It looks to me like the USGS PC flow report is stuck again. The flow graph has been too steady over the last week. Has anybody been out there to verify? Would appreciate some feedback as I am thinking about giving the creek one more try before shutting down to give the fish room to spawn.
I fished the creek today for the first time in a couple of months. Parked at access 3 and fished upstream, water was as low as I can remember seeing it. Caught a bunch of little dinks, the creek seems to be absolutely full of them. Nothing bigger than 10 inches. One monster swam by my feet in the rock garden and got the heart pumping a bit.
Had a couple of bad experiences with other anglers. I got to the creek about 9:30 and there were no other cars in sight. Started fishing the hole at access 3 right by the parking lot, literally 5 minutes later a guy arrives and says he's going to drop in above me if that's ok....sure I said...and he drops in 20 feet above me into the same run! There isn't another person on the creek and this guy is fishing right on top of me!
Later in the day upstream another guy wades right through the run I'm fishing.
It wouldn't be so bad if it had been crowded but it was pretty quiet out there.
Saw a couple of fish paired up on the redd at the lower parking area but the top of the red was out of the water and exposed. Not good!
The sad part is the anglers that show that little of an understanding of ethics are the same anglers that will be wading through reeds and sight fishing for spawning fish. I'm curious as to the total percentage of anglers fishing Putah, do so only after the flows drop.
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Winter eats heat the way darkness swallows light. The terrors of failed power and frozen stems are stymied with fire, smoke and white ash.
I can't say whether the flow is correct now, but when I fished last Thursday, 121 CFS was probably the correct flow. I did pretty well landing a 17 incher and 8 other fish. I fished less than 3 hours due to a chronic foot problem. It's possible that they may not lower the flows this Winter until we start getting some rain. The creek flows are controlled by the Solano County Irrigation District and determined by the farmers' needs downstream. Since we haven't had any rain in a long while, the farmers' need for water may be greater than normal.
