Lake Wohlford 1/16
Ever notice how you see plenty of earthworms around the garden except when you need some to take fishing? Every spring weed-pull they come wiggling out of the dandelion roots. I try to keep them in a container with potting soil and cornmeal inside the refrigerator but they don’t last long. Yesterday I dug around their usual haunts and found not one.
I hit the road in search of the slimy squirmers. First was the Sports Authority, they have no live or frozen bait like Sport Chalet does but the latter is thirty miles from me. At the liquor store in Lake Elsinore their worm cooler was empty. Next stop was the bait and tackle shop on the south side of town, where they always have fine quality baby ‘crawlers. A sign of the times, that place went the way of its next-door neighbor Do-It Center, closed and empty.
Alas Wal-Mart on Grape Street remained faithful with a freshly stocked fridge full of nightcrawlers and even smaller trout and bluegill worms. It is rare to find the perfect size worm for trout. ‘Crawlers are too big and redworms are too small. The bad news was the only two cans available of the nice size were wilted dead.
I went through a few containers of nightcrawlers to select the smallest available but size didn’t really matter because I was taking them to Lake Wohlford, where the authorities have planted hatchery trout from Nebraska, which are larger and feistier than your normal smallish California domesticated variety.
After I purchased two four-dollar permits, Chuck P. and I managed to find each other on the south side of the lake a little after seven o’clock. He was casting a lure for a while before switching over to a Power Bait rig formed out of a one-ounce egg sinker, eight pound test and a treble hook. I, with my second rod stamp, was soaking a worm/Power Bait combo rig with a slow-sinking water-filled Cast-A-Bubble and four pound test while casting a Thomas Buoyant with the six-pound outfit.
Recent reports had the trout bite starting around ten in the morning after the water temperature has risen somewhat. I calculated that this information was over a week old and we have been under 80-degree Santana condition days since. The water would be warmer, commencing the bite earlier.
It’s true! Around eight, Chuck was the first to hook up, netting a rainbow of a pound-and-a-half.
I switched out the bubble for a quarter-ounce egg sinker then at nine it was my turn. While flingin’ the lure my bait pole bell dinged my attention. Looking over I saw my rod bending, almost being pulled from its holder. Actually I couldn’t find my official rod holder spike so I did it the old fashioned way with a forked twig and a rock.
Upon grasping the outfit I could tell I was on to a nice one. Feeling weighty and fighting hard I gently cranked the fish to the surface; I guestimated it to be over three pounds. I loosened the drag knob of the spinning reel just in time for the fish to detect shallow water and dart to the left. I backed off the knob even more as I followed the trout’s stubbornness a hundred feet along the shore. It stopped for a second then made a run straight for the middle of the lake. I adjusted the drag to where I normally would while using two-pound test, hoping the four-pound would give me a couple pounds of pressure insurance as I finessed the monster closer to shore.
Not much help in that. I had the lunker just about to netting range when it became separated from my line. I yelled and stomped up and down in the heat of passionate piss. Dam, that could have been my only chance of the day at something besides the half ‘o can I landed earlier.
The problem, I discovered, was the characteristic of the combo rig. The way it is tied, you use a Trylene knot to fasten a baitholder worm hook to the leader, leave eight to twelve inches excess line from there, then tie on a #16 treble hook at the end for the molding on of PowerBait. You use an insulin syringe to inject the worm with air so that the whole thing floats up from the bottom. The fish ate the Power Bait, causing the knot on the worm hook to bind, weakening the line to the point of critical failure. The treble is tied to the line that comes out the wrong end of the worm hook knot.
I retied once again, this time only with a treble and P.B. I dug around for my bell but couldn’t remember in all the excitement where I put it. I think I set dropped it near the pole twig then ground it into the sand with my waffle boots.
Next at nine Big Chuck hooks up with his own behemoth and when it surfaced we both let out an excited YEAH! Again the fish fought hard; it took at least five minutes for it to poop out, making several runs away from the net as I attempted to scoop it up.
Alas the fish swam over the submerged net; I lifted it out with a cheer. After disgorging the hook, Chuck hung the big fatty on the electronic scale where it registered a whopping three pounds two ounces.
We fished until noon-thirty bit had no noticeable hits on any bait or lure.
Across the lake at the Wohlford Café, the burgers and beer tasted really delicious. After dining I traded one of the four half-gallon frozen water milk jugs I had in my ice chest for Chuck’s small trout so that I could have dinner and he could keep his fish cool for the twenty-minute ride home. He basically tossed the fish into his truck bed and laid the bottle over the top. I got to thinking, maybe that’s the way to ensure you will catch something, don’t bring a bag, ice or a cooler with you to transport home the fish -- it could be a jinx.
*****
This is a So. Cal. marine sportfishing survey by the DFG from 1964. There are a few interesting photos within. My favorite is the aerial view of Royal Palms Beach near San Pedro showing a pier. As many times as I have been down there I never knew it ever existed. The last time we went SCUBA diving there, we saw huge schools of opaleye. Fishing from that pier must have been great in the day. I started fishing in 1964 but I was only 7, so never made it.Big shark spotted off San Clemente beach
Black abalone listed as endangered
18,000 bass dropped into Lake Elsinore
Divers begin to chop up sunken trawler's fishnet