The final day of our three-day Napa River striped bass extended annual fishing charter extravaganza.
As always we were casting lures on light tackle to Stripers in the shallows. And always single-shank, barbless hooks and predominantly catch and release but that part is entirely up to you.
This year Seth booked three consecutive days instead of the usual two-day Saturday and Sunday that coincides around the time of his Dad’s birthday.
My three, well-seasoned passengers all said they had a great time on each and every day but last Friday was definitely the most productive day having the most Stripers (50) and the biggest fish landed.
Yesterday Brian did happen to hook up with three very big Stripers (probably in the 15 pounds plus range) given the ferocity of the strike, the massive head shakes and huge showers of spray. How do I know? Because we’ve caught a lot of fish in this size range and what I observed fit the criteria. But for some reason yesterday each one of them managed to throw the hook and send the lure back at him, through no fault of his own.
The guys let me fish at one spot where there are sometimes lunkers and I managed to catch two, average-sized fish and lose a big one myself – that also threw the hook. On reflection I think they were just playing with the bait (ie lure) due to a big change in the weather, atmospheric pressure, windier, colder, much clearer water and little tidal differential.
Unfortunately due to the wind and the timing of the tides we couldn’t fish some of the wide-open, exposed areas where I had found some good fish on previous days.
At least there were shakers at most of the places we stopped at right up until the very end of the day.
All in all it was a very productive and enjoyable three day weekend and yesterday we finished with at least 25 (probably more) stripers albeit much smaller than our usual, average size fish.
Total count for the three days was around a hundred fish. Predominantly catch and (careful) release using single shank barbless hooks.
Capt Aussie Bob
Wombat Charters
Napa, California
(707) 738-8685 call or text
The above two pics show a couple of the Stripers that were caught on lures just before first light.
I need to remember in future not to have lighting pointing upwards from the deck and under my passengers faces. It looks like we are making a ‘Scary Movie’ sequel…