The first time I ever fished the San Joaquin River was in its pristine Middle Fork, high in the Sierra Nevada in the Devils Postpile National Monument, when I was 10-years-old. While hiking with my aunt Alicerae, I pulled my … Continued
No fish gets me more excited than steelhead, whether I catch these often-elusive fish on a river or on a reservoir. I love their hard strikes, their unpredictable and often spectacular battles, and the beautiful photo targets they make after you … Continued
The opening of California’s recreational ocean salmon season from Point Arena to Pigeon Point on the first Saturday in April has been a fond tradition for anglers for many years — but it won’t happen this year, due to low … Continued
Wade Sinnen, CDFW environmental scientist, speaks at the salmon fishery information meeting in Santa Rosa on March 1. Photo by DAN BACHER, Fish Sniffer Staff. There is no doubt there will be ocean and inland recreational fishing seasons targeting Sacramento … Continued
It’s was more than 40 years ago, but for some reason I remember the comment like the conversation took place yesterday. I was probably 7 years old and my dad was talking about hunting over a cup of coffee with … Continued
If you want to catch landlocked steelhead, Thermalito Afterbay on the Feather River will be the place to go this season. The California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) has already planted 150,000 Feather River steelhead in the Thermalito … Continued
It’s official; a new record for the number of steelhead returning to the Mokelumne River Fish Hatchery in one season has been set. The hatchery has received 530 adults and 638 juveniles this year to date, a total of 1,168 … Continued
There couldn’t be a bigger difference between January 2017 and January 2018 on the American River below Nimbus Dam. Last winter, high flows ranging from 15,000 cfs to 80,000 cfs were raging down the river as record snow and rain hit the … Continued
The final couple of weeks of the 2017 salmon season produced surprisingly good fishing for late fall Chinook salmon in the Sacramento River in the Jelly’s Ferry and Red Bluff areas – and for those targeting steelhead as a record … Continued
Our plugs bristled with big keenly sharp treble hooks, so it seemed counter intuitive to think that you had to “let the fish eat” in order to get a decent hookset, but that’s exactly what you had to do. Doing … Continued