Tackle Express Castaic Fishing Reports

With the lake continuing it’s drawdown to 150 feet, we’re at the old drought line around 120′ which means the sticks and bushes are high and dry. While this is good news for our terminal tackle it also means we are seeing the lake at a level not witnessed since it was filling up in the early 70’s. The once rocky, clean shoreline has given way to 50 years of mud and silt buildup.

Striper fishing remains solid with Yak flies and Shad flies employed with the fly-coring technique, as well as umbrella rigs and small swimbaits trolled slowly in the twenty to fifty foot depth zone. The points in the Fish Arm, Center Point, and the area around the island in the Ski Arm are all holding fish of all sizes. Huge schools of 10″ Stripers are just about everywhere on the lake smashing the small baitfish, but very few of the bigger models are showing up on the surface as the Shad remain deep with the falling water.

Great Bass fishing on tap for both numbers and size despite high fishing pressure and falling water levels. The fish are holding on rocky points and bluffs closest to the main lake and the bite seems to get stronger when the wind is blowing into these areas. 5″ wacky-rigged Senkos in green pumpkin hues and dropshot rigs are hard to beat.

The Oxblood and Morning Dawn patterns are working better in the stained water or mud lines, and I switch to the more translucent colors like Neptune Shad, Watermelon Candy and Purple Smoke in the clearer areas. Netting Shad for bait remains difficult as the falling water is keeping them off the bank for now. Hopefully they will come shallow when the lake stabilizes in a month or two.

Not much change this week as water levels continue to fall. The quality Bass are holding a little deeper now, mostly on rocky main-lake points and bluffs in the fifteen to twenty foot depth zone. Dropshot rigs, Ned rigs and finesse Carolina rigs are all working with the C-rig appealing to the bigger fish. We are focused on areas that have a little wind blowing into them. Stay away from areas that have wake boat waves crashing into them. The Bass have a hard time adjusting their swim bladders to the rebounding waves and will suspend or leave the area completely. Netting Shad for bait remains difficult as the falling water is keeping them off the bank for now.

The C3 Baits/Carolina Rig combo is tough to beat as the weeds start to grow in around the swim beach area and Eastern shoreline. C3 Baits Shimmys and Jobus in Oxblood and Neptune Shad continue to get hammered on the inside and outside weed edges by quality Largemouth of all sizes, with the average fish being around two pounds.