A few weeks ago I wanted to fish for the Late Fall salmon run that should have been trickling in the Lower Sac. I met Benson at 9am (no waking up early!) at Gianella and back trolled for salmon in a few spots. No fish roll, no pull downs no action. It was Deadsville.
We decided try our luck for striped bass and it payed off. I was throwing my new Sage X 890 with T14 and Benson used my Winston IIIX 896 with T8. Our flies were 1/0 hybrid rattle Clousers in olive over white with some chartreuse that Angel taught me to tie. I LOVE that pattern. It is my go to pattern now for just about all my baitfish patterns.
We both caught fish in almost every spot we tried. It was great to find fish after very slow salmon fishing.
We continued heading downstream to hit all the…as Dan Blanton would say…”HPS” spots. We got one nice slow moving bend in the river and I cast first towards the bank. I hooked up immediately to a feisty 3-4 pounder. Benson cast directly upstream from me while I was playing in the fish and hooked up to something SOLID. That fish took him around the boat a couple of times and then settled in for a tug of war with the Winston.
This fish was Benson’s PB for stripers on a fly. It was 37 inches long.
We called it quits so we could end the day on a high note! We were off the river at 1pm.
