more like a catfish but I'll never know because it too came unbuttoned. This happened to Tim again as well, so the next hit I had I swung for the fences and would have made Bill Dance proud! Fish On! It started stripping drag and I saw the flash of a bass in the murky water as it turned and the side of the fish was about 8 inches and it was long! I tried slowing it down by fingering the spool and it just kept going, and then.....slack... ARRRRGGGHHH! I reeled in my lure and not a trace of fish on it. So it hit me that the hooks were just too small to really get a good bite on these fish, but that was all they would hit, and they probably don't see too many of these lures tossed at them, so they were willing to play. So that was about all we did, fought and lost about 5 or so fish each and knew that was what were going to get.

All said and done, we had a great time on the water and were humbled by the better predator this day. But I had landed my first Lake Casistas fish, and Lake Casitas is no longer called Lake No Fish.

Afterwards, we headed back to the campsight, I danced with Tim's 2 year old daughter until I couldn't move, dined on chili burgers by the fire with my wife and smiled. What a great trip!

Oh and thanks to John for coming up to the lake and delivering a brand spankin' new In Seine beanie and sweatshirt, they truly came in handy after the fire died down and the temp. dropped.

Adam

My understanding from talking to a guy from HB who fishes the shad bite there at Casitas each year is that the shad bite hasn't really gone full blown yet this year. That won't happen until the fish are fully of their beds and schooling up. He got 15 fish to 6.5 lbs site fishing bass on their beds. Like you he got no interest from fish on shad in the same areas they were seeing fish.

I stumbled on the shad bite off Arrow Island literally like a saltwater bite for seabass. There were a few boats anchored up and obviously fishing shad. I did a slow cruise by and observed one guy working a fairly nice fish. They were in about 10' of water. I figure the bigger fish would be deeper and I anchored outside this group in 18' of water. I started clearing my livewell of dead and dying shad. Soon there were big cruising bass slurping shad at the surface and soon I was on the 7 lb fish which fought great on 6 lb.

After I depleted my shad, I went trolling. Casitas is a great lake for this as there are many points which create spots for big bass to ambush passing trout. Sure enough, it worked and the rest is history.

I'd say that you should go back and do the shad thing again. Watch the reports and don't forget to clear your bait tank, uhh chum, err clear your bait tank. Do so at the end of the sunken island closest to the Santa Ana ramp. You'll be blasted for sure.

Thank You for the weekend report!

John.