Wild ride at San V today

[Moose]

Hit up San V today for about a dozen cookie cutter 1lbrs plus a couple better fish. Two best went 2.6 and 3.1 both flippin deep bushes. Most of the rest came off various drop shot 6” Roboworms. Got driven off by the wakeboard boats about Noon. Fish were keyed on little 1” shad and breaking but wouldn’t touch anything I threw at them.

Was a wild ride heading in. Tried to attach the video but couldn’t get it to load so I added the picture at impact with a wake on the way in. Had two boats cross in front of me and the wakes came together at the perfect time to send me airborne and caused me to spear the next wave. Took a major soaking!!

[Fisheromen]

No busters?

[Moose]

There were but they were so keyed on TINY shad that I couldn’t get them to eat anything! Tried every bait I normally get but on but never got touched. Very frustrating to say the least

[VinnyBass]

And I thought I was the only one whose boat got slammed by a wake at San V.
On a Monday earlier this year I was fishing around the island, down the bank from McFish and everything was calm. Then one of those big Ranger boats was flying down the channel and I could see this huge wake coming and first thought maybe it is not that bad. Then before I could turn my boat with the trolling motor fast enough it slammed into the back part of my boat and water was everywhere. I was shocked how much water into my boat and me. I never mentioned it, but I was not too happy. Anyway, I survived and continued to catch fish. Still do not understand how McFish's boat further down the bank was not capsized. (I guess that hidden"M. Long" bait tank kept his boat afloat....ha ha)
Anyway....thanks for the report and glad you survived that wild ride.
Tight lines always.

[Moose]

The wakeboard boats have been insane out there this year. I really hate that they have the whole lake but insist on running right by the boats fishing. Sometimes not even a long cast away! Really irks me.

[Mcfish]

The best part of retirement..I don't fish the weekends! I've had a place in Parker on the river for 40 years, the stupidity I've seen by the wakeboarders and recreational boaters is beyond belief! I've rescued dozens of boaters and witnessed people dying because of the recklessness of boaters and impaired drivers! The breaking fish at San V are pickier than the El Cap fish. I think the San V fish are more keyed on the silversides. I throw tiny flukes and baby sluggos and the busters can't really resist them. My casts aren't as long as with hardbaits, but my hookup percentage is way higher. When the breaking fish are finicky, this is definitely the way to go!

[Moose]

I actually threw the bottom three baits yesterday. I can normally skitter/wake them around the books and get them to eat but not yesterday. I’ve got a handful of baits that I usually throw on the breakers with good luck but nothing worked for me yesterday

The baitfish kept trying to use my boat as a hiding place so I got a real good look at their size and they were MAYBE 3/4” long. Back in Barona it was loaded with 1 to 1 1/2” shad but there were no breakers back there.

[Mcfish]

It's definitely not a normal year, all the lakes have been off their normal patterns! It seems like they're starting to come around, but it's hard to be patient!

[Moose]

If you don’t mind flippin or finesse there are plenty of bites to be had. The reaction bite, at least for me, has been largely absent this year. Had a few good days at El Cap on chatterbaits and blades but usually El Cap is a crankbait lake for me and that bite just never showed up for me this year.

[professionull]

Time to bust out the trout rods with 4lb and start hucking tiny rapala shadraps again or start trolling

[KillinTime]

What McFish said. The tiny fluks are the way to go=)

[Mcfish]

Time to bust out the trout rods with 4lb and start hucking tiny rapala shadraps again or start trolling

I actually spent a couple seasons back in the 80s, trolling shadraps with leadcore, mostly 35'-50' deep. I caught alot of nice fish, but it was just too boring for me. I just wasn't cut out for trolling, I had more fun throwing spoons and chasing busters in the fall.

[KillinTime]

Time to bust out the trout rods with 4lb and start hucking tiny rapala shadraps again or start trolling

I actually spent a couple seasons back in the 80s, trolling shadraps with leadcore, mostly 35'-50' deep. I caught alot of nice fish, but it was just too boring for me. I just wasn't cut out for trolling, I had more fun throwing spoons and chasing busters in the fall.

Same experience here, lead coring San V back in the day. The fish just did not put up much of a fight. But you could get a lot of numbers in the fall and winter time.

We used to do good on these too fishing the busters later in the season.....

[otaymichael]

I hear you. Bait that my JB scared up, from 10' away sometimes, was about 1/2' long. That was at Cap which I hit up for an afternoon session yesterday after getting some basal cell growth cut out of my chest earlier, been awhile. Tried top for a bit, mixed in with JB, nada. Saw a buster or two, but not like Barrett has been lately (that's all I've fished past few weeks, except for Maui three week trip just took). Thought downsizing, after an hour, from a larger silver/black JB to the smaller, solid white one was the ticket after getting hit, and landing, a 1/2 pounder first two seconds of first cast. Not to be, another hour of it for nada. One blowup on a frog, and watched a 2# grab the white JB and run with it for a second only to spit it out before I set the hook. Was nice to be out, none the less. Report from three gents leaving was good bite early, top, then died.

[CorsoEnthusiast]

The wakeboard boats have been insane out there this year. I really hate that they have the whole lake but insist on running right by the boats fishing. Sometimes not even a long cast away! Really irks me.

In July while my brother was here we were out on the V with a buddy, spot locked on a point and some window licker in a ski boat starts coming fast straight at us and cuts less than 20 feet off the bow of my buddie’s rig. It’s a pet peeve of mine how just inconsiderate the majority of the “pleasure boat” crowd is out there.

[professionull]

I actually spent a couple seasons back in the 80s, trolling shadraps with leadcore, mostly 35'-50' deep. I caught alot of nice fish, but it was just too boring for me. I just wasn't cut out for trolling, I had more fun throwing spoons and chasing busters in the fall.

I still prefer to troll lead core in the winter when they aren't as active. Yeah they don't fight hard but going to the lake and catching 1 or no fish all day sucks. At least with the core you can generally catch 3-5 on the dead-slowest of days

[CorsoEnthusiast]

The guys with forward facing sonar are chasing and catching schooling fish in open water in the dead of winter now.

[Moose]

I kind of feel like forward facing sonar is may be taking technology a little too far on the water. It’s taking a little bit of the challenge of finding fish out of the game. How far are we going to go with technology? Pretty soon it will be Literally watching a TV screen and seeing live images of the fish.

[Early release]

I can see that point of view on FFS, but I have a different direction. I added it to my kayak when I moved up from a smaller depth/fish finder. I don't have it on all the time, but I am using it to see what the fish are doing. As fisherman with a certain level of history some of us saw the first commercial depth finders which were a couple of red lines. The lowest red line being the bottom and then well, other ones were other things, maybe fish. That was about as basic as it gets, but then we moved forward and with sonar and side imaging and down imaging we have a pretty nice picture of the world below. Now with FFS, I can see from watching fishing shows that pros fish like it's a video game. Maybe it is for them, since the stakes are much higher for them. Also, I might suggest that they are showing success more than failure, since nobody wants to watch a fishing show that the close is "Well, they really were biting yesterday..."

I'm using it to figure out for myself how the fish relate to different things at different times. This year at Barrett the normal busting behavior was different than it has been. I started using my panoptix to watch the bass, and learn a little more about what they were doing. I didn't really use it to target fish, I don't have it on most of the time. When they were busting and I did have it on, and I learned a bit more than what I thought. Those bass were below the shad, the shad would have a more or less contained ball of some size, the shad came to the surface for some reason ( maybe something hatching, maybe some bugs on surface, maybe something else ) and depending on how the ball moved, the bass would go nuts for a minute or stay put. When they were down low, I tried a crankbait through the pack and I could clearly see them move. I agree with you, that wasn't the fishing I want to do either. But once I found them, in an area I spent the time to learn what was attracting them, why that was attractive to them in that area and then when I see those same other things happening in another area, I have a method for a successful deception to the fish, FFS or not.

Of course it doesn't always work and that's the fun of fishing. I look at FFS as a parallel to sight fishing in clear water. Just because you know where they are, doesn't mean you are catching them. At the beginning of this post, you were in the middle of actively feeding fish and they weren't convinced by what you were offering. We've all been there and it's both fun and miserable.

[CorsoEnthusiast]

I have played a little with Active Target on my buddy’s boat. There are fish looking at your bait on almost every cast. It’s definitely a challenge learning to use it effectively. I wouldn’t be interested in video game Fishing but as the above poster said, being able to use it in situations to help study fish behavior is the attraction for me. When I get a boat, I want it.