CA Delta 02-23-2020

I haven't been out on the Delta for going on 5 months, but with the weather warming up and the most recent tournaments kicking out some above average weights I decided to give it a try. I launched out of B&W resort and marina at 6:30 am and decided to run north towards beaver slough. The weather was calm with the water temp starting out at a chilly 53 degrees. I knew that beaver slough had a lot of flooded wood around the banks and those big pre-spawn females like to hold next to the wood in the spring so I decided to start out there. The tide was almost topped out and was going to begin to fall within the next hour. So I started out throwing a red craw colored squarebill. Fishing it parallel to the rock banks and reeling it slow enough to keep it just over the grass but fast enough to still get a reaction strike. I caught my first fish at 08:45 and got on a little flurry on one section of bank till about 10 am catching numbers of small fish and having a couple of bigger followers that wouldn't commit. I decided with the tide dropping and the bigger fish being a little less keen with reaction baits to move out a little deeper with a jig and a texas rigged craw. I got bit almost immediately by a solid 5 pound class fish and the next cast I got thumped again but missed it. I stayed on that stretch of bank till around 12 pm catching multiple 1-2 pound keepers but nothing quite as big as the first fish. With the sun out and the weather warming, I decided to go to the back of the slough and look around for some fish moving up early, because "why not" 🤷🏼‍♂️ the warmest water I found was 59.3 and saw a few buck bass cruising around. I decided to move from there, out to some deeper grass and any kind of abnormalities on the bank that a big pre-spawn female might move up on to feed. On her way back to her spawning grounds. I flipped and cranked some laydowns with little to no success but was able to get a little bit of an idea of what stage the fish were in on that section of the delta. I got off the water at 2 pm, I caught all my fish on a craw color/imitation, granted I didn't try throwing a shad or bluegill color imitation but I think I am going to give that a go next time I go out. The weather is looking good for the rest of the week with a couple of days pushing 80 degrees on the schedule but by the weekend we are looking at a slight drop in overnight lows and a chance for rain on Sunday. I know it doesn't seem like much but with Florida strain largemouth you never really know what will make these fish shutdown. Until next time remember to live fast and catch bass🤘