Rancho Seco Lake 03-31-2020

I took the new Pond hopper out to Rancho Seco lake this week to try to get on a few bedding fish. Yes Rancho Seco is still open for launching but it's an electric motor only lake. My Nitro has been down with some motor problems for a couple of months now and since Mercury is shut down due to Covid19 I don't think it will be getting fixed for a while. Anyways on a positive note here's how my day went. I launched at 8 am and started burning a bull shad up shallow to see if I could pick up a reaction bite from one of the big females potentially cruising shallow. I don't have a fish finder on this boat yet but I estimate the water temp to be in the 60-65 degree range based on all the bedding activity I was seeing up shallow. as I fished down the dam I started seeing a lot of fish on beds as well as empty beds. so I switched from looking for that one bite to getting a few in the boat. I tied on a drop shot with a 7 inch morning dawn Roboworm and went to work on the dinks. I fan casted the flats next to the dam for about an hour catching 10+ fish. nothing over 3 pounds but good healthy fish. I kept moving down the bank but switched to a fluke to cover water faster. I got bit almost immediately on top working it fast and erratic on the surface. I stuck with the fluke for the majority of the day till around 2 pm Catching a lot of 1-2 pound bass. This time of year I like to try to get these fish to react rather than try to convince them to feed. Bass only have one thing on there mind and that is to spawn. so from my experience Its more productive to fan cast bedding areas with something fast and erratic to really trigger these fish into biting, but anyways around 2 pm I started slowing down again with a drop shot and a Senko. trying to get a bigger bass to mess up. unfortunately luck wasn't in my favor and I ended up spooking more big bass then I caught. I got off the water around 4 pm and loaded up the boat. All in all it was a good trip with good numbers of bass, I was able to get 12 pounds for 5 fish with the biggest being 3.35 not a giant bag but i'll take what I can get this time of year. The weather was beautiful and it was a relief to get some good warm weather for once. It was sunny, high of 70 degree's and mixed clouds. wind was out of the southwest at 5-8 mph and the water was clear. The Water is usually extremely clear at this lake for anyone who hasn't been. most days you can see 10-12ft down which makes it very easy to spoke big fish. I hope everyone is being safe from Covid19. I know us bass fisherman are going to try to get out as much as possible even with all this going on. I just recommend listening to the CDC and act like you already have it and don't want top spread it. I have been making sure I wear gloves and mask when I head to the gas station and the launch, then once on the water I can relax the mask and protective equipment. I just hope the state doesn't close all the lakes, but I believe its not far off. they have already closed majority of the local fisheries including Lake Berryessa as of today. I really hope this all is over sooner rather than later so I can get back to booking trips because as of right now the Governor of California has deemed it as a nonessential business which I have a differing opinion on but that's besides the point. In the mean time this is the perfect time to clean up your equipment and get everything ready for the summer months. Till next time stay safe, practice social distancing and Live Fast and Catch Bass.