Puddingstone Reservoir Worm Bite May 4th. 2016

Puddingstone Lake San Dimas Ca, Worm Bite  

The day started out overcast but by the time I went to the lake it had cleared up it was in the middle of the day around 3:00pm it was pretty windy and difficult to cast a bait caster especially with no weight (fly-lined).

I was switching off between a 4” Regular Torpedo (salt impregnated & fatter than a finesse worm) in a watermelon candy color on a spinning reel with 5 pound Sniper fluorocarbon line. I received a couple of bites on this bait but failed to hook any bass. my other set up was on a Kistler Helium II Rod and a Curado Reel with 8-pound fluorocarbon Bass Pro Shop line. On the business end of this was a 5/0 Trokar wide gap hook and a 6 inch hand made stick bait by Bass in the Hood the color was a triple laminate light blue/amber brown/smoke silver (triple laminates are harder to make) It was my last bait in this color the others were sold.  The bass threw my bait so I don’t have a photo of the color of the bait.

Casting was difficult in the wind I would cast out and let my stick bait sink & soak for about 30 seconds then I would work the bait back with my rod tip low creating very short jerks two or three jerks then I would pause for about 10 seconds then repeat.

I noticed the water level had decreased while the water clarity increased. So I chose a lighter more natural looking bait then I had been throwing with success when the water was higher and darker.

 I had several small bass chase my bait in the shallows but the larger bass bit deeper on the pause, the bite was very subtle but the fight was fierce and in spite of my efforts to keep the bass from going air born it did, fortunately for me I was able to keep the bass hooked until I was able to lip her after I weighed her and took a few photos she was released unharmed to grow bigger. The bass weighed 4 pounds 5 ounces on a Rapala digital scale.